While much of central London was high on champagne and banana-flavoured confetti, Ed Miliband was having a more sober time on New Year’s Eve. The Labour leader was spotted at Coriolanus at the Donmar Warehouse with his wife Justine Thornton.
The play stars Thor actor Tom Hiddleston, and there’s been some grouching among Shakespeare fans that the play has sold out to teenage girl fans, but Miliband may have had another cast member crush.
The political tragedy also stars Birgitte Hjort Sørensen in the role of Coriolanus’s wife Virgilia. Sørensen is best known as the TV reporter in the Danish drama Borgen, about coalition politics and a female Prime Minister. Ed and his wife are known to have Saturday night as Borgen night.
Coriolanus offers political lessons of a different nature. A military hero, Coriolanus bemoans the role of hoi polloi in public politics, saying that allowing civilians to influence their leaders is like allowing “crows to peck the eagles”. Prices at the Donmar begin at £7.50 for a standing ticket but Miliband stepped away from the cheap seats and didn’t mix with the throng, choosing seats which cost up to £35 for the sold-out run.
A fellow theatregoer said Miliband enjoyed the show and joined in with a standing ovation at the end, albeit slightly behind the rest of the audience. It’s always important to check public opinion first, his pollsters must have told him.
