Shakespearean star Gwilym Lee is joining the cast of Midsomer Murders.

Dr David Bramwell, creator of the Cheeky Guides series, is also an expert "trickologist" and will be performing a comic lecture on the history of hoaxes, pranks and mischief at Hendrick's Carnival of Knowledge at the Brighton Fringe in May. Here he shares three of his favourite lesser-known pranks.

After his recent stint as Richard III the actor Mark Rylance is to take on another major period of British history in a television adaptation of Hilary Mantel’s award-winning novels.

If you think a play that sets out to celebrate the 400th anniversary of UK-Japan relations sounds in danger of becoming a dry history lesson, you'd be right.

Holly Williams gives a run down of this year's top Children's shows

The Reclaim Shakespeare Company plans to stage a protest against BP sponsorship at the British Museum this weekend

Thousands of children are to be given the chance to stage a Shakespeare play in a theatre to mark the 450th anniversary of the Bard's birth in 2014.

Andrew Lloyd Webber has become the latest cultural heavyweight to take aim at the Government over its education policy, saying funding arts in schools has produced “enormous returns” for the Treasury.

The nights are long, the weather's miserable and you're starting to feel sure that the sun has, finally, after 4.57 billion years, decided it is done with shining.

The Archbishop of York has inspected the final preparations for an event billed as Britain's biggest outdoor theatre production.

Anyone wondering whether Shakespeare's plays are relevant today could do worse than visiting a new exhibition at London's British Museum dedicated to the "Bard", and, more importantly, the world in which he lived.

Last week, continuing my rolling tour, annoying the British public for my new hidden- camera show, we rolled into Stratford-upon-Avon. As everyone knows, this is one of the UK's major tourist destinations (one of the reasons we were filming there). As the cameras rolled, however, I couldn't help feeling a little sorry for the international visitors. To put it bluntly, there isn't much to see in Stratford. Visitors wander around trying to ignore the expensive temptations of every retail chain in existence, while occasionally stumbling upon an old house that Shakespeare was supposed to have been born in or sampled his first doughnut in. Other than that, there are a couple of statues and the opportunity to brave the homicidal swans and go for a boat ride on the river Avon.

Enjoy a three-course meal in the RSC’s Rooftop Restaurant and Bar, followed by a performance in the Royal Shakespeare Theatre for just £40 per person

Veteran stage and screen actor John Woodvine was in a stable condition in hospital today after collapsing while performing in a musical last night.