Suitably theatrical performances by Albert Finney and Tom Courtenay (both inexplicably nominated for Oscars) adorn this bludgeoning tragi-comedy about the relationship between an ageing, temperamental married knight of the theatre and his devoted gay dresser.

The Finney character is rather obviously modelled on Donald Wolfit but, since he and the dresser are patently unsympathetic, such minor felicities as the film has - including a wonderful scene where half the cast of the play attempts to produce a backstage tempest for Finney's King Lear - go largely unappreciated in the face of the repetitive haranguing between the two men.

Both of them are roundly out-acted by Eileen Atkins as the thin-lipped stage manager.