Back to 70s for Ashes' Glenister

Philip Glenister is going back to the 1970s again in a new play set in Parliament.

The star of Life On Mars and Ashes To Ashes who famously played hardman detective Gene Hunt, will make his National Theatre debut in This House in September alongside Phil Daniels.

The pair will play two real-life Labour whips charged with keeping Harold Wilson's minority 1974 government in power.

Daniels plays south London MP Bob Mellish and Glenister plays Wakefield MP Walter Harrison.

The efforts of the whips of the period to keep the government going despite lacking a majority and having to deal with crisis after crisis have passed into Westminster legend.

Ill MPs were wheeled through the lobby and arms were regularly twisted to keep independent-minded politicians in line.

One story has Harrison being told an absent-without-leave left-wing MP was on holiday in Crete when a crucial vote was about to take place - prompting the response "Crete? He ought to be in f****** concrete".