The best theatre to stream this month: the Gisèle Pelicot trial becomes an all-star play that ‘just floors you’

This roundup shows theatre reaching audiences through several digital routes. Some works are complete recordings or films. Others are live events accompanied by online access. The result is a wider afterlife for performances that might otherwise be limited by place, dates, or ticket availability.

The Pelicot Trial will be staged at London’s County Hall on 30 November and livestreamed in full after selling out. DuEls is available on Sadler’s Wells Digital Stage. Arcadia arrives on NT at Home from 26 November. Salt is available on BBC iPlayer. Each platform changes how audiences encounter the work.

ITA Music Vol 1: New Originals is available on Spotify, extending music from recent Internationaal Theater Amsterdam productions beyond the theatre. Together, these releases suggest that performance now travels through livestreams, digital stages, streaming services, and recorded music, preserving different parts of the original experience for new audiences.

Documentary theatre turns real testimony, records, events, or public evidence into performance. Its force comes from presenting material connected to actual lives, rather than asking actors to inhabit an entirely fictional plot. That can make an audience feel responsible for listening closely. The Pelicot Trial matters because its subject is both public and deeply personal.

Milo Rau’s four-hour play, created with Servane Dècle, concerns the trial of men who drugged and raped Gisèle Pelicot. The production does not rely on traditional scenes, costumes, and a constructed set. Instead, Young Vic boss Nadia Fall described it as presenting “the facts.” The cast includes Adjoa Andoh, Rosie Jones, and Olivia Williams.

This approach makes the act of witnessing central. Fall said the show “just floors you,” suggesting that factual material can carry dramatic weight without fictional embellishment. Its international performances and planned livestream show how documentary theatre can bring difficult public evidence to wider audiences while keeping attention on what happened.

A four-hour running time gives The Pelicot Trial unusual scale. It asks audiences to remain with its subject for an extended period. The length matters because the play concerns a major criminal trial and uses documentary methods. It signals that the production wants space for complexity, detail, and sustained attention.

The play focuses on the trial of the men who drugged and raped Gisèle Pelicot. Rather than compressing the case into a few fictional scenes, it presents “the facts.” Young Vic boss Nadia Fall stressed that it is not a traditional piece with scenes, costumes, and a set. Its structure therefore appears built around real material and the act of hearing it.

The article does not specify the exact amount of testimony or evidence included, so the running time cannot establish a precise quantity. It does show the production’s commitment to duration. Audiences are asked not merely to learn about the case, but to spend substantial time witnessing its realities.

The Gisèle Pelicot trial became a theatrical subject because it contains a stark confrontation with real violence and public justice. The source identifies the defendants as men who drugged and raped Pelicot. It does not provide a full legal chronology or verdict. Instead, it focuses on how the trial’s facts can be carried into performance.

Milo Rau’s four-hour documentary play, created with Servane Dècle, presents this material without the usual fictional machinery of scenes, costumes, and a set. Young Vic boss Nadia Fall said that “the act of witnessing” was what affected her most. Her response points to the production’s central mechanism: audiences encounter facts directly, rather than through an invented story.

That combination makes the subject powerful for public discussion. The theatre does not turn the case into distant entertainment. It creates a shared space for attention, discomfort, and reflection. The play has been performed around the world, and its London production will be livestreamed, extending this act of witnessing beyond those inside the theatre.

Livestreaming changes the reach of a live production. A theatre normally limits attendance by seating, location, ticket price, and performance date. A broadcast can remove some of those barriers. It also lets people encounter an event who could not travel to the venue or secure a ticket, while preserving the sense that the performance is happening live.

The Pelicot Trial sold out quickly at the Young Vic’s London staging. It will take place at County Hall on 30 November, but the production will also be livestreamed in full. The choice is especially significant because the play is built around witnessing real trial facts. Online viewers can therefore join the same larger public encounter, even if they are not physically in the room.

The livestream does not make every viewing identical to attending in person. Screen viewing changes the shared space and the relationship with performers. Still, it expands access and gives the production a longer, broader public life. For documentary theatre, that can help more people engage with difficult evidence and public questions.

The roundup presents performance as something that can travel beyond its original stage. A livestream keeps a production connected to a scheduled event. A digital dance film reshapes movement through editing and location. A recorded play preserves acting for later viewing. A music release separates sound from the theatre and lets it circulate independently.

The Pelicot Trial will be livestreamed in full. DuEls is an hour-long film on Sadler’s Wells Digital Stage, placing performers among the statues of Oslo’s Vigeland Museum. Arcadia is available on NT at Home from 26 November. Salt, inspired by Selina Thompson’s live performance, is on BBC iPlayer. ITA Music Vol 1: New Originals gathers requested theatre music on Spotify.

These forms do not simply copy live performance. They transform it through cameras, platforms, editing, or audio-only listening. DuEls makes movement interact with sculpture on screen, while Salt adds Thompson’s reflections on creating the work. The future audience may therefore meet one production through several distinct, complementary versions.

Artists can begin with material that already carries human weight, then choose a form that makes audiences attend to it. Court facts can become documentary theatre. Historical exploitation can become ritual and commemoration. A novel can become staged drama and music. Sculpture can become a partner for bodies in motion. The source shows performance as transformation without erasing origins.

The Pelicot Trial presents the facts of a trial involving Gisèle Pelicot. Salt draws on Selina Thompson’s journey retracing the transatlantic slave triangle from the UK to Ghana to Jamaica. Arcadia adapts Tom Stoppard’s writing across two centuries. DuEls places performers among Vigeland Museum’s statues, while ITA Music releases tracks from recent productions.

The mechanism is framing. Artists select, arrange, embody, record, and place material before an audience. They can preserve its reality while adding rhythm, movement, sound, ritual, or reflection. That balance helps spectators feel they are witnessing lives and events, not merely receiving information. Different forms create different kinds of closeness without pretending the source material is fictional.