The show, running free of charge between 1 PM and 2:30 PM, will star Ian Holm, Vanessa Redgrave, Janie Dee, playwright Joe Penhall (Blue/Orange), author Margaret Drabble and Azmat Begg (whose son, Moazzam Begg, is currently being held at Gunatanamo Bay). Corin Redgrave produces. The production will consist of a mixture of music, readings and other performances. Other recent political days at the Royal Court have included A Royal Welcome, staged during President Bush's state visit to the UK, and War Correspondence, staged during the Iraq war.

Many of the participants are no strangers to political theatre. Janie Dee led the concert for peace, which promoted pacifism in the face of the Iraq war at the Wyndham's Theatre, while Vanessa and Corin Redgrave are famously political, both having appeared in the National Theatre's series of political platforms before and during that war.

This also coincides with a mini-resurgence in new political plays. London's Tricycle Theatre is currently showingJustifying War about Lord Hutton's official enquiry into the death of a civil servant and weapons of mass destruction expert, while David Hare's state-of-the-railways play is chugging around the country before reaching London in mid-January.