This week, there’s news of another extension: My Perfect Mind is actor Edward Petherbridge’s tale about suffering a stroke, and will now run at the Young Vic until 4 May. The Told By An Idiot show features Petherbridge playing himself and Paul Hunter playing all the other characters. The play was inspired by Petherbridge who suffered a stroke as he was rehearsing to play King Lear. At the start of his recovery, he could hardly move his thumb and index finger together, but he could still remember every word of Shakespeare’s complex role.

Derren Brown fans will be pleased to hear the illusionist is returning to the West End in June, bringing a new one-man show called Infamous to the Palace Theatre. Infamous is described as one of Brown’s most personal works and sees the master of mind control reunite with his close collaborator, actor, director and magician Andy Nyman.

More Oliviers news this week: an influx of American stars are bringing a touch of US glamour to the Royal Albert Hall ceremony, with Broadway stars and Glee co-actors Matthew Morrison and Idina Menzel both performing solo. Other stars whose attendance is confirmed include Kim Cattrall, Daniel Radcliffe, Damian Lewis, Petula Clark, Will Young and Heather Headley.

If you’re able to get to the free public Oliviers event stage in Covent Garden, you’ll be treated to special live performances from shows including Billy Elliot, Matilda, The Phantom Of The Opera, Wicked, Burn The Floor, Potted Potter and Some Like It Hip Hop, before seeing the ceremony on the live big screen relay.

London Theatre Cast News

• One of my favourite actors, Stephen Campbell Moore is to lead the cast in Lucy Kirkwood’s Chimerica at the Almeida Theatre from 20 May. He’ll be joined by Sean Gilder, Trevor Cooper and Claudie Blakley
• Game of Thrones star Joe Dempsie will appear in the upcoming production of Even Stillness Breathes Softly Against A Brick Wall at the Soho Theatre from 28 May
• Good news for Bonnie Langford fans! She’s returning to the role of the Lady of the Lake in Monty Python’s Spamalot from 6 May
• The ever-brilliant Clive Rowe and John Heffernan are to join the previously announced Simon Russell Beale and John Simm in Jamie Lloyd’s production of The Hothouse at the Trafalgar Studios from 4 May

Wicked has been voted the best musical of the Noughties by visitors to show-and-stay.co.uk, with Spring Awakening and Avenue Q coming in second and third. It’s nice for the Wicked team, but to be honest, I’m not convinced by any poll that has Billy Elliot at No.7 (surely top 3?), and is missing Mamma Mia, Phantom of the Opera and Les Mis.

Next up is Dirty Dancing, which is having a Valentine’s Day Charity Gala on 13 February in aid of Magic 105.4′s Cash for Kids charity. If you’re a fan, make sure you’re there for this special show.

Also this week, the Tricycle Theatre’s announced the third play in their Irish Season. Pat McCabe’s The Dead School joins Greta Garbo Came To Donegal and Chronicles of Long Kesh at the theatre this spring. The Dead School arrives at the Tricycle after a Ireland and a sell-out run at the Ulster Bank Dublin Theatre Festival in 2009, where it was nominated for three Irish Times Theatre Awards including Best Production. If you saw it, tell us about it!

But all the big news today has been about the National Theatre’s new season. And it’s got me breathless with excitement.

There’s Oscar-winner Danny Boyle directing a new take on Frankenstein, and (my personal favourite) Rupert Goold directing a new play by Mike Bartlett about global warming called Earthquakes In London. Shakespeare fans can see a £10 Hamlet with Clare Higgins and Rory Kinnear, directed by Nicholas Hytner, as well as Twelfth Night directed by Peter Hall for his 80th birthday, starring his daughter, film and stage actress Rebecca Hall, as Viola. Wow.

There’s more: I’m personally chuffed to see two shows transferring from my hometown theatres in Northampton: Eugene O’Neill’s Beyond The Horizon and Tennessee Williams’s Spring Storm from the Royal & Derngate Theatres start the new season in April.

Read the whole story of the National Theatre’s 2010 plans on the Official London Theatre website, and put the booking dates in your diaries today! It’s going to be great.