After a monologue delivered by Derek Jacobi, the film opens in 1603, with Robert Cecil, Earl of Salisbury, ordering a desperate search for a trove of manuscripts. Ben Jonson, who has the manuscripts, flees down the streets of London and into the theatre known as The Rose

• Anonymous
• Rhys Ifans
• Vanessa Redgrave
• David Thewlis
• Roland Emmerich