The arts world is facing a Hamlet availability crisis. It is of course utterly impossible to get tickets for the reportedly superb Tom Hiddleston version of the play, running in a tiny London theatre for three weeks to raise money for the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (Rada). It was also fiendishly difficult to get tickets for the recent critically adored Hamlet, starring Andrew Scott of Sherlock fame.

Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet, starring Tom Hiddleston. ‘There happens also to be new Hamlet starring Gyles Brandreth, and it is very, very possible to get tickets for that.’ Photograph: Johan Persson

To compound the nightmare, there happens also to be a new production of Hamlet starring Gyles Brandreth, and it is very, very possible to get tickets for that.

News of utterly sold-out theatre shows has in the past brought out the anti-theatre grump in me: say what you will about Hollywood films, they are non-elitist – you can pretty much always get tickets. But I am also a convert to livestreaming theatre into cinema. So won’t Kenneth Branagh – director of the Hiddleston Hamlet – relent, and allow his production to be beamed into Britain’s movie theatres? A portion of the ticket price could go to Rada! It would raise money for Rada! Why are we all pining hopelessly for this show when the solution is obvious?

Of course it might be that Sir Kenneth has cunningly contrived his Hamlet-famine for precisely this outcome. Never mind. Let’s see Tom Hiddleston’s Hamlet in cinemas.

Welcome to show-off Britain

“I just think somehow we’re bringing up a generation of rude people,” said Salman Rushdie, explaining his decision to quit Twitter. But there’s something else: a new generation of braggers, humble and otherwise.

We’re all at it. Showing people your holiday snaps used to be a byword for dullness. Now we’re incessantly sharing them live on Instagram. And every summer people are positively screaming online about their children’s great exam results under the guise of saying “well done” to them.

‘It's official!' yelled one bizarrely huge banner at a school gate]I saw last weekend. ‘Ofsted says we're GOOD'

I have (boastfully) proposed the term “thankbrag” to describe the habit of those, especially journalists, who effusively thank everyone for congratulating them on this brilliant thing that they have just written. But perhaps the most extraordinary indication of show-off Britain is the phenomenon of schools who hang bizarrely huge banners outside their gates, boasting about their Ofsted reports, like placards in revolutionary Russia. “It’s official!” yelled one I saw last weekend. “Ofsted says we’re GOOD.”

Do they think prospective parents make decisions based on these school banners? Nope. It’s just the new compulsion to self-advertise. I’d prefer a tiny thoughtful sign outside school gates, saying: “Could do better.”

Trucks of my fears

‘I’m uneasy about these proposed truck convoys in which only the front one has a driver and those behind are controlled by wifi.’ Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo

People nervous of driverless cars are sometimes dismissed as luddite wusses afraid of the future, like timid Edwardians who wouldn’t dream of using a lift unless there was a bellhop in it to press the buttons.

But I’m uneasy about these proposed truck convoys in which only the front one has a driver and those behind are controlled “by wifi” (Username: Notcrash. Password: Quitesafe). Oh great. I hope the wifi is better than the one in my house, or in the back of any cab I’ve ever been in that boasts its “free wifi”. Or on any train I’ve ever been on. Or indeed my mobile phone. Let’s trust that, on the first day, the humanoid driver doesn’t check his wing mirror and suddenly see those driverless followers veering all over the road – then check the settings on his dashboard and realise the sickening truth: “Oh no! It’s gone to BT Openzone!”

• Peter Bradshaw is the Guardian’s film critic