Twenty years ago, Kenneth Branagh was a high-flying, hard-falling victim of a media celebrity mugging. He could do no wrong when he erupted into the West End in Another Country, became an actor-manager with the Renaissance company, a television household name in the Fortunes of War, and went on to direct and star in a hugely successful movie of Henry V - all before he had turned 30. Then the mood changed and the pricks started: too smug, too successful, not as talented as he pretends, a bit lightweight. The brickbats said more about media caprice than about Mr Branagh, but they coincided with some career missteps and the previously seamless rise stuttered. Now 20 years on, the proof of Mr Branagh's special talent is once again in full flow. His performance as Chekhov's dissatisfied anti-hero Ivanov has been the theatrical highlight of the West End autumn, while his Sunday evening television appearances as Henning Mankell's troubled detective Kurt Wallander (just one to go in the current series) have been a reminder of an equally assured talent for the small screen. Not everything Mr Branagh touches turns to gold - even his admirers found his recent Magic Flute movie over-indulgent - but he is unquestionably a special performer. There is a long list of roles - by Ibsen, Chekhov and Miller among others - in which he would fill any theatre and which he should be encouraged to undertake. Mr Branagh called his early autobiography Beginning. Now it is time for Act Two.