INTERVIEW: SIMON STEPHENS The award-winning playwright talks to Aleks Sierz about his new play, The Trial of Ubu, which is currently at the Hampstead Theatre in a production directed by Katie Mitchell and which features a puppet version of Alfred Jarry’s Ubu Roi (1896).
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The Archive
The archive is a back-catalogue of recordings since 2003. There are now more than 1000 recordings of sessions with critics, playwrights, directors, actors, and other theatre-makers, free to access via the search facility. Search the Archive
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Playwright and screenwriter Abi Morgan explores love and death
INTERVIEW: ABI MORGAN The playwright and writer of the film The Iron Lady talks to Aleks Sierz about Lovesong, her latest collaboration with Scott Graham and Steven Hoggett of Frantic Assembly, currently at the Lyric Hammersmith as part of a nationwide tour.
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Nicholas Wright on Caroline Blackwood and Wallis Simpson
INTERVIEW: NICHOLAS WRIGHT The playwright talks to Aleks Sierz about his latest work, The Last of the Duchess (Hampstead Theatre), which is based on the book of the same name by Caroline Blackwood, and tells the fascinating story of the last years of Wallis Simpson, widow of Edward VIII, who abdicated in 1936.
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V&A National Video Archive of Performance
FOCUS ON VIDEO Jill Evans, producer of the V&A’s National Video Archive of Performance, and Kate Dorney, curator of Modern and Contemporary Performance, tell Aleks Sierz about the V&A’s extensive collection of video recordings of theatre performances, and discuss the hazards as well as the joys of creating them.
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The War Horse puppet-master speaks
INTERVIEW: ADRIAN KOHLER The co-founder, with Basil Jones, of Handspring, the South African puppetry company, talks to Heather Neill about creating the horses in the National Theatre’s spectacular adaptation of Michael Morpurgo’s War Horse, and discusses adult puppetry.
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Playwright Philip Ridley talks to Aleks Sierz
INTERVIEW: PHILIP RIDLEY The playwright talks to Aleks Sierz about his latest play, Leaves of Glass (Soho), a work which explores family relationships, memories of the past and hidden secrets. He also outlines his career and discusses the political resonances of his plays.
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Critic John Thaxter on reviewing in his seventies
ON CRITICISM Aged 77 and still reviewing, John Thaxter explains how he combined a high-flying business career with a vocation as a critic. Dominic Cavendish hosts.