theatreVOICE

Whilst even big names like Tom Stoppard, David Hare or Alan Bennett are only rarely performed over here, Martin Crimp and Simon Stephens earn a big part of their income from German royalties. Stephens in particular gets pushed by the influential monthly magazine „Theater heute“ which prints practically each of his texts and follows this […]

365, the National Theatre of Scotland’s production at the 2008 Edinburgh International Festival, is a highly unusual project. Originating with its director, Vicky Featherstone (artistic director of the NTS), it found playwright David Harrower accepting a commission on a specific subject; the first time he has written an original play in this way.
   The play’s subject matter - young adults […]

Walking through the Stage Door of the National Theatre of Macedonia, Bitola I noticed that there are lots of ‘no guns’ notices displayed. At first I was slightly alarmed… just how dangerous is it to make theatre in Macedonia? However rather than being a clue that the seemingly friendly cast are secretly gun-toting maniacs, […]

Even big successes in the British and Irish theatre sometimes tend to get lost on their way across the channel. My absolute highlight of last years’s Edinburgh Fringe was Enda Walsh’s „The Walworth Farce“. Whilst the press voiced a few nit-picking reservations, in the Traverse Bar even from colleagues who normally couldn’t agree on the […]

It was quite unsettling to hear about Rebecca Lenkiewicz’s fear of appearing on a stage after 10 years as an actress in her TheatreVOICE interview ahead of the opening of Her Naked Skin on the Olivier stage.
When you watch actors performing, the last thing that you consider is that they may be overcoming a serious phobia […]

So, let us weave these words,
The last stray and fraying threads,
Let us weave them into a fine peplos
A dress fit for a goddess. Begin then.
- Hera, in the opening scene of Alcmaeon in Corinth

Alcmaeon in Corinth is a play about history: the fragments that remain, but also the personal histories that everyone carries, and sometimes […]

Like the Finborough Theatre, the best kept secrets are often hidden away from the usual theatre razamataz. Neil McPherson, who has just unearthed another amazing find in Patrick Hamilton’s Hangover Square has proved to have that absolutely essential but elusive quality when it comes to running a theatre: an unerring sense of a good play […]

New plays, says publisher Nick Hern in his interview with me (in listenNOW), are the lifeblood of theatre. Agreed. But how do you find them? And what do publishers get out of printing them?
In this engrossing and entertaining discussion, Nick Hern (who this year celebrates the 20th birthday of his company) outlines how most playwrights […]

The recent appointment of Andy Arnold as artistic director of the Tron Theatre in Glasgow (audio interview for theatreVOICE conducted June 9) comes at an important time for Scottish theatre. Like the Tron, the Traverse Theatre in Edinburgh (where Dominic Hill was recently appointed as artistic director) appears to be re-energised by a change in leadership. Arnold’s first […]

Interviewing someone who has no theatre background is refreshing. The most interesting issue addressed by Gregory Burke was what happens after you have had a smash hit.
His first visit to a theatre was when the Traverse agreed to stage Gagarin Way. It subsequently became the only winner so far of a First of the Firsts […]