Browse content similar to Sir Alan Ayckbourn - British Playwright. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
Line | From | To | |
---|---|---|---|
disfigured years ago in a gun incident. Now it is time for | :00:07. | :00:14. | |
HARDtalk. My guest on HARDtalk is often | :00:14. | :00:16. | |
diskette TAS described as the most performed living playwright in the | :00:16. | :00:26. | |
world. A revival of the play 'Absent Friends'. After more than | :00:26. | :00:31. | |
50 years of writing and directing what is it about Alan Ayckbourn and | :00:31. | :00:36. | |
his betrayal about relationships that can still filled theatres | :00:36. | :00:46. | |
:00:46. | :01:08. | ||
Welcome to HARDtalk. Another play, another opening night and I imagine | :01:08. | :01:14. | |
that when you have had has many new productions as you have, but to | :01:14. | :01:21. | |
become quite relaxed about it. Have you? Know. Never. Writing a new | :01:21. | :01:27. | |
play is always a challenge. I have a huge backlog of work. He been | :01:27. | :01:33. | |
just going to one, particularly one like 'Absent Friends' where I am | :01:33. | :01:37. | |
not at the helm. I have traditionally always directed my | :01:37. | :01:42. | |
own work. In this case I have stepped aside he leads a wonderful | :01:42. | :01:46. | |
young director do it for me. Of course to get nervous for everybody | :01:46. | :01:53. | |
else. There is something so imprisoned making about seeing a | :01:53. | :01:58. | |
production with that your hand on it. The process of reading the | :01:58. | :02:07. | |
reviews. Is that still difficult? It needn't be. But you still go | :02:07. | :02:13. | |
rushed to see the papers? No. I remember the very first play of | :02:13. | :02:20. | |
mine which opened in the West. The first review that came out, I | :02:21. | :02:28. | |
remember it, it was written by a man who is now no longer critique | :02:28. | :02:36. | |
you. He wrote the solitary worse review of a play of mine. I've read | :02:36. | :02:44. | |
it. It said I did not laugh at all. So I just laid down and cried a | :02:45. | :02:49. | |
little. Then afterwards someone rang me and said congratulations on | :02:49. | :02:58. | |
the reviews.e reviews.gle other one was fabulous. I made a vow to never | :02:58. | :03:04. | |
read reviews. Do you still not freedom? No. At the centre the | :03:04. | :03:09. | |
atmosphere around the house. Were people I tiptoeing like someone has | :03:09. | :03:14. | |
died aged she and they are not very good. When people are bouncing and | :03:14. | :03:24. | |
:03:24. | :03:25. | ||
cheering into the run AC which is good. We have to take the reviews | :03:25. | :03:33. | |
with a bit of salt. You have 76 four-length place.In your 70s. You | :03:33. | :03:38. | |
had a stroke quite recently. It leads to the question of why you | :03:38. | :03:42. | |
keep up the pace that you do. You are remarkably prolific as a | :03:42. | :03:49. | |
playwright. I think I am like those ocean liners that take seven miles | :03:50. | :03:57. | |
to stop. My impetus is carrying me through. I have been driven by a | :03:57. | :04:03. | |
small theatre I'd run in North Yorkshire for so long. The | :04:03. | :04:08. | |
expectation there is a new play every year, which I have provided. | :04:08. | :04:16. | |
I still have that... I am going through the motions. I need to | :04:16. | :04:23. | |
write the play. Do you want to write the play? I need to. It is a | :04:23. | :04:29. | |
needing two. It is a requirement of life. I have never been without a | :04:29. | :04:33. | |
play in my body since I was 17. should talk about the plays | :04:33. | :04:41. | |
themselves. 8 Alan Ayckbourn playing his immediate the | :04:41. | :04:46. | |
recognisable offence of your work. While you are the mark the -- | :04:46. | :04:55. | |
remarked -- remarkably. Everybody knows that what you will get his | :04:55. | :05:00. | |
couples that any sense torturing each other emotionally. Is this a | :05:00. | :05:06. | |
fair characterisation? They have gone darker as time goes on. I | :05:06. | :05:15. | |
started writing quite lightweight place. They were mostly McCague the | :05:15. | :05:23. | |
plot driven. As I went on and got to place like 'Absent Friends' I | :05:23. | :05:29. | |
began to dig a little deeper. If you dig deeper on your characters | :05:29. | :05:33. | |
obviously the darkness comes out. Most people inside have some kind | :05:33. | :05:40. | |
of angst in them. If they do not they are not worth writing about. I | :05:40. | :05:48. | |
have explored more and more. I always took the Jane Austen | :05:48. | :05:58. | |
:05:58. | :05:59. | ||
approach. Writing about the people my way forward. He was still making | :05:59. | :06:04. | |
a social commentary on the Times? write about the men and women may | :06:05. | :06:11. | |
see around be. With a player like 'Absent Friends' it is very much a | :06:11. | :06:17. | |
child of the 70s. He could not updated. He would start asking all | :06:17. | :06:27. | |
:06:27. | :06:27. | ||
kinds of questions. Why do none of the women have jobs? To be in the | :06:27. | :06:35. | |
revival scour you get 21st century actresses saying, why is this -- | :06:35. | :06:39. | |
why is she was into him in this way? Why wouldn't she tell him to | :06:39. | :06:49. | |
:06:49. | :06:53. | ||
shut up? Is that make them. Pieces? I would like to think that it is a | :06:53. | :06:58. | |
social document. This is how we were. What has happened in the last | :06:58. | :07:05. | |
30 or 40 years is quite considerable. The shift in the | :07:05. | :07:09. | |
balance of the sexes has been quite considerable. You say to write | :07:09. | :07:16. | |
about those around you. He also go through your own experience. He | :07:16. | :07:20. | |
referred to the importance of your mother. From the sound of it she | :07:20. | :07:25. | |
was an extraordinary character and quite an eccentric. She was very | :07:25. | :07:32. | |
eccentric. She was a writer. Not a play right but a prose writer. She | :07:32. | :07:41. | |
rode for magazines. Looking back on her she was my mother. I thought | :07:41. | :07:49. | |
all mothers were like her. I thought they'd all broke China in | :07:49. | :07:57. | |
the morning, Coast Main and typed away until lunch. As they get all | :07:57. | :08:00. | |
that I look back on my child would and realise I was living with a | :08:00. | :08:07. | |
unique person. If my mother had been a brilliant pastry chef at we | :08:07. | :08:12. | |
probably have followed in her footsteps. But since she wrote I | :08:12. | :08:18. | |
thought that was the way to earn a living. You say she cursed men. | :08:18. | :08:22. | |
There was due to a series of relationships she had, not least | :08:22. | :08:29. | |
with your father. My one regret is that I never knew my father very | :08:29. | :08:38. | |
well. They used to go and visit him. He was a great fireless. He was the | :08:38. | :08:42. | |
leader of the London Symphony Orchestra. My big regret is that I | :08:42. | :08:52. | |
:08:52. | :09:01. | ||
never saw him play. He had given up He said he laughed with him as you | :09:01. | :09:09. | |
laughed with nobody else. If I had met him in a crowd and nobody had | :09:09. | :09:13. | |
told me. Within ten minutes we would have been laughing at the | :09:13. | :09:22. | |
same things. That is where I got my humour from. He was part of this - | :09:22. | :09:26. | |
some other things you write about our relationships. Things everybody | :09:26. | :09:32. | |
is familiar with. It must impart something of the relationships your | :09:32. | :09:42. | |
:09:42. | :09:42. | ||
mother had. In the holidays she used to drive me around with her. | :09:43. | :09:46. | |
She would go off to the hairdressers and they remember the | :09:46. | :09:56. | |
:09:56. | :09:56. | ||
terrible smell of ammonia. But also Listening to Women talking. Small | :09:56. | :10:00. | |
children and not really listening. They're just discounter well. | :10:01. | :10:05. | |
Except that I had everything and I am very careful not to speak in | :10:05. | :10:09. | |
front of small children because they are recording machines. They | :10:09. | :10:14. | |
will play it back to you been used to come. Do you think that is why | :10:14. | :10:21. | |
you're often described as a feminist writer? I think so. I'd | :10:21. | :10:25. | |
New Labour wins world and it was very slow to. Do you think of | :10:25. | :10:34. | |
yourself as a week -- feminist writer? Yes. Yes I do. It is not a | :10:34. | :10:42. | |
big powerful stance, but I realised quite early on in my life that | :10:42. | :10:49. | |
women did not have ever read it lost. The plays I was recording in | :10:50. | :10:58. | |
the 70s reflected this. Quite ironically I thought women did not | :10:58. | :11:04. | |
have much of a deal. I thought I had better corrected or at least | :11:04. | :11:10. | |
reflected. He mentioned that job place over time have got darker. He | :11:10. | :11:15. | |
have attributed that to the effect you had a stroke. Did it make a | :11:15. | :11:22. | |
difference to what you're writing? I was getting darker before the | :11:22. | :11:31. | |
stroke. What happened with the stroke was that when I woke up - he | :11:31. | :11:35. | |
always think you're immortal. When something happens you think | :11:35. | :11:40. | |
somebody has got by a number of there. The first thing I was aware | :11:40. | :11:44. | |
of that I did not have a single idea in my head for the first time | :11:44. | :11:50. | |
since I was 17. I had no idea for a player. A moment of panic came over | :11:50. | :12:00. | |
:12:00. | :12:03. | ||
me. Then I said to myself I have a directing career. Weeks and months | :12:03. | :12:10. | |
passed and then middle germs such a degree of force of new ideas | :12:10. | :12:18. | |
started to come in through the gate. That was a few years back and five | :12:18. | :12:27. | |
or six days later. It mixes all the more remarkable that to say he did | :12:27. | :12:32. | |
not intended to be brighter. Although you tell about a mother it | :12:32. | :12:35. | |
was our only when Stephen Joseph who was a matter of viewers said, | :12:35. | :12:40. | |
if you do not like the path as an actor he should write some. Haji | :12:40. | :12:45. | |
not thought before that that you should write? I watched my mother | :12:46. | :12:50. | |
right. I started trying to write short stories. I was rubbish at | :12:50. | :13:00. | |
:13:00. | :13:03. | ||
that. By the time I got to boarding school my prep school when I was 10. | :13:03. | :13:12. | |
I adapted, plagiarised a famous book. They adapted it for myself to | :13:12. | :13:20. | |
play the comical side kick. They are wonderful school stories. The | :13:20. | :13:25. | |
agreed to stage it at the school. And then I'd have won this | :13:25. | :13:29. | |
childhood diseases like chicken pox. I was stuck in the sanatorium on | :13:29. | :13:37. | |
the first night. Might I middle much of that performance was | :13:37. | :13:42. | |
leaning out of the window and saying to a friend, how was it? He | :13:42. | :13:52. | |
:13:52. | :13:54. | ||
I said, oh that's it. It was never done again. I started playing | :13:54. | :13:59. | |
around by the time I went to public school. I was writing a little bit. | :13:59. | :14:04. | |
What does seem odd is that in that long career of writing plays, you | :14:04. | :14:11. | |
have not being taken by the lure of Hollywood or television? It isn't a | :14:11. | :14:19. | |
low were to you? There are two reasons to that. I was born into | :14:19. | :14:28. | |
theatre. I'm really a Renaissance man in theatre. I do a lot of | :14:28. | :14:33. | |
recording and all the sound for my new shows. I did the lighting for | :14:33. | :14:39. | |
them. I have also worked in all branches of theatre. I know that | :14:39. | :14:46. | |
business inside and out. I do not know it well enough to do | :14:46. | :14:51. | |
everybody's job, but I said me know when they're trying to snow me all | :14:51. | :15:00. | |
bluff me. If you think of the reach, or the money or the acclaim that | :15:00. | :15:03. | |
could come with reaching a wider audience, had the never been | :15:03. | :15:13. | |
tempted by the idea of television or film? Well, I think I know where | :15:13. | :15:19. | |
the power lies in film. It probably lies in the producer, director, the | :15:19. | :15:25. | |
writer is somebody you stick at the end of the title. Certainly, I | :15:25. | :15:32. | |
would have liked to be a French director. A film-maker, whatever | :15:32. | :15:38. | |
they are called. I would make my own films. It is about keeping | :15:38. | :15:44. | |
control. That is one of the reasons that that a certain point in 2002 | :15:44. | :15:48. | |
you bend your plays from being shown in London's West End. You | :15:48. | :15:58. | |
:15:58. | :15:59. | ||
were annoyed that the attempt of one of your productions, damsel in | :15:59. | :16:03. | |
distress, but also because of the use of an obsession with using | :16:03. | :16:10. | |
Hollywood stars? Yes, that obsession. It is very natural. As | :16:11. | :16:18. | |
theatre gets more expensive, commercial theatre, and today, the | :16:18. | :16:22. | |
money it cost to put on a show commercially, just a simple little | :16:22. | :16:27. | |
stage play, like 'Absent Friends' is massively more expensive. The | :16:27. | :16:32. | |
ticket prices reflect this. Management hang on to the edge of | :16:32. | :16:41. | |
their seats. They look for safe passage. If your ship looks rocky | :16:41. | :16:48. | |
at the start of the mast, you must let it flow through. Those people | :16:48. | :16:54. | |
only, for me, they unbalance a play. I write all of my plays as if they | :16:55. | :16:59. | |
are written for a tiny little company in the north-east of | :16:59. | :17:05. | |
England and have always been written for a company. Normally, | :17:05. | :17:09. | |
they are team players. If you look at a player like 'Absent Friends', | :17:09. | :17:16. | |
it has six parts. Five of them are equal parts. You cannot say there | :17:16. | :17:26. | |
that is the star part. When you look at the audience figures, the | :17:26. | :17:29. | |
Society of London has audience figures, they credit the big names, | :17:29. | :17:34. | |
the big Hollywood names as attracting people. They attract | :17:34. | :17:39. | |
audiences to the theatre batter helping the business. It is working. | :17:39. | :17:48. | |
Yes, it is. It is not my sort of theatre. I much prefer to watch a | :17:49. | :17:55. | |
show, take a serious television series like like these terribly | :17:55. | :18:02. | |
popular Danish shows. They have wonderful cars and beautiful acting. | :18:02. | :18:08. | |
There is no expectation from anyone if you do not know them. -- Peter | :18:08. | :18:16. | |
forecast. I do not know if it is a good guy or a bad guy. I wonder | :18:16. | :18:20. | |
what Colin Firth is doing in the corner with very few lines. Of | :18:20. | :18:26. | |
course, he is the bad guy. You get a little tilt on it. It is not a | :18:26. | :18:33. | |
lot, but it is just enough. But what the play to be seen for what | :18:33. | :18:42. | |
he tears. You did not sustain that then? You gave in? I have never | :18:42. | :18:45. | |
directed a show in the West End myself. I have let them be done by | :18:45. | :18:54. | |
others. I have just concentrated on the new ones. For instance, this | :18:54. | :19:03. | |
last year entering our grounds, it is my very latest since | :19:03. | :19:08. | |
Neighbourhood Watch. It is a play that is very far removed from | :19:08. | :19:15. | |
'Absent Friends'. It is about their response from my Joe Public to the | :19:15. | :19:23. | |
riots and protecting themselves. I have already written 76, which is | :19:23. | :19:27. | |
called 'Surprises', which I would do in the summer. That is my next | :19:27. | :19:35. | |
project. Do you mind that over the years, you have never got the | :19:35. | :19:39. | |
critical respect that some of your contemporaries have? You have | :19:39. | :19:46. | |
commented on it before, others have had certain a claim that you have | :19:46. | :19:56. | |
:19:56. | :19:58. | ||
not. -- acclaim. The so-called comic drama test often do not get | :19:59. | :20:05. | |
it in our lifetime. People realise long after we are dead, he was | :20:05. | :20:15. | |
:20:15. | :20:17. | ||
quite funny. Their last much longer. The good play is last longer -- the | :20:17. | :20:27. | |
:20:27. | :20:28. | ||
good plays. They are much more relevance. We can wait. I wonder | :20:28. | :20:32. | |
why you think that tears? Is it because you write comedy, because | :20:32. | :20:37. | |
you write for the provinces, because you write about the middle | :20:38. | :20:44. | |
classes? What is it? It is all of those. The early thing that makes | :20:44. | :20:53. | |
me boil is that people say it is just a comedy. Do you realise how | :20:53. | :20:59. | |
much skill and talent it takes to be a comic actor? Any fool can be | :20:59. | :21:05. | |
tragic and see it -- standing there weeping their socks off. There is a | :21:05. | :21:10. | |
lot of control of physical and verbal and instinct, which you are | :21:10. | :21:16. | |
born with. It is the same with writing. People used to say to me, | :21:16. | :21:21. | |
do you want to write a serious play? I said, all of my plays a | :21:21. | :21:28. | |
very serious. I take them seriously. Without the committee, Norris. That | :21:28. | :21:35. | |
is what brings the audience closer to your characters. You laugh with | :21:35. | :21:44. | |
them, and for them. T E talk about Molly air, I wonder if you feel | :21:44. | :21:52. | |
angry that perhaps there is an underestimation of your talents? -- | :21:52. | :22:02. | |
I heat you talk about Morley air. People see through it all. They see | :22:02. | :22:08. | |
through to the basis. A Guardian critic has likened it to Chekhov? | :22:08. | :22:18. | |
:22:18. | :22:18. | ||
like that. One of my great heroes. No, I think it is sort of a funny | :22:18. | :22:24. | |
thing. If you write a good comedy and you also have a serious intent | :22:24. | :22:27. | |
underneath, half of you is saying that they are not supposed to see | :22:28. | :22:32. | |
the serious intent, they are supposed to focus on the committee. | :22:32. | :22:41. | |
The serious intent will hit them later. -- focus on the comedy. A | :22:41. | :22:45. | |
man said that he enjoyed the play, had a very good laugh, but if I did | :22:45. | :22:55. | |
not know what I was laughing about, I think that that is a nice time | :22:55. | :23:01. | |
bomb of a play. The next project for you, I wonder what city is that | :23:01. | :23:09. | |
would make you think that you have unpacked something else to think | :23:09. | :23:15. | |
about, what would it be? The new one is about ageing. That is not | :23:15. | :23:20. | |
surprising. Once I start writing things there is a lot of people | :23:20. | :23:27. | |
writing about that. In the papers, people are talking about the NHS | :23:27. | :23:34. | |
and far too many old people in society. One of my characters says | :23:34. | :23:38. | |
I'm 120 Isolde my doctors say if I'm lucky I will have another 60 | :23:38. | :23:48. | |
Goodyears. -- by M 120 years old. Longevity is probably my next | :23:48. | :23:55. | |
project. The process of being in the rehearsal room is one that she | :23:55. | :24:00. | |
loved and will stay at? Being in rehearsals with a group of like- | :24:00. | :24:06. | |
minded actors is a wonderful thing for an increasingly elderly man, | :24:06. | :24:14. | |
because of the energy with the young actors. I said once this year | :24:14. | :24:19. |