Peter Brook is one of the most influential directors of our time, whose productions are a byword for imagination, energy and innovation. He was born into a Russian émigré family in London and, after a turbulent time at Oxford University, he veered between directing West End comedy, new work from abroad and opera at Covent Garden. By the 1960s he was moving towards greater experimentation, with controversial works like The Marat/Sade, films like Lord of the Flies,...

'An impressive achievement' Mail on Sunday'Fascinating' Irish Times'Penetrating and entertaining ... This book is probably as close as we shall get to him [Burton]' LA TimesRichard Burton: star. The roaring boy from the Welsh coal valleys who came to sport on the banks of the old Nile, playing great Antony to Elizabeth Taylor's Cleopatra.From the West End to Hollywood, from Camelot...

**It is the middle of the Swinging Sixties, and Clive James doesn't have much to show for it. May Week Was In June is the third hilarious, tender instalment of memoir from the iconic author, poet and broadcaster.'Nobody writes like Clive James' – Spectator**Arriving at Cambridge University in a cold October in 1964, the young Clive James has yet to find a footing in the literary world. His move from Sydney and three years of hand-to-mouth existence in Lond...

In 1953, Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot premiered at a tiny avant-garde theatre in Paris; within five years, it had been translated into more than twenty languages and seen by more than a million spectators. Its startling popularity marked the emergence of a new type of theatre whose proponents—Beckett, Ionesco, Genet, Pinter, and others—shattered dramatic conventions and paid scant attention to psychological realism, while highlighting their characters’ inability to understan...

In Two Minds is the first comprehensive biography of Jonathan Miller – the story of one of post-war Britain's most intriguing polymaths. Descended from immigrants who fled Tsarist anti-Semitism to become shopkeepers in Ireland and London's East End, Miller was born into an intellectual milieu, between Bloomsbury and Harley Street – the son of a novelist and a leading child psychiatrist. Miller trained as adoctor but then forged a career as a stellar comedian and as a world-renowned theatre...

'Damn, all my cheating secrets revealed. In book form' Stephen FryWhich philosopher had the maddest hairstyle? Which novelist drank 50 cups of black coffee every day? What on earth did Simone de Beauvoir see in Jean-Paul Sartre?How to Sound Cultured offers a wry and yet profoundly useful look inside the mirrored palaces of high culture. Covering such inscrutable characters as Heidegger, Montaigne, Kahlo and Lévi-Strauss (apparently not just a designer of jean...

Francis Bacon was one of the most powerful and enigmatic creative geniuses of the twentieth century. Immediately recognizable, his paintings continue to challenge interpretations and provoke controversy. Bacon was also an extraordinary personality. Generous but cruel, forthright yet manipulative, ebullient but in despair: He was the sum of his contradictions. This life, lived at extremes, was filled with achievement and triumph, misfortune and personal tragedy.In his revised and up...

An alternative autobiography of the well-loved actor and man of the theatre, winner of the Sheridan Morley Prize for Theatre Biography.In My Life in Pieces Simon Callow retraces his life through the multifarious performers, writers, productions and events which have left their indelible mark on him.The story begins with Peter Pan – his first ever visit to the theatre – before transporting us to southern Africa and South London, where Callow spent much of h...

Lucy Kerbel's 100 Great Plays for Women is an inspiring guide to a hundred plays that put female performers centre stage, dispelling the myth that 'there aren't any good plays for women'. With a foreword by Kate Mosse.Women buy the majority of theatre tickets, make up half the acting profession and are often the largest cohort of any youth theatre or drama club. And yet they have traditionally been underrepresented on stage. 100 Great Plays for Women seeks to addr...

Aimed at both the amateur enthusiast and those wishing to pursue their interest and undertake professional training, this basic introduction to the craft is full of valuable adviceThe basic skills that every actor needs to develop are covered in this guide, including breathing, voice control, the use of body language, timing, and handling the audience. The importance of understanding a text and the interaction of the characters within it is considered, as i...

This Introduction is an exciting journey through the different styles of theatre that twentieth-century and contemporary directors have created. It discusses artistic and political values, rehearsal methods and the diverging relationships with actors, designers, other collaborators and audiences, and treatment of dramatic material. Offering a compelling analysis of theatrical practice, Christopher Innes and Maria Shevtsova explore the different rehearsal and staging principles and methods ...