Best seats in the house for Ayckbourn masterclass
Posted on 22 November 2012
The audience at the event in the University’s Department of Theatre, Film and Television will include the playwright himself along with Lady Ayckbourn. The event on Friday 23 November is open to all and celebrates donors who have bought seats in the Department’s scenic stage theatre, many of whom will also be in attendance.
It also signals the climax of celebrations to mark the University’s acquisition, funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund, of Sir Alan’s archives which are now held in the Borthwick Institute.
One of the Department’s professional associates, Michael Billington visits York regularly to conduct masterclasses on contemporary theatre. The masterclass will focus on A Small Family Business - which Sir Alan wrote for the National Theatre's Olivier in the 1980s.
Michael Billington will offer an introduction to the play and direct a group of student actors in scenes from it. This is the second occasion Michael Billington has directed a sequence from an Ayckbourn play at the University – his previous masterclass, in 2009, was based on How The Other Half Loves.
Mike Cordner, Ken Dixon Professor of Drama in the Department of Theatre, Film and Television, said: “A Small Family Business is an extraordinarily inventive and prescient state-of-the-nation play written stage at the height of the Thatcher years. The continued support of the UK's leading comic playwright and its most authoritative theatre critic has been crucial to the development of our work in contemporary theatre at the University. Having them with us together once again promises a very special event."
Michael Billington is theatre critic for the Guardian and the author, among numerous other books, of the authorised biography of Harold Pinter and a study of Sir Alan Ayckbourn's plays.
The masterclass is at 5.30pm on 23 November in the Department of Film, Theatre and Television on the University’s Heslington East campus expansion. All are welcome.
Notes to editors:
- More information about the Department of Theatre, Film and Television at the University of York at www.york.ac.uk/tftv/
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