Search results for ""Nick Hern Books""

The vital building blocks of movement training – a key sourcebook for actors, directors, students and teachers. In precise detail, Darley sets out the exercises and techniques she developed with her own drama-school students. She deals with the vital building blocks of movement training: awareness, relaxation, tension—particularly Lecoq's Seven States—and suspension, before progressing to areas in which she was a pioneer: animal work, contact work, visual spacing, and the relationship between voice and movement. 'Christian was much more than a teacher, she was an indomitable and extraordinary spirit' Anna Maxwell Martin

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A powerful stage adaptation of Nobel Prize winner Annie Ernaux's critically acclaimed 'masterpiece' (The Guardian), premiered in this English translation at the Almeida Theatre, London, in 2024.

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The extraordinary play based on the true story of Nick Yarris, who served twenty-two years on Death Row for a crime he didn't commit. Premiered at the Donmar Warehouse in October 2024, starring Adrien Brody.

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A blistering dark comedy about wrecking the places we love. Premiered at Summerhall during the 2024 Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

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The West End edition of the Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning musical.

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A riveting play about a creative writing professor at Yale and her brilliant, rebellious student, exploring the limits of what one person can ask of another.

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An epic, panoramic play about how the political fault-line has been redrawn. Premiered by the Royal Shakespeare Company and Headlong in October 2024.

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Two plays by Matt Hartley: his entertaining one-woman play, The Wife of Cyncoed, premiered at the Sherman Theatre, Cardiff, in 2024; and Idyll, a captivating short play premiered by Pentabus Theatre in 2021.

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'Feel the rhythms Of your own heartbeat As I tell you a story My story' A woman, shaken by a broken relationship, finds herself discovering love in the last place – and with the last person – she ever expected. Based on Jade Anouka's own experience, and told through poetry, HEART is a raw and honest exploration of love, loss and self-discovery, celebrating the resilience of the human spirit and the beauty of human connection. It was first performed by Anouka herself, as an Audible Original audio play, before being presented on stage at the Minetta Lane Theatre in New York, the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, and Brixton House in London. This edition of the play also includes a selection of the author's poems.

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A play about one of the most remarkable medical breakthroughs of our time: the procedure that led to the first 'test-tube baby' and the creation of IVF.

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'Shisha lounges are an essential part of the Muslim experience, bruv, like the Fillet-O-Fish.' Chunkyz Shisha Lounge is a home away from home for Jihad, Rashid and Asif, a space where community whispers are heard, jokes are told, and new hustles are born. But its future is under threat, having become a target for local politicians. Aspiring journalist Jihad wants to fight back. After winning a competition to produce his own documentary, he sets out to create something that gives a voice to his community and challenges the usual stereotypes that fill the airwaves. Will he be able to create something that makes his boys proud? Or will his dreams of becoming a journalist come at a cost too high to bear? Mohamed-Zain Dada's debut play, Blue Mist is a story about South Asian Muslim men navigating a system that isn't built for them. It premiered at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in October 2023, directed by Milli Bhatia, in a co-production with SISTER.

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'After thousands of years, I have a mouth… So if you don't mind, Mum, Dad, I'm going to speak. I'm going to shout. When I become a human I'm going to use some words. Can you still hear me? Is my microphone on?' Young people have inherited a burning world. In Jordan Tannahill's urgent and lyrical play, they reckon with the generations who have come before them, questioning the choices that have been made, and the ones that they will yet be forced to make. In Is My Microphone On? an ensemble of young performers hold the audience to account, and invite them to experience the world together anew. The play was commissioned by the Theater der Welt festival in Germany, premiered in English by Canadian Stage, Toronto, in 2021, and performed by youth theatres across the UK as part of the 2023 National Theatre Connections Festival. It offers opportunities for a large, flexible cast of any size or mix of genders, and can incorporate chorus work, movement and music.

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'If you not give elephant proper burial he'll haunt you forever.' They call him Mlima, the mountain – a magnificent elephant slaughtered by poachers for his tusks. Beginning in a game park in Kenya, we follow the trajectory of the tusks through the international ivory-trade market, while Mlima's spirit is close behind, marking all those complicit in his barbaric death. Lynn Nottage's play Mlima's Tale is a thought-provoking, heart-wrenching, rage-inducing portrait of humankind's capacity for corruption and greed, and our continued destruction of the natural world. It was first produced at The Public Theater, New York City, in 2018, and received its British premiere at Kiln Theatre, London, in 2023, directed by Miranda Cromwell.

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The story Charles Dickens might have written after drinking too much gin… Follow half-orphan Pip's extraordinary exploits with sisters Pippa and Poppy and best friend Harry Biscuit, as they attempt to escape the calculating clutches of the dastardly Mr Gently Benevolent, defeat the hideous Hardthrasher siblings, and deflect disaster at every turn! Will evil be vanquished by virtue? Can love triumph over hate? Mark Evans' stage play Bleak Expectations is a hilarious, chaotic caper, featuring dastardly villains, preposterous names, pulse-quickening romances, heart-rending death scenes, and definitely, probably, hopefully a happy ending. Based on the award-winning BBC Radio 4 series, the play opened at The Watermill Theatre, Newbury, in 2022, directed by Caroline Leslie. It transferred to the Criterion Theatre in London's West End in 2023, where it featured a medley of many well-known actors and comedians. It offers rich opportunities to amateur theatre companies looking for a gloriously daft Dickensian romp which will have their audiences joyfully transported and begging for more.

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'Hope? Hope, is that you?' Years and years ago, Hope disappeared. Now, she's back. To find something she left behind. But in the People's Republic of Koka Kola – a world of dwindling resources, corruption and corporate giants – what happens to Hope? A surreal and frenetic quest through a hyper-capitalist country, Tom Fowler's play Hope has a Happy Meal premiered at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in June 2023, directed by Lucy Morrison, in a co-production with SISTER.

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This encouraging, no-nonsense guide walks you through the whole process of applying for drama school – including doing your initial research, selecting the right school for you, choosing and preparing your audition pieces, nailing the audition and dealing with recalls. This revised and updated edition incorporates recent changes to the application process such as online auditions, ensuring you have the most up-to-date information. Perfect for any aspiring actor, as well as anyone advising or coaching them, it will answer your questions, bust commonly held myths and give you all the knowledge you need to boost your chances of getting into drama school. The Compact Guides are pocket-sized introductions for actors and theatremakers, each tackling a key topic in a clear and comprehensive way. Written by industry professionals with extensive hands-on experience of their subject, they provide you with maximum information in minimum time.

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'If you can cook, if you know flavour and taste and texture, people will pay you to do it. People always need to eat. Always.' They don't seem an obvious match. Joanne is spiky, defensive, a survivor; Paul is quiet, considered – and hiding profound grief for his father. But the pleasure he takes in cooking – and the astonishing food he prepares – creates a bond between them. When the hotel where they both work closes and they start to spiral into poverty, it throws everything up in the air – first their plans for a cookbook and a restaurant, and, eventually, even their dreams of a future together... Gareth Farr's play Biscuits for Breakfast is a tender, heartfelt drama about families – the ones we inherit and the ones we create – and the struggle to survive when times get tough. It opened at Hampstead Theatre, London, in 2023, directed by Tessa Walker.

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As a gay Lebanese-American Maronite Christian in rural Pennsylvania, Joseph Douaihy has a pretty complicated life. But when his father dies as the result of a prank, things truly take a turn for the bizarre. Stephen Karam's play Sons of the Prophet confronts, with intelligence, empathy and tenderness, the inevitability of loss and the equally inevitable comedy which results from our attempts to cope with its consequences. It premiered in Boston in April 2011, transferred Off-Broadway later that year, won the Lucille Lortel, New York Drama Critics' Circle and Outer Critics Circle Awards for Best Play, and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It received its European premiere at Hampstead Theatre, London, in 2022, directed by Bijan Sheibani.

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'I knew that you could strike out on your own. I may not have been the best father in the world, but I did get that right.' When Eddie returns home to Shropshire, he falls back into his fractious, complicated relationship with his father, both skirting around things long left unsaid. As their connection starts to evolve, can they break through and find the new beginning they both need? Tom Wentworth's Little Bits of Ruined Beauty is a darkly comic play examining the subtle shift from cared-for to carer, and how dignity and independence are maintained in isolated rural areas. It was premiered in 2022 by Pentabus on a tour of the UK, directed by Nickie Miles-Wildin, and commissioned and supported by Unlimited, celebrating the work of disabled artists.

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'You know you act like you're not from here.' Entrenched in her picturesque Devonshire village, Ivy Tiller is preparing to wage a war. Her target: the invasive grey squirrel. Her goal: to oust the invaders and restore the native red squirrels as the 'rightful' inhabitants. Galvanised by her important mission, Ivy's determination swells to uncomfortable heights. Bea Roberts' blackly comic play Ivy Tiller: Vicar's Daughter, Squirrel Killer challenges our assumptions about who belongs and who thrives, and exposes the dark side of the rural idyll. It was first performed by the Royal Shakespeare Company at The Other Place, Stratford-upon-Avon, in October 2022.

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Frantic Assembly's electrifying take on Shakespeare's tragedy of paranoia, sex and murder, firmly rooted in a volatile twenty-first century. In a world of broken glass and shattered promises, of poisonous manipulation and explosive violence, Othello's passionate affair with Desdemona becomes the catalyst for jealousy, betrayal, revenge and the darkest intents. As relevant today as it ever was, Othello exposes the tension, fear and paranoia buried beneath the veneer of our relationships and how easily that can be maliciously exploited. Frantic Assembly's touring production was first performed in 2008, with revivals in 2014 and 2022. This edition of Scott Graham and Steven Hoggett's muscular, radically adapted text also features articles and interviews about the production and Frantic Assembly's revolutionary work.

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John Gabriel Borkman, once an illustrious entrepreneur, has been brought low by a prison sentence for fraud. As he paces alone in an upstairs room, bankrupt and disgraced, he is obsessed by dreams of his comeback. Downstairs, his estranged wife plots the restoration of the family name. When her sister arrives unannounced, she triggers a desperate showdown with the past. Henrik Ibsen's most contemporary play and his penultimate, John Gabriel Borkman is gripping, penetrating and savagely funny. This version by Lucinda Coxon premiered at the Bridge Theatre, London, in September 2022, directed by Nicholas Hytner, with a cast led by Clare Higgins, Simon Russell Beale and Lia Williams.

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'Three options, as I see it – they'll kill it off entirely, you'll let it die of natural causes, I'm going to make it live again.' When the owner of a Sheffield scissor manufacturer dies, the future of the factory site falls into uncertainty. Can it be reborn as a fashionable music venue, converted into luxury apartments, or somehow reinvigorated so the old business can survive? There's more than just money or bricks and mortar at stake. It's about knowing where you fit in the world – knowing that somewhere there's still a place for you. Fresh, funny and heartfelt, Rock / Paper / Scissors are three intricately interwoven plays by Chris Bush about family, heritage and legacy. They were first performed simultaneously with the same cast moving between three theatres in Sheffield – the Crucible, the Lyceum and the Studio – as part of Sheffield Theatres' fiftieth birthday celebrations in 2022. While the three plays can be enjoyed separately, they also offer a uniquely rewarding opportunity for any company looking to take on the challenge of staging them together.

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'If I invited you to come with me on a journey, a story, will you come with me?' When Okumu's village in Northern Uganda is attacked by a guerrilla rebel group, the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) led by Joseph Kony, he and his brother find that their lives are changed forever. Far Gone is a profoundly moving play for one actor which tells the story of a young boy's journey from childhood innocence to child soldier, seen through the eyes of those that love him – and those that betray him. Inspired by John Rwothomack's own real-life experience of nearly being kidnapped by the LRA, the play was co-produced by Roots Mbili Theatre and Sheffield Theatres, with support from Theatre Deli, Sheffield. It premiered at the Crucible Studio, Sheffield, in February 2022, directed by Mojisola Elufowoju, and then toured the UK. 'This play is not about me, the kid who was lucky enough to escape. This play is for the hundreds of thousands who did not. For the parents whose children were either lost forever or forever changed. For the young girls who were forced to marry men old enough to be their fathers. For the brothers, sisters, cousins, nieces, nephews, sons and daughters who lost the innocence of childhood, simply for being born at an unfortunate time in an unfortunate place. For the future generations who will continue to suffer the trauma the LRA has imprinted on them, for many years to come.' John Rwothomack

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'When I look at you – when you look at me – when our eyes connect? I have to protect. To hold on to something, 'cause there's too much to feel!' Four generations of black men are trying to understand themselves in a world which tells them they have to be strong. Inspired by real-life testimony and told through an explosive fusion of text, physical theatre and hip-hop dance, Samskara explores vulnerability, emotional trauma and how cycles of fathering affect masculinity. Moving through joy and suffering, laughter and longing, this soul-baring odyssey untangles what it means to be a black man in twenty-first-century Britain. Samskara premiered at The Yard Theatre, London, in November 2021, written, directed and choreographed by award-winning artist Lanre Malaolu.

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'O'Brien! They've got you too!' 'They got me a long time ago.' Winston Smith is in prison, found guilty of Thoughtcrimes against Big Brother. As part of his reconstruction, he must re-enact key moments from his past life, with the help of other thought criminals, so that everyone can learn from his mistakes. Including his biggest mistake of all: falling in love with Julia. George Orwell's classic dystopia 1984 is a still-resonant vision of the tolls of living under totalitarianism. Constructed almost entirely from dialogue taken from the original novel, this bold and powerful dramatisation restores the blazing heart of Orwell's work: a doomed love story, with the lovers at its centre. This pre-eminently stageable version, adapted with an eye on economy by Nick Hern for a cast of five or more, is ideal for any school, youth group or amateur company looking to bring Orwell's chilling vision to life on stage.

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'It's been a year since I died, and still nobody has found me.' Summer, 1827. In a red barn in Suffolk, Maria Marten awaits her lover. A year later, hidden in a grain sack under the floor of the barn, Maria's body is found, barely identifiable - and the manhunt begins. The Red Barn Murder had all the hallmarks of a classic crime drama: a missing body, a country location, a disreputable squire and a village stuck in its age-old traditions. But whilst sending shockwaves throughout the country, Maria's own story was lost. The Ballad of Maria Marten rediscovers her story, bringing it back to vivid, urgent life. Beth Flintoff's thrilling play was first performed by an all-female cast in a production by Eastern Angles in July 2018. Subsequent national tours were produced with Eastern Angles by Matthew Linley Creative Projects in association with the Stephen Joseph Theatre.

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Two young people and their dæmons, with everything at stake, find themselves at the centre of a terrifying manhunt. In their care is a tiny child called Lyra Belacqua, and in that child lies the fate of the future. As the waters rise around them, powerful adversaries conspire for mastery of Dust: salvation to some, the source of infinite corruption to others. Philip Pullman's The Book of Dust – La Belle Sauvage is set twelve years before the epic His Dark Materials trilogy. Bryony Lavery's stage adaptation was first performed at the Bridge Theatre, London, in December 2021, directed by Nicholas Hytner, whose groundbreaking production of His Dark Materials was a critical and commercial success at the National Theatre. 'Once in a lifetime a children's author emerges who is so extraordinary that the imagination of generations is altered' New Statesman on Philip Pullman 'High-octane adventure accompanies ingenious plotting during Lyra's extended journey in a canoe down a dangerously flooded Thames' The Times on Philip Pullman's novel 'An imaginative adaptation which keeps alive the wit and excitement of the book' Guardian on Bryony Lavery's version of Treasure Island

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'Folk say you can trick a brain. Placebo power… I'm going to stand up and it'll feel better.' Gaynor's got to leave the house if she wants to meet her newborn grand-daughter. Stillness has been the only way to deal with her chronic pain but now it's time to move. Gilly's not sure what her dying dad is feeling but she knows, from experience, that it's best not to Google it. Dougie and Ciara have spent their last NCT class preparing for the labour pains ahead, but now it's time for one last night on the dance floor. And then there's Mick, who wakes up on Portobello Beach in the early hours of the morning with two gold rings in his pocket. He can't remember what they're for but he knows it's something important. He'll work out what if only his old pal, Pat, will stop buying him drinks… Five Edinburgh souls stagger towards each other and are transformed. Full of tenderness and humour, Frances Poet's play Still is a cathartic story of life, loss and joy. It premiered at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, during the 2021 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, directed by the theatre's Artistic Director Gareth Nicholls.

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'Make me happen' Your partner's died, could things have been different? Caryl Churchill's short play What If If Only premiered in the Jerwood Theatre Downstairs at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in September 2021, directed by James Macdonald. This edition also includes the resonant and surreal short piece, Air. 'Caryl Churchill has remade the landscape of contemporary drama – and earned herself a place among the greats' Guardian

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Meet Aurora and Orion: Sister and Brother. Constellations in time. More than blood. More than just fam. They look after each other in their small London flat, filled with the memories of their parents' Black Love. When that love is threatened, they must confront their own worst fears as they find their way back to each other and to what it means to love whilst Black. Black Love by Chinonyerem Odimba, with music by Ben and Max Ringham, is an explosion of form-busting storytelling, combining real-life stories, imagined worlds, and new songs inspired by an R&B heritage. It was premiered in July 2021 in Paines Plough's the Roundabout as a co-production between Paines Plough and Belgrade Theatre in association with tiata fahodzi, co-directed by Odimba and Katie Posner, as part of Coventry City of Culture 2021, before touring the UK. Black Love won Best Musical Theatre Bookwriting at the 2022 Writers' Guild of Great Britain Awards.

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'30 just matters, innit. Like there's no doubt you're a proper adult then. Like 25 to 29 is just training, but 30, it's real.' Tunde's thirtieth birthday is fast approaching. So he's started therapy because he hasn't been able to get to the gym for weeks, and a recent one-night stand ended in tears – his. Interrogating the challenge of opening up and accepting our own vulnerabilities, Ifeyinwa Frederick's Sessions is a raw, funny, bittersweet deep-dive into the complexities of masculinity, depression and therapy. It was first produced in 2021 on tour of the UK, before a run at Soho Theatre, London, co-produced by Paines Plough and Soho, and directed by Philip Morris.

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'I'd watch you eat. I'd eat you up. Look at you. You get it, don't you? You're real.' Lori is a professional chef. Bex waits on tables to make ends meet. One night together in a walk-in fridge and it's the beginning of something beautiful. Lori has big plans, while Bex is struggling. If we are what we eat, then Bex is in real trouble. It's not her fault – the system is rigged. No one on minimum wage and zero hours has the headspace to make their own yoghurt. Chris Bush's Hungry is a play about food, love, class and grief in a world where there's little left to savour. It was premiered in July 2021 in Paines Plough's the Roundabout, directed by Katie Posner, as a co-production between Paines Plough and Belgrade Theatre as part of Coventry City of Culture 2021, before touring the UK. 'One of the UK's most exciting young playwrights' The Stage 'A writer of great wit and empathy' The Times

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'When the barman pointed to the cordoned-off area I was like, who are all these old people at our reunion?' It's been thirty years since former flames Alex and Jason last saw each other. With their carefree university days long behind them, the student reunion seems the perfect opportunity to reconnect, revive and relive their heyday. But as they flirt with reigniting their passion – even if just for one night – will the march of time get in the way? Deborah Bruce's Raya is a witty and tender play about whether or not we can ever turn back – or stop – the clocks. It opened at Hampstead Theatre Downstairs, London, in June 2021, directed by the theatre's Artistic Director, Roxana Silbert. Deborah Bruce's other plays include Godchild, The Distance and The House They Grew Up In.

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'There's a knock at the door.' Fifteen years after Nora Helmer slammed the door on her stifling marriage, leaving her family behind, she's back with an urgent request. Lucas Hnath's funny, probing and bold play is both a continuation of Ibsen's complex exploration of traditional gender roles, and a sharp contemporary take on the struggles inherent in all human relationships across time. A Doll's House, Part 2 premiered at South Coast Repertory, California, in 2017, and transferred to Broadway later that year. It received its UK premiere at the Donmar Warehouse, London, in 2022, directed by James Macdonald with a cast led by Noma Dumezweni as Nora.

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When Tom and Barbara Good decide to exchange the pressures of the rat race for an alternative, more sustainable way of living, they set about turning their suburban home in Surbiton into a model of self-sufficiency. They grow their own fruit and veg, keep livestock in the garden, make their own clothes, and even generate their own electricity from manure. It's the good life for them – but not for Margo and Jerry Leadbetter, who live next door, and are desperately trying to maintain the Surbiton status quo. Jeremy Sams' stage play, based on the hugely popular sitcom by John Esmonde and Bob Larbey, reunites the well-loved characters (not forgetting Geraldine the goat) as they get themselves into and out of scrapes – some old, some new, all hilarious. Tapping into issues that resonate now more than ever, The Good Life is a witty reimagining of a television classic, with a wellyful of laughs that's sure to delight audiences everywhere. It was first produced by Fiery Angel on an extensive tour of the UK in 2021, directed by Jeremy Sams and starring Rufus Hound, Preeya Kalidas, Dominic Rowan and Sally Tatum.

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The essential guide to getting into drama school. Packed with sound advice and essential information for young people who want to train as actors and performers (including musical theatre), this clear and honest guide is written by a teacher and audition panellist with a lifetime’s experience of the audition process. It will help all aspiring actors develop the self-confidence, motivation and skills required to get into the drama school of their choice. Topics include: • Researching and selecting the appropriate drama school • Making yourself the best prepared candidate • Choosing and preparing your speeches and songs • Developing your working process and your self-awareness • Coping with the audition day itself • Considering your next steps if you do (or don’t) get in. Also includes suggestions of speeches and songs to look at (as well as those you should avoid), information about the major UK drama schools, how to obtain funding, suggested further reading, and an introduction to the theatrical terms and genres that every prospective student should know.

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It's Christmas Eve. As the cold, bleak night draws in, the penny-pinching Ebenezer Scrooge is confronted by the spirit of his former business partner, Jacob Marley. Bound in chains as punishment for a lifetime of greed, the unearthly figure explains it isn't too late for Scrooge to change his miserly ways in order to escape the same fate. But first he'll have to face three more eerie encounters... Mark Gatiss' spine-tingling adaptation is faithful to the heart and spirit of Charles Dickens' much-loved festive ghost story – with an emphasis on the ghostly. Commissioned by Nottingham Playhouse, the adaptation premiered there in 2021, starring Nicholas Farrell alongside Gatiss, and directed by the theatre's Artistic Director, Adam Penford. A Christmas Carol – A Ghost Story subsequently transferred to Alexandra Palace Theatre, London, produced by Eleanor Lloyd Productions and Eilene Davidson Productions.

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'I should've seen him. Felt him. Walking across the sand. His antlers, twisting, reaching up to the moon. But the Mariner didn't come. The Mariner didn't come.' Mark and Tiny go for walks along the beach at Seaton Carew, County Durham. Their dad is dying, and their town is crumbling. Family rifts and political divides try to pull them apart, and a figure made of driftwood stalks the shore at night. Tim Foley's Driftwood is an intoxicating and mystical play about love, belonging and the tides within us. It was premiered in 2023 by Pentabus and ThickSkin on a tour of the UK, co-directed by Neil Bettles and Elle While.

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García Lorca's drama about the shattering effects of emotional repression on a family of cloistered daughters, in a version by playwright Rona Munro for the critically acclaimed Shared Experience Theatre Company. When Bernarda's husband dies, she locks all the doors and windows. She tells her grown-up daughers to sew and be silent. 'There are eight years of mourning ahead of us. While it lasts not even the wind will get into this house.' But locks can't hold back the growing tide of desire... Rona Munro's version of The House of Bernarda Alba was first staged by Shared Experience Theatre Company at Salisbury Playhouse in March 1999 before a UK tour.

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Mike Kenny's imaginative stage adaptation of E. Nesbit's much-loved children's classic. Famously filmed, this story of a prosperous Edwardian family - mother and three children - forced into near-penury in the rural north of England captures the anxieties and exhilarations of childhood with great tenderness and insight. As Mike Kenny says of his remarkably faithful adaptation, 'You don't need a real train to perform this play… the most powerful prop is the imagination of the audience, the most effective tool the skill of the actors.' So this version of The Railway Children, which offers three plum roles for young performers, is eminently suitable for schools, youth theatres and drama groups - anywhere, in fact, where the cry of 'Daddy! My Daddy!' is likely to provoke a tear. Mike Kenny's version of The Railway Children was first staged at the National Railway Museum in York in 2008, before receiving a major production at Waterloo Station in London in 2010.

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A darkly humorous play about the people behind the tabloid stories of migrant workers and sex-trafficking in today's Europe. The first play in English by an award-winning writer who is well-known in her native Croatia. London 2007: an aspiring actress from Croatia, a Serbian stand-up comedian, a Bulgarian mafioso, a Norwegian journalist, a sex-trafficking victim... Big city, big dreams, big fall. Tena Štivičić's play Fragile! was first performed at the Arcola Theatre, London, in September 2007.

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Caryl Churchill's spare and resonant version of Strindberg's enigmatic masterpiece. Written in 1901, a mysterious amalgam of Freud, Alice in Wonderland and Strindberg's own private symbolism, A Dream Play follows the logic of a dream: A young woman comes from another world to see if life is really as difficult as people make it out to be. Characters merge into each other, locations change in an instant and a locked door becomes an obsessive recurrent image. As Strindberg wrote in his preface, he wanted 'to imitate the disjointed yet seemingly logical shape of a dream. Everything can happen, everything is possible and probable. Time and place do not exist.' This version of A Dream Play, from a literal translation by Charlotte Barslund, is by leading playwright Caryl Churchill. It was first performed in the Cottesloe auditorium of the National Theatre, London, in February 2005, in a production directed by Katie Mitchell, with additional material by Katie Mitchell and the company. Also included is an introduction by Caryl Churchill.

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Shocking and beautiful, a powerful play about the impact of a soldier's injury in a foreign conflict on his family back home. Wounded in the war in Iraq, a young farmer-turned-soldier returns home with injuries that have extraordinary consequences. Lust, temptation, sibling rivalry and the pressures of the past combine with the struggle to maintain a rural existence. Jonathan Lichtenstein's play The Pull of Negative Gravity was first staged at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, as part of the 2004 Edinburgh Festival Fringe. It received a Fringe First Award.

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A comedy drama about an all-female theatre company touring Britain during the darkest days of World War Two, written by the well-known actress and premiered in the West End. While the men are fighting Hitler and the bombs are falling on London, a 'girls only' theatre company sets out in a battered 1920s Rolls-Royce to bring Shakespeare to a culture-starved Britain. Imogen Stubbs' play We Happy Few was inspired by the real-life Osiris Players, whose travelling productions during the War inspired many to take up the profession - Judi Dench to name but one. We Happy Few was premiered at the Gielgud Theatre in the West End in June 2004 in a production directed by Trevor Nunn and starring Juliet Stevenson and Patsy Palmer. An earlier version of the play was performed in 2003 at Malvern Theatres.

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A revised and updated edition of Declan Donnellan's bestselling book, a fresh and radical approach to acting by a world-famous director. 'Cuts open every generalisation about acting and draws out gleamingly fresh specifics' Peter Brook 'Explains Donnellan's highly practical system and sheds unique light on one of the greatest directors of acting in our time' Le Monde 'Hugely practical and never gets lost in theory' El Pais 'A gripping read, as acute about the psychology of lying as it is about the art of acting' Guardian 'Rooted in modern theatre, modern psychology and, above all, modern reality' Izvestia 'Unpretentious, straightforward, and pierced with acute insight' Kommersant

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A comprehensive 'how to' book on the Laban system of movement - from the author of Laban for Actors and Dancers. Laban for All offers a simplified version of Rudolf Laban's system for analysing - and annotating - the way the human being moves. It can be used by relative beginners upwards. The reader is introduced to the language and terms of Laban, with each new concept accompanied by very specific, clearly illustrated exercises - each designed to strengthen and deepen our understanding. When the basic vocabulary has been explained and demonstrated, its expressive possibilities in drama and dance are further explored. The result is a thorough - and thoroughly practical - grounding in the most significant movement system of modern times.

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