A-Z of Teesside playwrights
Wally K Daly. Grangetown.
In the early 1980s, three of his stage plays were performed at the Queen's Theatre, Hornchurch - The Miracle Shirker, Vaughan Street (both 1980) and a stage adaptation of his radio and television play Butterflies Don't Count (1982). Along with some 39 plays for radio and was an active member of the Writers Guild. Wally was a contemporary of Bert Woolley of Grangetown Boys Club, who also do great things for young people and amateur dramatics on Teesside.
https://writersguild.org.uk/wally-k-daly-1940-2020/
Ishy Din. Middlesbrough.
Ishy Din is an award-winning playwright, whose plays include Snookered, Wipers and Arriving Empty. Ishy has also written for TV and Film. He has written an episode for the Channel 4 drama Ackley Road. Radio: Ishy Din’s first radio play was John Barnes Saved My Life for BBC Radio 5 Live. Other credits include Who’s Baby for BBC Radio 4 and Parking and Pakoras for local radio.
http://www.jtmanagement.co.uk/clients/ishy-din/
Graham Farrow. Middlesbrough.
Graham was educated at Scarborough College. His first novel, Speak no Evil, was nominated for the 1989 Commonwealth Writer's Prize.
Graham’s stage plays Talk about the Passion and Rattlesnakes have been produced globally; they are especially popular in the United States and London, and are translated into many different languages. Talk about the Passion and Rattlesnakes are published by Methuen. When Talk about the Passion ran in London in February 2018, The Stage Newspaper called the production one of the 'picks of the week'. Talk about the Passion had its Asian premiere in Istanbul in November 2018, directed by Turkish actor/musician Emre Kinay.
Other plays produced include Lake of Fire, Pure Morning, Hair of the Dog and Down Amongst the Dead Men. Farrow's plays typically deal with losers, loners, the down and out and the dispossessed; all searching for redemption or resolution of some sort.
Alex Simone Hart. Marske by the Sea.
Alex is an actress, working in the industry, under the name of Alexandre Andlau. Alex attended Prior Pursglove College, Guisborough, before graduating in Drama from John Moore’s University, Liverpool in 2016, then an MA Acting from Mountview, in London, just two years later. Her most recent engagement was as Titania in a Midsummer Night’s Dream at Cambridge.
But it was back in Christmas 2019, that Alex was shown a photograph of her great grandmother Mary Mackin playing for Smith’s Dock FC, at South Bank ground. The photograph was courtesy, of her Dad’s cousin Mary, the granddaughter of the footballer Mary Mackin. And that was just the start of the story.
Mary told of the family leaving, what is now Northern Ireland and coming to Teesside, to work in the Iron and Steel industry, and of three of the nine children, who sadly didn’t survive to adulthood. Mary was born in 1888 and at the outbreak of WWI, was to be found working the munitions factory, which lead to her playing football and Ayresome Park, and being banned three years later, by the FA.
Throw in an episode, where Suffragette Mary chained herself to South Bank Police Station and you can see why Alex was so inspired, not to write a play, but a six- part screenplay for a television series. Alex is so grateful to her father Paul, for his detailed research and putting together the family history, while Alex developed and wrote the screenplay. They are now currently in discussions with various individuals and production companies, in the hope of bringing this amazing story to the screen.
You can catch her interview with Radio Tees presenter Scott Makin
https://www.facebook.com/aleeexhart/videos/1033599970677211
Robert Holman. Guisborough.
Robert a British dramatist whose work has been produced since
the 1970s at the RSC, the West
End, Royal Court Theatre and
elsewhere in the UK.[1] He has been resident dramatist
at both the Royal
Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre.
Robert’s plays include: The Nature Cause (1974) Outside
the Whale (1976) German Skerries (1977) Rooting (1979) The Estuary (1980) Other
Worlds (1983) Today (1984) The Overgrown Path (1985) Being Friends (Bush
Theatre, 1986) Lost (1986) Making Noise Quietly (1987) Across Oka (1988) Rafts
and Dreams (1990) Bad Weather (1998) Holes in the Skin (2003) Jonah and Otto
(2008)
A Thousand Stars Explode in the Sky (2010) written with
David Eldridge and Simon Stephens
A Breakfast of Eels (2015)
Holman is an acknowledged inspiration for some of the younger generation of British playwrights, including David Eldridge and Simon Stephens. A documentary, "Robert Holman, A Writer's Writer" was made by the Donmar Warehouse, celebrating Holman's influence on younger writers including David Eldridge, Simon Stephens, Samantha Ellis, Duncan Macmillan and Ben Musgrave.
Robert
Holman, ‘extraordinary and influential’ playwright, dies aged 69 | Theatre |
The Guardian
Anne Jellicoe: Middlesbrough.
A British playwright, theatre director and actress. Although
her work covered many areas of theatre and film, she is best known for
"pushing the envelope" of the stage play, devising new forms which
challenge and delight unconventional audiences. As a result, her dramatic career
is, in many ways, unique in the twentieth century.
Her plays include The Knack: 1962; The Sport of My Mad
Mother 1958. Shelley; or, The Idealist. 1966. The Giveaway: A Comedy. 1970. The
Seagull by Anton Chekhov, translated by Jellicoe & Adriadne Nicolaeff.
1975. Three Jelliplays. Contains You'll Never Guess; Clever Elsie, Smiling
John, Silent Peter, and A Good Thing or a Bad Thing. 1975. Devon, by Jellicoe
and Roger Mayne. 1975.
In 1978, Jellicoe set up the Colway Theatre Trust to explore the concept of Community Plays: pioneering work which she continued to develop over the next ten years. Jon Oram became artistic director of Colway Theatre in 1985.
Further reading: A Shell Guide. Community Plays: How to Put Them On.1987.
Ann
Jellicoe obituary | Theatre | The Guardian
Gordon Steel. Grangetown.
His plays include, Like a Virgin, Dead Fish, Studs, Albert Nobbs, A Kick in the Baubles and The Fulstow Boys. His newly formed Steelworks Theatre Company staged his play Grow Up Grandad to great acclaim.
Gordon has also taught and lectured performing arts for over thirty years. Mark Benton, Daniel Casey, Dean John Wilson, Neil Grainger and Jess Daley, are some of the students who have gone on to forge successful careers in the industry.
Dramatist: Gordon Steel | Alan Brodie
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