Until I was poking around the Tony Awards website, I had no idea that the Tonys were giving a Lifetime Achievement award to Alan Ayckbourn.
In the past year, I've become a huge fan of Ayckbourn's work. I had the pleasure of performing in his play "Comic Potential." Then I spent a month reading and re-reading "The Norman Conquests"--marveling at the sheer organization it takes to put together a trilogy of plays that intersect with each other and still work individually in different ways.
What I love about Alan Ayckbourn is that he approaches everything from a challenging and intelligent position. He looks at everyday life from unique perspectives and still manages to stay true to his characters and situations.
In "Bedroom Farce," four couples in four very different marriages interact over the course of one night all in each other's bedrooms. He does something similar in "Absurd Person Singular"--this time with Christmas parties.
He can go from funny to tragic to vulnerable to cynical and back again. Finishing one of his plays you feel like you've just read an incredibly well-written novel. You want to go back again and again to see how he does it.
I think over the years he's gotten lost amongst some of his more political contemporaries in British theater--David Hare, Tom Stoppard, etc.
It's nice to see him getting recognition for consistently producing intelligent, non-pretentious theater that holds up even now. Just last year, "The Norman Conquests" won the Tony Award for Best Revival of a Play, and a revival of "Bedroom Farce" is currently playing on the West End.
Here's hoping Lifetime Achievement Awards gets people to read and produce even more of Ayckbourn's plays. There are still a lot I want to see done onstage.
In the past year, I've become a huge fan of Ayckbourn's work. I had the pleasure of performing in his play "Comic Potential." Then I spent a month reading and re-reading "The Norman Conquests"--marveling at the sheer organization it takes to put together a trilogy of plays that intersect with each other and still work individually in different ways.
What I love about Alan Ayckbourn is that he approaches everything from a challenging and intelligent position. He looks at everyday life from unique perspectives and still manages to stay true to his characters and situations.
In "Bedroom Farce," four couples in four very different marriages interact over the course of one night all in each other's bedrooms. He does something similar in "Absurd Person Singular"--this time with Christmas parties.
He can go from funny to tragic to vulnerable to cynical and back again. Finishing one of his plays you feel like you've just read an incredibly well-written novel. You want to go back again and again to see how he does it.
I think over the years he's gotten lost amongst some of his more political contemporaries in British theater--David Hare, Tom Stoppard, etc.
It's nice to see him getting recognition for consistently producing intelligent, non-pretentious theater that holds up even now. Just last year, "The Norman Conquests" won the Tony Award for Best Revival of a Play, and a revival of "Bedroom Farce" is currently playing on the West End.
Here's hoping Lifetime Achievement Awards gets people to read and produce even more of Ayckbourn's plays. There are still a lot I want to see done onstage.
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