this month's
Ink Pellet contains
Punching Hard
Artistic director of Nottingham Playhouse, Adam Penford, 45, talks to Susan Elkin especially about Punch which opened at Apollo Theatre London this month and simultaneously on Broadway. “Yes” chuckles Adam, who is talking to me via Zoom from New York, where he is in rehearsals. “It is very unusual for a new play to open […]
First Encounters: King Lear
Once more taking Shakespeare to schools and communities around the country, Susan Elkin caught up with the RSC in Birmingham for an inspiring afternoon. “But nothing will come of nothing” called an irrepressible, totally engaged girl of about nine in response to Oliver Senton as a fine King Lear gasping his incredulous “Nothing?” in the […]
Prize Writer
Chris Power, 50, is a novelist, reviewer, teacher and judge for the 2025 Booker Prize. Susan Elkin spoke to him. Chris Power is on holiday in Sweden when I catch up with him. “Yes,” he says cheerfully. “This is the lakeside house that my Swedish wife grew up in and we’re here on holiday with […]
ROYAL COURT YOUNG PLAYWRIGHTS AWARD
The 2026 Young Playwrights Award is now officially nation-wide! Do you have an idea or a story to tell? Can you imagine it performed live, by actors on a stage? It’s time to start your playwriting journey. The Young Playwrights Award is a free, open-access competition for any teenager in the UK interested in writing a play, […]
VOICED: THE FESTIVAL FOR ENDANGERED LANGUAGES
With half of the world’s languages threatened to fall silent by the end of the century comes the first ever UK festival Voiced: The Festival for Endangered Languages, celebrating the power of language and art by highlighting endangered global and local languages through a creative festival. Throughout October, the Barbican, London will be filled with an explosion of voices and […]
NATIONAL THEATRE EXPANDS SCHOOLS PROGRAMME
The National Theatre has announced its autumn programme for schools across the UK, deepening its work with young people to support its continued ambition to reach every child in the UK before they leave school. Over 90% of state secondary schools are already signed up to access the National Theatre Collection to stream world-leading theatre directly […]
The National Plan for Drama and Theatre Education
Following feedback from drama teachers, educators and other interested parties, The National Plan for Drama and Theatre Education document is now completed and you can find a direct link to the pdf here. This is a mammoth achievement and a feat of collaboration. It has been widely circulated including to the DfE Team, whose members are also […]
BROADWAY LICENSING GLOBAL OFFERS UK TEACHERS FREE PERUSALS FOR HARRY POTTER AND THE CURSED CHILD SECONDARY SCHOOL EDITION
The Critically Acclaimed Show Has Now Been Adapted for UK Secondary Schools (London)—Broadway Licensing Global London, Sonia Friedman Productions, Colin Callender and Harry Potter Theatrical Productions are thrilled to announce that secondary school teachers can now sign up for a free perusal script of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Secondary School Edition. BLG London […]
A Final Haunt
After 33 extraordinary years, Susan Hill’s The Woman in Black will haunt the stage of the Fortune Theatre for the final time, as the production ends in the West End on Saturday 4th March 2023. PW Productions announce that after 33 extraordinary years in London’s West End, the theatrical sensation that is Susan Hill’s THE […]
Reaching for the Moon
Susan Elkin paid a visit to Half Moon theatre in London’s East End to chat with CEO Chris Elwell about their extensive education outreach and innovative theatre programmes. Half Moon Theatre sits in the heart of Limehouse in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, spitting distance from the DLR and mainline station. Formerly a pretty […]
Sidebar
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By Jamie Read, Co-Director of READ College here are so many myths surrounding healthy voice use for today’s Musical Theatre singers that it can be difficult to know what to believe. The constant worry about damaging your voice, and the stigma often unfairly placed on singers who sustain a vocal injury, can lead to […]
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By Jonathan FS Post Published by Oxford University Press This little book, part of a huge series of Very Short Introductions, is a surprisingly detailed and scholarly starting point for anyone beginning to study Shakespeare’s non-stage work. We casually refer to Shakespeare as the “greatest poet in the English language” with some justification but, Post […]
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By Oliver Ford Davies Published by Bloomsbury Have you ever noticed just how many apparently single parent fathers there are in Shakespeare? Prospero, Capulet, Lear, Leonato, Egeus, Shylock et al. Of course, Ford Davies has played most of them. That means that he’s worked with many interesting young female actors such as Mariah Gales who […]
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By Matt Haig Published by Canongate When I interviewed Matt Haig for September’s edition of Ink Pellet I was struck by the writer’s belief in the power of story-telling and how it can help young people understand the fragility of life. His fiction (Matt writes for both children and adults) pushes the boundary of the form […]
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van Placey’s excellent play operates at lots of levels and in different worlds. It’s a topical, intelligent, thoughtful, feminist take on Robert Lewis Stevenson’s novella rather than a dramatisation of it. And it’s rollicking good theatre – frank, uncompromising, fresh and often quite confrontational. In Victorian England, Dr Jekyll’s widow Harriet is dabbling in […]
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Ian McKellen’s Lear is physically and mentally ill from the moment he first appears. He has uncertain, slightly tottery gait. He is in pain and his speech is spat out as if in recovery from a small stoke. It is impeccably observed. So is the capricious mood switching and anger often stressed by the shock […]
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We’re in the Cypress pub as opposed to in Cyprus for this Othello Adapted for Frantic Assembly by Scott Graham and Steven Hoggett. It’s a thuggish world of gang warfare, ruthless competing for girls and a great deal of violence with rounders bats and knives around a versatile snooker table. There’s a lot of powerful physical theatre […]
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Graham Hooper compares two contrasting photography exhibitions currently showing in London
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This Christmas, Sally Cookson will be adapting The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at the West Yorkshire Playhouse. Mark Glover spoke to the innovative director to discuss nostalgia, story-telling and the pressures of re-working such a classic book.
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In this, the first of a regular feature examining issues facing the arts, Susan Elkin posses the question why so few men still take up ballet