45 h. ago Haunted house and invisible demons: Tennessee Williams' early radio play 'The Strangers' publishes

Tennessee Williams' early radio play, “The Strangers,” is featured in The Strand this week

Politics

66 h. ago PATRICK MARMION reviews Indian Ink at Hampstead Theatre, London: Felicity Kendal triumphs in this revived classic from the late Tom Stoppard

It must surely be an emotionally intense experience for her to be starring in the revival of a play by her former partner, Tom Stoppard, who sadly died just last month.

Politics

69 h. ago Indian Ink review: Felicity Kendal adds poignancy to Tom Stoppard play

In the wake of Tom Stoppard’s death this lush adaptation of one of his lesser works is given new charge

Politics

6 d. ago ‘A master of complications’: Felicity Kendal returns to Tom Stoppard’s Indian Ink after three decades

The writer’s former partner and her co-star Ruby Ashbourne Serkis describe the bittersweet nature of remounting his 90s play so soon after his death• ‘We were swimming in the mind pool of Tom Stoppard!’ – actors salute the great playwrightI won’t, I promise, refer to Felicity Kendal as Tom Stoppard’s muse. “No,” she says firmly. “Not this week.” Speaking to Stoppard’s former partner and longtime leading lady is delicate in the immediate aftermath of the writer’s death. But she is previewing a revival of his Indian Ink, so he shimmers through the conversation. The way Kendal refers to Stoppard in the present tense tells its own poignant story.Settling into a squishy brown sofa at Hampstead theatre, Kendal describes revisiting the 1995 work, developed from a 1991 radio play. “It’s a play that I always thought I’d like to go back to.” Previously starring as Flora Crewe, a provocative British poet visiting 1930s India, she now plays Eleanor Swan, Flora’s sister. We meet Eleanor in the 1...

Politics

1 week ago Brian Cox on Tom Stoppard’s sensational Rock’n’Roll: ‘I looked through the curtain and saw Mick Jagger and Václav Havel’

The actor, who starred as a Marxist academic in the acclaimed 2006 play at the Royal Court, remembers an astonishing writer of ideas and eleganceBy the time I was cast in Rock’n’Roll in 2006 I had been following Tom for years. I saw Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead when it came to London in 1967 with the wonderful Graham Crowden as the Player King. It was a big sensation. The Real Thing was a great play and Arcadia was extraordinary.Rock’n’Roll was w at the Royal Court in London by Trevor Nunn and starred Rufus Sewell as Jan, a Czech student who returns to Prague in 1968. I played Max, a Marxist academic. It was a fascinating experience, because there were two plays there: the play about Sappho, the Ancient Greek poet, and the play about the Soviet takeover in Czechoslovakia. Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago ‘He played with language better than anybody’: Terry Gilliam and John Boorman on Tom Stoppard

Two film-makers who worked with the late playwright recall a man of extraordinary wit, endless invention and innate eleganceI was utterly knocked out by the way Tom Stoppard’s mind worked, his brilliance and by the fact he made Brazil out of a big lump of stone that I’d spent a year or two preparing. I gave that to him and out of that he carved a beautiful Michelangelo David. Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago Private View at Soho Theatre: 'Like Tom Stoppard doing a dark, queer love play'

This debut play by Jess Edwards is a brainy rush of ideas

Politics

2 w. ago ‘I thanked him for ending my acting career!’ – theatre directors on their debt to Tom Stoppard

Carrie Cracknell, Nina Raine and Belarus Free Theatre’s Natalia Kaliada and Nicolai Khalezin share memories of working with the playwright and ‘guardian angel’Natalia Kaliada and Nicolai Khalezin, co-founding artistic directors of Belarus Free Theatre Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago ‘There was rage and pain and iron in him’: Patrick Marber on the great hits – and fond smokes – he had with Tom Stoppard

The director worked with theatre colossus Tom Stoppard on two smash hits. Here, he remembers their heated rehearsals, the night they stayed up watching Jaws – and the last four cigarettes they smoked togetherTom was my hero from the night I first saw Travesties in 1979. I was 15. The older kids at school did a production of it and I was spellbound; it was glamorous, sensual and completely incomprehensible. I wanted to know everything about this cool, obscure playwright. I started in the school library with the Encyclopedia Brittanica. Then I read Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (incomprehensible) and then I read a third of Jumpers before giving up (totally incomprehensible).As an English Lit student in the mid 1980s, I studied Stoppard and found his work slightly less incomprehensible. But in 1993, I saw the original production of Arcadia and felt that same spell I’d felt as a child. Let’s call it art. And beauty. And words spoken from a stage like no one else. A couple of yea...

Events

2 w. ago ‘We were swimming in the mind pool of Tom Stoppard!’ – actors salute the great playwright

Rufus Sewell, Christine Baranski, Susan Wokoma, Toby Jones and Harriet Walter share their unforgettable encounters with a theatrical giantI worked with Tom when I was quite young, on Arcadia in 1993, and again on Rock’n’Roll 13 years later. In the interim it slowly dawned on me that not all jobs were like that. He was one of the most intelligent people you could ever meet but the extraordinary thing was that you’d walk away from conversations with him feeling like you were not unintelligent or unwitty yourself. That’s not always the case with incredibly brilliant writers and funny people. That generosity of spirit marked my time with him. He was incredibly good company, very sweet, and you felt encouraged to put forward your own ideas, make your own jokes. Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago Surreal, erudite and always experimenting: Tom Stoppard was a playwright never likely to stand still

David Lister remembers the brilliant, complicated man whose work explored politics, science, love, Shakespeare, and even rock’n’roll

Politics

2 w. ago The Lights of London’s West End Will Dim This Week in Memory of Tom Stoppard

The Lights of London’s West End Will Dim This Week in Memory of Tom Stoppard  Time Out Worldwide

Politics

2 w. ago The lights of the West End will dim this week in memory of Tom Stoppard

The lights of the West End will dim this week in memory of Tom Stoppard  Time Out Worldwide

Politics

2 w. ago Hollywood's secret script doctor: How Sir Tom Stoppard's uncredited writing for Spielberg and Lucas made their blockbusters sing

Few British playwrights were as revered or decorated as Sir Tom, whose talents saw him win an Oscar and a Golden Globe for the screenplay Shakespeare In Love.

Society

2 w. ago BBC Breakfast paused as host shares devastating death update with Royal tributes

The Oscar-winning Shakespeare in Love playwright Tom Stoppard died aged 88 as the Royal Family were among the first to pay tribute

Events

2 w. ago BBC Breakfast host shares heartbreaking update minutes into show as Royals pay tribute to 'genius' friend

BBC Breakfast announced the death of acclaimed playwright Tom Stoppard at age 88, sharing tributes from King Charles and Queen Camilla

Politics

2 w. ago King and Queen pay tribute to ‘dear friend’ Sir Tom Stoppard

The writer, known for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead and Shakespeare In Love, died at his home in Dorset.

Politics

2 w. ago Sir Tom Stoppard obituary: He both entertained and fought oppression with his pen

Sir Tom Stoppard had a remarkable rise to the top of the cultural world and leaves behind an astonishing legacy of work

Politics

2 w. ago Sir Tom Stoppard obituary: Iconic playwright lit up the screen with his humour and wit

Sir Tom Stoppard has passed away at the age of 88 but leaves a lasting legacy behind

Politics

2 w. ago Tom Stoppard dead: Shakespeare In Love writer and Oscar winner dies at the age of 88

Iconic screenwriter Tom Stoppard has passed away at the age of 88. The screenwriter scooped an Oscar for his 1998 film Shakespeare in Love, starring Gqyneth Paltrow

Events