Alan Bennett News

Maggie Smith was presented with the Critics' Circle Award 2015 for Services to the Arts at a private lunch held at the National Liberal Club in London on March 31, receiving an engraved crystal rose bowl. The event hosted byJeffery Taylor, president of the Critics' Circle and Mark Shenton, chairman of the Drama section of the Critics' Circle. 

Elements Theatre Company honors the 400th Anniversary of Shakespeare's death with Labyrinth: A Legacy of Language, Friday & Saturday, April 22 & 23. 

Gary Naylor sees a play that shows humanity at its best and worst and plenty of points in between, driven by a brilliant script by one of Britain's best young playwrights.

AN IMAGINED meeting between English composer Benjamin Britten and poet WH Auden form the basis of the Old Mill Theatre's latest play.

This Tuesday in New York City, Circus Road Films and Theatricals & Big Head Productions will present an invite-only reading of a new play The Poets of Amityville by Eugene Pack.

Daniel Evans today announces his final season as Sheffield Theatres' Artistic Director, including the eagerly anticipated news of the Crucible's Christmas show, Irving Berlin's whip-cracking musical Annie Get Your Gun. The season also includes two world premieres on the Crucible stage - an adaptation of a classic novel and an exciting new musical set in Sheffield. A poignant moment in the city's history is told on the Studio stage along with a heart-warming family tale for the festive period.

London is never short of theatre temptations, whether splashy West End shows, epic dramas or bold fringe offerings. From a computer-created musical to tabletop Shakespeare, here are some of this week's most eye-catching openings. Don't forget to check back for BroadwayWorld's reviews, and if you need more ticket-booking inspiration, here is last week's round-up.

Following the Birmingham Repertory Theatre Company's successful collaboration with Chichester Festival Theatre in 2015, producing The King's Speech, the two companies have worked together once more to present Alan Bennett's award-winning double-bill. First performed in 1988, Single Spies consists of two plays, An Englishman Abroad and A Question of Attribution; both portrayals of two of the best-known members of the 'Cambridge Five' - the spy ring recruited at Cambridge University in the 1930s.

Alan Bennett's hit comedy SINGLE SPIES just released rehearsal images in preparation for its upcoming UK tour. The production embarks from tonight's 4 February opening at Chichester Festival Theatre before touring to Birmingham, Richmond, Canterbury, Newcastle, Oxford, Cheltenham, Bath, Leeds, Salisbury and Sheffield. Scroll down for a sneak peek at the company in rehearsal!

We talk to the star of theatre and television about her forthcoming tour in Alan Bennett's Single Spies - and taking on the role of the Queen!

Alan Bennett's hit comedy SINGLE SPIES just released rehearsal images in preparation for its upcoming UK tour. The production embarks from a 4 February opening at Chichester Festival Theatre before touring to Birmingham, Richmond, Canterbury, Newcastle, Oxford, Cheltenham, Bath, Leeds, Salisbury and Sheffield. Scroll down for a sneak peek at the company in rehearsal!

A new production of Alan Bennett's hit comedy comes to Birmingham Repertory Theatre next month. Following the success of The King's Speech, Birmingham Repertory Theatre and Chichester Festival Theatre collaborate once again on this award-winning comedy masterpiece, Single Spies.

Ambassador Theatre Group (ATG) has announced that a major new production of Shakespeare's greatest tragedy, King Lear, will embark on a UK tour to nine regional venues from April to July in association with the Royal & Derngate Theatre, Northampton. 

Sony Pictures Classics' THE LADY IN THE VAN, Alan Bennett's adaptation of his commercial and critical West End hit, based on his own bestselling memoir, hits theaters across the U.S. today, January 15, after an early December rollout in New York City and Los Angeles.

Should the primary goal of education be to prepare students to ace their exams - that is, should teachers 'teach to the test?' Or should schools be more concerned with imparting a love of learning, of developing students eager to pursue knowledge?

Should the primary goal of education be to prepare students to ace their exams - that is, should teachers 'teach to the test?' Or should schools be more concerned with imparting a love of learning, of developing students eager to pursue knowledge?

David Ian Productions and the Ambassador Theatre Group have announced that Duncan James will star as 'Tick' in the international smash hit musical PRISCILLA QUEEN OF THE DESERT at Wolverhampton Grand Theatre from Mon 2 - Sat 7 May 2016.

They were the brand name on every woman's lips. Goodman Theatre announces it will produce the world premiere of War Paint, a new musical that charts the ascent and arch-rivalry of cosmetics entrepreneurs Helena Rubinstein and Elizabeth Arden. Patti LuPone, who 'generates more raw excitement than any other performer on Broadway' (The New York Times), and Christine Ebersole, a 'first-class, revitalizing master of period style' (The New York Times), respectively star as Rubinstein and Arden, the brilliant innovators with humble roots who shrewdly navigated the 1930s male-dominated business world to forever change the business of beauty. Directed by Michael Greif (Rent, Next to Normal, If/Then, Grey Gardens), War Paint reunites Scott Frankel and Michael Korie-the acclaimed composer and lyricist team of Grey Gardens and Far From Heaven-with Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Doug Wright (Grey Gardens, I Am My Own Wife, The Little Mermaid). The musical is inspired by the book, War Paint, by Lindy Woodhead and the documentary film, The Powder & the Glory, by Ann Carol Grossman and Arnie Reisman.  

Should the primary goal of education be to prepare students to ace their exams - that is, should teachers 'teach to the test?' Or should schools be more concerned with imparting a love of learning, of developing students eager to pursue knowledge?

Gary Naylor sees two plays by Terence Rattigan, the first delving into the darker elements of the soul and the second provoking plenty of laughs.