Helen Edmundson
Helen Edmundson is a British playwright. She has won awards and critical acclaim both for her original plays and for her adaptations of various literary classics for the stage.
Theatre
Edmundson's first play Flying was produced at the National Theatre Studio in 1990. In 1992, her adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, produced by Shared Experience, won a UK Theatre Award; the production toured nationally and internationally. In 1993, Edmundson's original play The Clearing, which won the John Whiting Award for best new play, and a Time Out Award, was staged at the Bush Theatre.[1] In 1994, her adaptation of George Eliot's The Mill on the Floss was also produced by Shared Experience, again touring nationally and internationally; the play won a Time Out Award. In 1996, Shared Experience staged Edmundson's adaptation of Tolstoy's War and Peace at the National Theatre; the production was co-directed by Nancy Meckler and Polly Teale and starred Rakie Ayola and BAFTA Award-nominee Anne-Marie Duff.
In 2002, Edmundson's play Mother Teresa is Dead was produced at the Royal Court Theatre. In 2004, her adaptation of Mary Webb's Gone to Earth was produced by Shared Experience at the Lyric Hammersmith and on tour. Edmundson's adaptation of Jamila Gavin's novel Coram Boy premiered at the National Theatre in November 2005, directed by Melly Still and starring Olivier Award-winner Bertie Carvel and Tony Award-nominee Paul Ritter; Edmundson received a Time Out Award.[2] The play came back for a revival at the same venue a year later, again directed by Melly Still and starring Bertie Carvel and Ruth Gemmell. Her adaptation of Euripides' Orestes, toured in the UK and played at the Tricycle Theatre with Shared Experience in 2006. Coram Boy was revived at the Imperial Theatre on Broadway in 2007, starring Emmy Award-winner Uzo Aduba and Tony Award-nominee Jan Maxwell, receiving six Tony Award nominations. In 2008, Edmundson amended her adaptation of War and Peace, turning it into a two-part play; this production was staged on tour by Shared Experience. In the same year, her musical adaptation of Isabel Allende's Zorro was produced at the Garrick Theatre, directed by Christopher Renshaw and starring Olivier Award-winner Lesli Margherita and Olivier Award-nominee Emma Williams. In 2009, Edmundson's adaptation of Pedro Calderon de la Barca's Life Is a Dream was produced at the Donmar Warehouse, starring BAFTA Award-winner Dominic West.
In 2010, Edmundson's musical adaptation of Arthur Ransome's novel Swallows and Amazons was first produced at the Bristol Old Vic, directed by Tom Morris. The next year, the show transferred to the Vaudeville Theatre. Edmundson took part in the Bush Theatre's 2011 project Sixty Six Books, for which artists wrote a piece based upon a book of the King James Bible; Edmundson wrote a piece entitled In the night, a promise, based on Zephaniah.[3] The same year, her adaptation of Coram Boy was revived at the Bristol Old Vic, again directed by Melly Still, in a production starring Emily Head and Simon Shepherd. In 2012, her play about Juana Ines de la Cruz, The Heresy of Love, was produced by the Royal Shakespeare Company at the Swan Theatre in Stratford-Upon-Avon, directed by Nancy Meckler and starring Catherine McCormack and Ray Coulthard.[4] The same year, Edmundson's adaptation of Swallows and Amazons was revived for a national tour. Also in 2012, Edmundson's play Mary Shelley was produced on a nationwide tour, including the Tricycle Theatre and the Liverpool Playhouse, by Shared Experience, directed by Polly Teale and starring Shannon Tarbet.[5] In 2014, Edmundson's adaptation of Emile Zola's Therese Raquin was produced at the Theatre Royal, Bath, starring Olivier Award-winners Alison Steadman and Desmond Barrit. In 2015, The Heresy of Love was revived for a run at Shakespeare's Globe, starring Naomi Frederick.[6] Edmundson's adaptation of Therese Raquin was produced by Roundabout Theatre Company at Studio 54 on Broadway from 2015 to 2016, starring Academy Award-nominee Keira Knightley and Tony Award-winner Judith Light.[7][8] The RSC is currently premiering her play Queen Anne, starring Emma Cunniffe and Natascha McElhone.[9]
Television and radio
Edmundson has written two short films for television: One Day for BBC Two and Stella for Channel 4, and her adaptation of Virginia Woolf's The Voyage Out was heard on BBC Radio 4 in 2006. In 2015, Edmundson's wrote two episodes of ITV drama The Suspicions of Mr Whicher, Beyond the Pale and The Ties that Bind, starring BAFTA Award-winners Paddy Considine and Tim Pigott-Smith. In September of the same year, Edmundson's feature-length adaptation of J.B. Priestley's An Inspector Calls, starring BAFTA Award-winners David Thewlis and Miranda Richardson, was broadcast on BBC One.[10]
Awards and honours
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- 1994 John Whiting Award winner for The Clearing[citation needed]
- 1994 TMA Awards winner for The Mill on the Floss[citation needed]
- 2015 Windham–Campbell Literature Prize (Drama) [11]
References
- ↑ http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre--civil-strife-paul-taylor-reviews-helen-edmundsons-the-clearing-at-the-bush-1507694.html
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ http://www.bushtheatre.co.uk/biography/writers/
- ↑ The Heresy of Love, RSC.
- ↑ http://www.sharedexperience.org.uk/maryshelley.html
- ↑ http://www.shakespearesglobe.com/theatre/whats-on/globe-theatre/the-heresy-of-love
- ↑ http://www.timeout.com/newyork/things-to-do/therese-raquin
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Matthew Hemley, "RSC unveils winter 2015 season and Antony Sher as Lear", The Stage.
- ↑ http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/sep/14/bbc-an-inspector-calls-this-is-england-90
- ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
External links
- Helen Edmundson at the Internet Movie Database
- Barbara Slaughter, "An interview with Helen Edmundson, author of Mary Shelley", WSWS, 13 June 2012.
