For over five decades, David Edgar has stood as one of British theatre's most formidably insightful political playwrights.
 |
| David Edgar. Photo by Simon Hadley. |
- “Cry havoc”: Politically-Engaged Theatre and the RSC — A panel featuring David Edgar alongside director Seán Linnen, director Penny Cherns, and playwright Tanika Gupta, exploring the history, responsibilities, and future of political theatre on RSC stages.
- The Making of Destiny — An in-depth conversation with David Edgar reflecting on the creation, impact, and half-century legacy of his groundbreaking work.
Destiny drew heavily on the complex social landscape of the 1970s West Midlands. Given your deep personal and family ties to Birmingham theatre, how did the region's specific political atmosphere at the time shape the play's themes of race, labor conflict, and far-right movements?
In fact, the play started out set in West Yorkshire. I’d been a reporter on the Bradford Evening Paper and became alarmed by the growth of an anti-immigration group which would later join the National Front.
So the first draft was set in a fictionalised Bradford, and the strike at the heart of the play was in a textile mill. That draft was turned down by Nottingham Playhouse, and the play was recommissioned by the Birmingham Rep, bringing me back to my hometown. I did a lot of research into the foundry industry and relocated the strike there. I also became involved in the anti-fascist movement, particularly in Birmingham, so the feel of the play is influenced by that – and the fact that I had grown up in the city which, after all, had been the location for Enoch Powell’s1968 Rivers of Blood speech and a number of battles between the National Front and its opponents.
I wanted the play to go on in a big industrial city like Nottingham or Birmingham, but when the Birmingham theatre board vetoed the production, I had to look elsewhere. The RSC was one of the theatres which turned down the Birmingham version, but, happily, the young RSC director Ron Daniels (who I knew from his fringe theatre work) persuaded RSC Artistic Director Trevor Nunn to programme the play in The Other Place.
Fifty years after writing Destiny, how do you see the play's portrayal of far-right politics and social division echoing—or differing from—the contemporary political landscape in the UK?
I think the play now looks more prescient than ever. The play predicted the far right trying to become more respectable and mainstream, as the British National Party did in the 1990s under Nick Griffin. But now much of the ideology and many of the policies of the 1970s National Front, particularly about deporting Britain’s black and Asian populations, has become mainstream. Also, the play suggested that big business might support the far right, which didn’t happen then, but is happening now, with the crypto-billionaires supporting Reform in Britain and the tech bros supporting Trump in America.
Given that you have written or adapted numerous works for the RSC since Destiny in 1976—including The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, Maydays, and Pentecost—how has your relationship with the company grown and evolved over the past five decades?
I’m the RSC’s most premiered playwright (or, put another way, its most produced living playwright), and the ten plays the RSC has produced make it my theatrical home. All the major awards I’ve received have been for RSC shows and – in three cases – the theatre has presented plays turned down by other theatres (Destiny, Pentecost and The New Real).
My aunt worked at Stratford as a production manager after the war; I’ve been seeing Shakespeare there since the age of 11, and I live 45 minutes away. I can’t imagine my career without it.
Having served as the RSC’s Literary Consultant in the 1980s and later becoming an Honorary Associate Artist, how has the company's internal creative culture and approach to new writing changed since the early days of The Other Place?
The early years of The Other Place, particularly when joined by the RSC’s small London theatre (the Warehouse, now the Donmar), were a golden age for new writing at the RSC, often political, angry and oppositional to the classical work of the company.
However, the RSC’s small-scale work formed a bridge between the alternative, fringe theatre and the mainstream theatre, as directors, writers and actors who’d grown up in fringe began to want to work in big institutional companies. This was a real two-way conversation which led to a transformation of the ambitions and scale of new political writing and how Shakespeare was presented. So the big change was a breaking down of the barriers between the company’s new and classical work. I think that was beginning to be understood during my period as a literary consultant.
What I was most proud of was theRSC’s championing of women’s playwriting (at that stage, much more wholeheartedly than at the National), presenting new work by Timberlake Wertenbaker, Caryl Churchill, Pam Gems, Heidi Thomas and Louise Page.
Your debut at the RSC took place in The Other Place shortly after it was established. How did Buzz Goodbody’s vision for a low-budget, experimental, community-orientedstudio space impact how your work was staged and received?
Destiny has a cast in double figures, well beyond the scope of small fringe theatres. The play couldn’t have happened without a company which could devote those resources to a show in a small space.
As the RSC publishes Buzz Goodbody’s original 1973 manifesto, which of her core principles regarding accessible, radical theatre feel most urgent for main-stage and studio companies to remember today?
The key word in TOP’s title was “Other”. Although the RSC’s experimental work did form a bridge between the alternative theatre and the mainstream, its various manifestations– from the Theatre of Cruelty season in the early 60s via Buzz Goodbody’s Other Place to Howard Davies’s Warehouse – felt like an oppositional challenge to the company’s mainstream classical work.
Whatever the size of the auditorium, the RSC is at its best when it’s taking on the status quo.
Your sessions at the 79th RSC Summer School focus on the making of Destiny and politically engaged theatre. What do you hope participants and contemporary theatergoers take away from re-examining the origins of political drama at The Other Place?
There’s always a danger that big institutions can forget their pasts. Marking anniversaries is a great way of avoiding that. The Other Place was 50 two years ago, andDestiny was premiered 50 years ago this September. Despite its association with a long-dead writer, the company has a really impressive and sometimes forgotten association with new work. The National Theatre’s recent revival of Christopher Hampton’s Les Liaisons Dangereuses – and the continued success of Willy Russell’s Educating Rita –are just two examples of RSC-premiered shows that have lived on.
As I said above, the RSC can be particularly proud of its championing of women playwriting, a tradition kept alive over the last decade by premieres of work by Tanika Gupta, Alice Birch, Ella Hickson, Juliet Gilkes Romero, Hannah Khalil, Laura Wade and others.
 | |
|
From starting out in journalism and fringe theatre in the early 1970s to establishing the playwriting course at the University of Birmingham, what core values or artistic principles have consistently guided your work as a dramatist?
I’ve nothing against plays about families or romantic love, but I’ve concentrated on plays set in public worlds, which speak to the great political issues of our time. Although I hope my plays are not conservative (with either size of C), I’ve tried to remain accessible to audiences, and to understand the rules which have guided playwrights throughout the ages.
My book on playwriting is called How Plays Work, and its opening line is “First things first. You know all this already”.
Looking back across your prolific career, what has been the most satisfying challenge of bringing complex socio-political issues and historical movements to the stage?
One of the most profound events of my life was the overthrow of communism in Eastern Europe, which I’ve tried to understand in four stage plays set in that fascinating part of the world. Three of those plays – Pentecost, The Prisoner’s Dilemma and The New Real were premiered by the RSC, and – alongside The Shape of the Table at the National - I think those plays are my most satisfying and complete achievement. But, also, of course, I couldn’t leave out my adaptation of Nicholas Nickleby.
Looking back across your five-decade relationship with the RSC, how has the institution's relationship with new writing and politically charged work evolved since the 1970s?
The decade between 1975 and 1985 saw so many brilliant new plays premiered by the RSC that it’s hard not to wallow in nostalgia for that golden time. And of course there have been ups and downs with the RSC and new work in the years since (and although the Swan does new work, TOP has not been consistently in operation). But I think the institutional memory of the plays I’ve spoken about here – and the dozens I haven’t had time to – should serve as a constant reminder to the organisation of the value of the challenging and the new.
You pioneered the MA in Playwriting Studies at the University of Birmingham. When speaking to early-career writers at events like the RSC Summer School, what do you find is their biggest misconception about how political change happens through art?
I think we’re living through a pretty good period of political theatre, notably concerned with exploration of identity (inspired by the Black Lives Matter and Me Too movements). I guess it’s good to remind politically-engaged writers that there’s a world beyond their own experience. As to political change, we live in an era when television drama in particular– from Gwynneth Hughes’s Mr Bates vs the Post Office to Jack Thorne and Stephen Graham’s Adolescence – is impacting political discussion in measurable ways.
In an era dominated by digital media and rapid news cycles, what unique role does live theatre retain as a space for civic debate and political reflection?
The reason why people still go to the theatre, and are prepared to pay often astronomical sums of money to see adaptations of films, is the irreplaceable intensity of the live theatre experience.
What advice would you give to young playwrights today who want to address pressing social and political issues without falling into didacticism?
Don’t be too worried about didacticism, particularly at times of heightened polarisation and political struggle. I wrote lots of didactic plays at the beginning of my career, and didn’t find it hard to move away from that when I needed to.
What was the first piece of theatre you saw that had a big impact on you and your career?
The three-show, all-day experience of the RSC’s 1963 version of the Henry VI plays and Richard III, the Wars of the Roses.
What is the biggest lesson you've learned across your career, and how do you use that when you connect with younger generations, including at the forthcoming RSC Summer School?
Oh, very simple. The great difference between British and American theatre is that British subsidies for companies like the RSC allow playwrights to have successful whole-life careers. The lesson: don’t give up.
Find out more about the work at the RSC by visiting https://www.rsc.org.uk/
Post a Comment