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Jonathan Harvey

Jonathan Harvey

This article is about the playwright Jonathan Harvey. For the composer, see Jonathan Harvey (composer). Jonathan Harvey is a British playwright whose work has earned multiple awards. His plays include:
- The Cherry Blossom Tree (Liverpool Playhouse Studio, 1987) which won him the 1987 National Girobank Young Writer of the Year Award.
- Mohair (Royal Court Young Writers Festival, London/International Festival of Young Playwrights, Sydney, 1988).
- Wildfire (Royal Court Theatre Upstairs, 1992).
- Beautiful Thing (Bush Theatre, London, 1993 and Donmar Warehouse, London/Duke of York's Theatre, London, 1994), winner of the John Whiting Award 1994.
- Babies (Royal National Theatre Studio/Royal Court Theatre, 1994), winner George Devine Award 1993 and Evening Standard's Most Promising Playwright Award 1994.
- Boom Bang-A-Bang (Bush Theatre, 1995); Rupert Street Lonely Hearts Club (English Touring Theatre/Contact Theatre Company, Donmar Warehouse/Criterion Theatre, London, 1995). Television and film work includes:
- Beautiful Thing (Channel Four/Island World Productions)
- Coronation Street (ITV)
- Gimme Gimme Gimme (BBC)
- Love Junkie (BBC)
- Murder Most Horrid (BBC)
- West End Girls (Carlton) He also wrote the book for Closer to Heaven, a stage musical with songs and music written by the Pet Shop Boys. Closer to Heaven ran for nine months at the Arts Theatre in London in 2001 and recently ran in Australia in 2005. Category:English writers

Jonathan Harvey (composer)

Jonathan Harvey (born 3 May, 1939 in Sutton Coldfield) is a British composer. He studied with Erwin Stein and Hans Keller at St John's College, Cambridge, eventually obtaining a PhD. Early musical influences included Schoenberg, Berg, Messiaen and Britten. While undertaking postgraduate study at Glasgow University, Harvey played cello in the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. Around this time, he became interested in the music of Karlheinz Stockhausen. In 1969 he took up a Harkness Fellowship at Princeton University, where he encountered Milton Babbitt, another strong influence on his music. In the 1980s Harvey produced much music at IRCAM after receiving an invitation from Pierre Boulez to work there. Harvey is a Visiting Professor of Music at Imperial College London, and an Honorary Professor at Sussex University. Harvey, Jonathan Harvey, Jonathan Harvey, Jonathan Harvey, Jonathan Harvey, Jonathan Harvey, Jonathan

United Kingdom

:For other meanings of the terms "United Kingdom" and "UK" , see United Kingdom (disambiguation) and UK (disambiguation). :For an explanation of terms like England, (Great) Britain and United Kingdom see British Isles (terminology). The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (usually shortened to the United Kingdom or the UK) is a country located off the north-western coast of continental Europe, surrounded by the North Sea, the English Channel, the Celtic Sea, the Irish Sea, and the Atlantic Ocean. It is composed of four constituent parts: three constituent countries—England, Scotland, and Wales—on the island of Great Britain, and the province of Northern Ireland on the island of Ireland. The border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland forms the United Kingdom's principal international land border, although there is a nominal frontier with France in the middle of the Channel Tunnel. The UK has several overseas territories and the Crown dependencies of the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands come under the UK's sovereignty. The UK also has close relationships with the fifteen other Commonwealth Realms, as they all share the same head of state. The UK is also one of the largest member states of the European Union and a founding partner of both the UN and NATO.
Terminology

- United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland: The official name for the sovereign state
- United Kingdom: an abbreviation of United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
- Britain: an informal term that sometimes means United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and sometimes means Great Britain
- British: an informal term that sometimes means from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and sometimes means from Great Britain
- Great Britain (as a geographical term): the largest island of the British Isles
- Great Britain (as a political term): England + Wales + Scotland
- British Isles (as a geographical term): Great Britain + Ireland + many smaller surrounding islands. This term is disputed, please see below.
- Ireland (as a geographical term): the second largest island of the British Isles
- Ireland (as a political term): an abbreviation of the Republic of Ireland, a sovereign state on the island of Ireland
- Northern Ireland: a political region of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
- Ulster (as a geographical term): Often used to refer to Northern Ireland. It is derived from the Irish Language term 'Ulad.' It was one of the ancient Irish provinces (the others were Connaught, Leinster and Munster.). Although it is normally used to refer to Northern Ireland, Ulster also (traditionally) includes Counties Cavan, Monaghan and Donegal, which lie in the Republic of Ireland. The term Ulster is often favoured by the Protestant community.
History
Protestant Today's state is the latest of several unions formed over the last 1000 years. Scotland and England have existed as separate unified entities since the 10th century. Wales, under English control since the Statute of Rhuddlan in 1284, became part of the Kingdom of England by the Laws in Wales Act 1535. With the Act of Union 1707, the separate kingdoms of England and Scotland, having shared the same monarch since 1603, agreed to a permanent union as the Kingdom of Great Britain. The Act of Union 1800 united the Kingdom of Great Britain with the Kingdom of Ireland, which had been gradually brought under English control between 1169 and 1691, to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland was formed in 1922, after bitter fighting which echoes down to the current political strife, the Anglo-Irish Treaty partitioned Ireland into the Irish Free State and Northern Ireland, with the latter remaining part of the United Kingdom. As provided for in the treaty, Northern Ireland, which consists of six of the nine counties of the Irish province of Ulster, immediately opted out of the Free State and to remain in the UK. The nomenclature of the UK was changed in 1927 to recognise the departure of most of Ireland, with the current name being adopted. 1927 The United Kingdom, the dominant industrial and maritime power of the 19th century, played a leading role in developing Western world ideas of property, liberty, capitalism and parliamentary democracy - to say nothing of its part in advancing world literature and science. At its zenith, the British Empire stretched over one quarter of the Earth's surface and encompassed a third of its population. The first half of the 20th century saw the UK's strength seriously depleted from the effects of World War I and World War II. The second half witnessed the dismantling of the Empire and the UK rebuilding itself into a modern and prosperous nation. The UK has been a member of the European Union since 1973. Its attitude towards further integration is conservative, and there is significant Euroscepticism in UK politics. It has not chosen to adopt the Euro, owing to internal political considerations and the government's judgement of the prevailing economic conditions.
Government and politics
The United Kingdom is a constitutional monarchy, with executive power exercised on behalf of the Queen by the Prime Minister and other cabinet ministers who head departments. The cabinet, including the Prime Minister, and other ministers collectively make up Her Majesty's Government. These ministers are drawn from and are responsible to Parliament, the legislative body, which is traditionally considered to be "supreme" (that is, able to legislate on any matter and not bound by decisions of its predecessors). The UK is one of the few countries in the world today that does not have a codified constitution, relying instead on customs and separate pieces of constitutional law. While the monarch is Head of State and holds all executive power, it is the Prime Minister who is the head of government. The government is answerable chiefly to the House of Commons and the Prime Minister is drawn from this chamber of Parliament by constitutional convention. The majority of cabinet members will be from the House of Commons, the rest from the House of Lords. Ministers do not, however, legally have to come from Parliament, though that is the modern day custom. The British system of government has been emulated around the world - a legacy of the United Kingdom's colonial past - most notably in the other Commonwealth Realms. The Prime Minister is chosen as the MP who can command a majority in the House of Commons - usually the leader of the largest party or, if there is no majority party, the largest coalition. The current Prime Minister is Tony Blair of the Labour Party, who has been in office since 1997. In the United Kingdom the monarch has extensive theoretical powers, but his or her role is mainly, though not exclusively, ceremonial. The monarch is an integral part of Parliament (as the "Crown-in-Parliament") and theoretically gives Parliament the power to meet and create legislation. An Act of Parliament does not become law until it has been signed by the Queen (being given Royal Assent), although no monarch has refused to assent to a bill that has been approved by Parliament since Queen Anne in 1708. Although the abolition of the monarchy has been suggested several times, the popularity of the monarchy remains strong in spite of recent controversies. Support for a British republic usually fluctuates between 15% and 25% of the population, with roughly 10% undecided or indifferent [http://www.mori.com/mrr/2000/c000616.shtml]. The current monarch is Queen Elizabeth II who acceded to the throne in 1952 and was crowned in 1953. Parliament is the national legislature of the United Kingdom. It is the ultimate legislative authority in the United Kingdom, according to the doctrine of parliamentary sovereignty. It is bicameral, composed of the elected House of Commons and the unelected House of Lords, whose members are mostly appointed. The House of Commons is the more powerful of the two houses. The House of Commons has 646 members who are directly elected from single-member constituencies based on population. The House of Lords has 724 members (though this number is not fixed): hereditary peers, life peers, and bishops of the Church of England. The Church of England is the established church of the state in England. established church]] The two largest political parties are the Labour Party and Conservative Party. The UK has long had a two-party system, but in the last 20 years the Liberal Democrats have re-emerged as a large third party. The electoral system used for general elections is first-past-the-post. The constitution of the United Kingdom is un-codified and partially unwritten, which means that no single document regulates how the government works, and unwritten constitutional conventions are used extensively. The constitution is based on the principle that Parliament is the ultimate sovereign body in the country. There has long been a widespread sense of national identity in the Celtic nations. Throughout the late 19th century the UK debated giving Ireland home rule. The Scottish National Party was founded in 1934, and Plaid Cymru (Party of Wales) in 1925. Referenda for devolution succeeded in 1997 for Scotland and Wales and in 1998 for Northern Ireland. In 1999, the Scottish Parliament and the National Assembly for Wales were established, the former having primary legislative power. Proportional representation is used for the elections, which has resulted in a Labour-Liberal Democrat coalition government in Scotland. Due to internal disagreements, the Northern Ireland Assembly has been suspended since 2002.
Subdivisions
The United Kingdom is a country that is divided into four constituent parts:
- England
- Scotland
- Northern Ireland
- Wales The constituent parts of the United Kingdom have administrative subdivisions as follows:
- The regions and administrative counties of England
- The council areas of Scotland
- The counties and county boroughs of Wales
- The districts of Northern Ireland The Laws in Wales Act 1535 incorporated Wales and England into England and Wales for legal purposes. Although all four have historically been divided into counties, England's population is an order of magnitude larger than the others so in recent years it has for some purposes been divided into nine intermediate-level Government Office Regions. Each region is made up of counties and unitary authorities, apart from London, which consists of London boroughs. Although at one point it was intended that each or some of these regions would be given its own regional assembly, the plan's future is uncertain, as of 2004, after the North East region rejected its proposed assembly in a referendum. Scotland consists of 32 Council Areas. Wales consists of 22 Unitary Authorities, styled as 10 County Boroughs, 9 Counties, and 3 Cities. Northern Ireland is divided into 26 Districts. Also sometimes associated with the United Kingdom, though not constitutionally part of the United Kingdom itself, are the Crown dependencies (the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey, and the Isle of Man) as self-governing possessions of the Crown, and a number of overseas territories under the sovereignty of the United Kingdom.
Military
The armed forces of the United Kingdom are known as the British Armed Forces or Her Majesty's Armed Forces, officially the Armed Forces of the Crown. Their Commander-in-Chief is the Queen and they are managed by the Ministry of Defence. Ministry of Defence The British Armed Forces are charged with protecting the United Kingdom and its overseas territories, promoting the United Kingdom's wider security interests, and supporting international peacekeeping efforts. They are active and regular participants in NATO and other coalition operations. The United Kingdom fields one of the most powerful and comprehensive military forces in the World. Its global power projection capabilities are second only to those of the United States Armed Forces. The British Army had a reported strength of 112,700 in 2004, including 7,600 women, and the Royal Air Force a strength of 53,400. The 40,900-member Royal Navy is in charge of the United Kingdom's independent strategic nuclear arm, which consists of four Trident Ballistic Missile Submarines, while the Royal Marines provide infantry units for amphibious assault and for specialist reinforcement forces in and beyond the NATO area. This puts total active duty military troops in the 210,000 range, currently deployed in over 80 countries. The UK's special forces, principally the SAS, provides elite commandos trained for quick, mobile, military responses; often where secrecy or covert operations are required. The Royal Navy is the second largest navy in the World in terms of gross tonnage. Despite the United Kingdom's wide ranging capabilities, recent pragmatic defence policy has a stated assumption that any large operation would be undertaken as part of a coalition. Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq (Granby, No-Fly-Zones, Desert Fox and Telic) may all be taken as precedent - indeed the last true war in which the British military fought alone was the Falklands War of 1982, in which military action was initiated by Argentina and the UK was fighting a defensive, rather than offensive, campaign. The British army has been actively involved in the Troubles in Northern Ireland. However, a programme of demilitarisation is being gradually implemented.
Geography
Troubles World Factbook Map of the United Kingdom]] Most of England consists of rolling lowland terrain, divided east from west by more mountainous terrain in the Northwest (Cumbrian Mountains of the Lake District) and north (the upland moors of the Pennines) and limestone hills of the Peak District by the Tees-Exe line. The lower limestone hills of the Isle of Purbeck, Cotswolds, Lincolnshire and chalk downs of the Southern England Chalk Formation. The main rivers and estuaries are the Thames, Severn and the Humber Estuary. The largest urban area is Greater London. Near Dover, the Channel Tunnel links the United Kingdom with France. There is no peak in England that is 1000 metres (3,300 ft) or greater. Wales is mostly mountainous, the highest peak being Snowdon at 1085 metres (3,560 ft) above sea level. North of the mainland is the island of Anglesey. The largest and capital city is Cardiff, located in South Wales. Scotland's geography is varied, with lowlands in the south and east and highlands in the north and west, including Ben Nevis, the UK's highest mountain at 1343 metres (4,406 ft). There are many long and deep-sea arms, firths, and lochs. A multitude of islands west and north of Scotland are also included, notably the Hebrides, Orkney Islands and Shetland Islands. The largest city is Glasgow. Northern Ireland, making up the north-eastern part of Ireland, is mostly hilly. The main cities are Belfast ('Beal Feirste' in Irish) and Londonderry / Derry ('Doire' in Irish). The province is home to one of the UK’s World Heritage Sites, the Giant's Causeway, which consists of more than 40,000 six-sided basalt columns up to 40 feett (12 m) high. In total it is estimated that the UK includes around 1098 small islands, some being natural and some being crannogs, a type of artificial island which was built in past times using stone and wood, gradually enlarged by natural waste building up over time.
Economy
artificial island The United Kingdom, a leading trading power and financial centre, has an essentially capitalist economy, the fourth largest in the world in terms of market exchange rates and the sixth largest by purchasing power parity (PPP) exchange rates. Over the past three decades, the government has greatly reduced public ownership by means of privatisation programmes, and has contained the growth of the Welfare State. Agriculture is intensive, highly mechanised, and efficient by European standards, producing about 60% of food needs with only 1% of the labour force. The UK has large coal, natural gas, and oil reserves; primary energy production accounts for 10% of GDP, one of the highest shares of any industrial state. Services, particularly banking, insurance and business services, account for by far the largest proportion of GDP. Industry continues to decline in importance, although the UK is still Europe's largest manufacturer of armaments, petroleum products, personal computers, televisions, and mobile telephones. Tourism is also important: with over 24 million tourists a year, between China (33) and Austria (19.1), the United Kingdom is ranked as the sixth major tourist destination in the world. The Blair government has put off the question of participation in the Euro system, citing five economic tests that would need to be met before they recommend that the UK adopts the Euro, and hold a referendum.
Society

Demographics
At the April 2001 census, the United Kingdom's population was 58,789,194, the third-largest in the European Union (behind Germany and metropolitan France) and the twenty-first largest in the world. Its overall population density is one of the highest in the world. Almost one-third of the population lives in England's prosperous south-east and is predominantly urban and suburban--with about 7.2 million in the capital of London. The United Kingdom's high literacy rate (99%) is attributable to universal public education introduced for the primary level in 1870 and secondary level in 1900 (except in Scotland where it was introduced in 1696). Education is mandatory from ages five through sixteen. referendum The Church of England and the Church of Scotland function as the official national religions in their respective countries, but most religions found in the world are represented in the United Kingdom. Anglicanism is the state religion that has been established in England since 1534 during the reign of King Henry VIII. During his reign, England broke ties with the Roman Catholic church and established the Church of England as the offical religion of England. Reforms to the nature of the church's relationship to the state have been ongoing, especially concerning the nature of the House of Lords and the appointment of a fixed amount of the lordships going to Lords Temporal, bishops of the Church of England. A group of islands close to continental Europe, the British Isles have been subject to many invasions and migrations, especially from Scandinavia and the continent, including Roman occupation for several centuries. Contemporary Britons are descended mainly from the varied ethnic stocks that settled there before the eleventh century. The pre-Celtic, Celtic, Roman, Anglo-Saxon, and Norse influences were blended on Great Britain under the Normans, Scandinavian Vikings who had lived in Northern France. Although Celtic languages persist in Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland, the predominant language is English, which is a West Germanic language descended from Old English, featuring a large amount of borrowings from Norman French.The other indigenous languages include the Celtic languages; Welsh, the closely related Irish and Scots Gaelic, and the Cornish language; as well as Lowland Scots, which is closely related to English; Romany; and British Sign Language (Northern Ireland Sign Language is also used in Northern Ireland). Celtic dialectal influences from Cumbric persisted in Northern England for many centuries, most famously in a unique set of numbers used for counting sheep. Recent immigrants, especially from the Commonwealth, speak many other languages, including Bengali, Cantonese, Hindi, Punjabi and Urdu. The United Kingdom has the largest number of Hindi speaking peoples outside of the Indian sub continent.
Culture
Urdu The United Kingdom contains many of the world's leading universities, including the University of Cambridge, the University of Oxford and the University of London (which incorporates, amongst others, Imperial College and University College London), and has produced many great scientists and engineers including Sir Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin and Isambard Kingdom Brunel; the nation is credited with many inventions including the locomotive, vaccination, television, vacuum, and both the internal combustion and the jet engine. The English language has spread to all corners of the world (primarily because of the country’s empire) and is referred to as a ‘global language’. It is now taught as a second language more than any other around the world. Over the next few decades, it is estimated that approximately half the world’s population will be proficient in the language. Playwright William Shakespeare is arguably the most famous writer in the history of the English language; other well-known writers from the United Kingdom include the Brontë sisters (Charlotte, Emily, and Anne), Jane Austen, William Thackeray, J. R. R. Tolkien, John Milton, H. G. Wells and Charles Dickens. Important poets include Lord Byron, Robert Burns, Lord Tennyson and William Blake. Notable composers from the United Kingdom have included William Byrd, John Taverner, William Lawes, John Dowland, Thomas Tallis, and Henry Purcell from the 16th and early 17th centuries, and, more recently, Sir Edward Elgar, Sir Arthur Sullivan (most famous for working with librettist Sir W. S. Gilbert), Ralph Vaughan Williams and Benjamin Britten in the 19th and 20th. George Frideric Handel spent most of his composing life in England. The BBC is the oldest and perhaps the most respected broadcasting network on the globe, with the BBC World Service radio channel and its news output held in particularly high regard. The other main television networks are ITV, Channel 4, five (TV) and Sky Television. Popular programmes in the UK include the three soaps Eastenders, Coronation Street and Emmerdale, as well as the comedy news quiz Have I Got News For You and Reality TV shows Big Brother and The X Factor. Various British TV formats have been exported to other nations, notably Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?, The Weakest Link and The Office. The UK was, with the US, one of the two main contributors in the development of rock and roll, and the UK has provided some of the most famous rock stars, including the Beatles, Queen, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, the Rolling Stones, The Who and many others. The UK was at the forefront of punk rock music in the 1970s with bands such as the Sex Pistols and The Clash, and the subsequent rebirth of heavy metal with bands such as Motörhead and Iron Maiden. In mid to late '90s, the Britpop phenomenon has seen bands such as Oasis, Blur, Radiohead and Coldplay gain international fame. The UK is also at the forefront of electronica, with British artists such as Aphex Twin, Talvin Singh, Nitin Sawhney and Lamb at the cutting edge. The United Kingdom was also associated with music from the Caribbean, with a large number of Jamaicans and other Caribbean nationals being present in the UK.
Sport
A great number of major sports originated in the United Kingdom, including football, golf, cricket, rugby, tennis and boxing. The national sport of the UK is association football, but the UK does not compete as a nation in any major football tournament. Instead, the home nations compete individually as England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. It is because of this unique four-team arrangement that the UK currently does not compete in football events at the Olympic Games. However, a united team will probably take part in the 2012 Summer Olympic Games, as these are hosted in London. The English and Northern Irish football associations have confirmed participation in this team while the Scottish FA and the Welsh FA have declined to participate. The UK also hosts many world-renowned football clubs, such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal in England and Rangers and Celtic in Scotland. Clubs compete in national leagues and competitions and some go on to compete in European competitions. Both forms of rugby are national sports. Rugby League originates from and is generally played in the North of England, whilst Rugby Union is played all over Britain. In Rugby League the UK plays as one nation - Great Britain - whilst in union it is represented by the four nations. England are the current holders of the Rugby Union World Cup. Every four years the British and Irish Lions (comprising the best players from England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland) tour other countries. Cricket is also played in the UK, although it is focussed in England. The Wimbledon Championships are an international tennis event held in Wimbledon in south London every summer and are seen as the most prestigious of the tennis calendar. Golf is one of the most popular participation sports played in the UK and St Andrews in Scotland is the sport's home course.
Miscellaneous topics

External links

- [http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/state/nations/ BBC Nations] History of the nations within the UK.
- [http://www.bbc.co.uk British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)]
- [http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/uk.html CIA World Factbook: UK.]
- [http://www.direct.gov.uk Gateway to UK governmental services and websites.]
- [http://www.number-10.gov.uk Number 10 Downing Street]
- [http://www.statistics.gov.uk Office of National Statistics]
- [http://www.opsi.gov.uk Office of Public Sector Information] Source for all UK legislation 1987-present (successor to Her Majesty's Stationery Office).
- [http://www.macs.hw.ac.uk/britishisles/ The British Isles] Independent view of the UK.
- [http://www.royal.gov.uk The British Monarchy]
- [http://www.parliament.uk/ The United Kingdom Parliament]
- [http://www.statistics.gov.uk/StatBase/Product.asp?vlnk=5703&Pos=&ColRank=1&Rank=272 Official Yearbook of the UK] factbook produced by the Office for National Statistics (years 2000 to 2005 available online).
- [http://www.ukcities.co.uk UK Cities] lists a variety of useful resources for every city in the UK.
- [http://www.justuk.org UK travel guide] United Kingdom for travellers.
- [http://www.world66.com/europe/unitedkingdom World66 Guide to United Kingdom] A travel guide written by its users.
- [http://www.multimap.co.uk www.multimap.co.uk] provides online maps and aerial photographs of the UK.
- [http://www.streetmap.co.uk www.streetmap.co.uk] an alternative to multimap.
- [http://www.freeworldmaps.net/europe/united-kingdom/map.html Physical map of United Kingdom.]
- [http://www.upmystreet.com www.upmystreet.com] detailed localised information about places in the United Kingdom.
- [http://www.parks.it/world/UK/Eindex.html UK Parks] National parks, Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty and other protected areas. ----
Category:British Isles Category:European countries Category:European Union member states Category:Members of the Commonwealth of Nations Category:Monarchies A als:Grossbritannien und Nordirland zh-min-nan:Liân-ha̍p Ông-kok ko:영국 ms:United Kingdom ja:イギリス simple:United Kingdom th:สหราชอาณาจักร

Playwright

A playwright, also known as a dramatist, is someone who writes dramatic literature or drama. These works may be written specifically to be performed by actors or they may be closet dramas or literary works written using dramatic forms but not meant for performance. The term is not a variant spelling of playwrite, but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder (as in a wheelwright or cartwright). Hence the prefix and the suffix combine to indicate someone who crafts plays. The homophone with write is in this case coincidental.

History

The earliest playwrights in Western literature with surviving works are Ancient Greeks with some of the earliest plays being written around the5th century BC. These playwrights are notable as they established forms that are still relied on by modern playwrights. Notable among them are Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, and Aristophanes. Shakespeare is considered to have written classical tragedies and comedies which lots of other work is based on. For example, Kiss Me Kate is based on The Taming of the Shrew and Romeo and Juliet has been remade more times than can be counted. Many playwrights are never known because only historical successes and current successes such as Broadway hits become known. Many more off-Broadway, off-off Broadway, student playwrights, and plays that never see the light of day, among others, are still playwrights even if they never achieve commercial or popular success. Contemporarily, successful playwrights – in stark contrast to the lot of the screenwriter — are often high-status figures in their industry. This is a corollary of the more literary approach that has characterised the theatre since its roots in poetry. The form has a greater reverence for the text and is much less oriented around a director. The playwright’s vision often takes precedence. In recent years this attitude has started to be slowly overhauled. A less rigidly formal approach to text for performance is now common, informed by practitioners like Jerzy Grotowski, Joan Littlewood and her protégé Mike Leigh. Documentary plays are also a common feature of the theatrical landscape since the middle of the Twentieth Century when they were employed, often tendentiously, in agit-prop or general political protest. These plays demand something different of a playwright, often the editing and reproduction of the other people’s words within a narrative structure. A recent example is Stuff Happens, David Hare’s 2004 play about the Iraq War, in which many of the speeches were taken verbatim from George W. Bush, Tony Blair et al.

External links

- [http://www.playwriting101.com/ Playwriting 101] - A playwriting tutorial written by playwright and screenwriter Jon Dorf. ja:劇作家 Category:Media occupations Category:Theatre

Liverpool Playhouse

The Liverpool Playhouse is a theatre in Williamson Square in the city of Liverpool, England. Although parts of the Grade II listed building date back to 1844, the main theatre was built in 1866 when it was the Star Music Hall. A repertory company was established in 1911, and disbanded in 1999. Among actors in the company were Robert Donat, Michael Redgrave, Anthony Hopkins and Ian McKellen. During the Second World War it was home to the Old Vic. The theatre was briefly closed in the late nineties, but has now reopened and has become the venue for numerous acclaimed new productions of old plays, in contrast to its sister theatre, the Everyman Theatre, which has focused on new works.

Mohair

Mohair is a silk-like fabric made from the hair of the Angora goat and rabbit. It is durable, light and warm, although some people find it uncomfortably itchy. The word was adopted into English before 1570 from the Arabic mukhayyar, a type of haircloth, literally 'choice', from khayyara, 'he chose'. Mohair is used to make sweaters, berets, and other clothing. It is mostly popular among women. Category:Textiles Category:Arabic words Category:Animal hair products

Wildfire

(image taken from the International Space Station)]] A wildfire, also known as a forest fire, vegetation fire, grass fire, brush fire, or bushfire (in Australasia), is an uncontrolled fire often occurring in wildland areas, but which can also consume houses or agricultural resources. Common causes include lightning, human carelessness and arson. Drought and the prevention of small forest fires are major contributors to extreme forest fires. The word "wildfire" originated as a synonym for Greek Fire, a napalm-like substance used in medieval Europe as a naval weapon; the word attained its present meaning by a common misunderstanding of the expression "spread like wildfire". Europe ----

Background

Europe] Wildfires are common in many places around the world, including much of the vegetated areas of Australia, forest areas of the United States and Canada, where the climates are sufficiently moist to allow the growth of trees, but feature extended dry, hot periods when fallen branches, leaves, and other material can dry out and becomes highly flammable. Wildfires are also common in grasslands and scrublands. Wildfires tend to be most common and severe during years of drought and occur on days of strong winds. With extensive urbanization of wildlands, these fires often involve destruction of suburban homes located in the wildland urban interface, a zone of transition between developed areas and undeveloped wildland. Today it is accepted that wildfires are a natural part of the ecosystem of wildlands, where, at the least, plants have evolved to survive fires by a variety of strategies (from possessing reserve shoots that sprout after a fire, to fire-resistant seeds), or even encourage fire (for example eucalypts contain flammable oils in the leaves) as a way to eliminate competition from less fire-tolerant species. In 2004, researchers discovered that exposure to smoke from burning plants actually promotes germination in other types of plants by inducing the production of the chemical butenolide. Most native animals, too, are adept at surviving wildfires. On occasions, wildfires have caused large-scale damage to private or public property, destroying many homes and causing deaths, particularly when they have reached urban-fringe communities. Slash (small, rotten, misshapen, or otherwise undesirable wood discarded during logging) has historically provided the fuel for devastating fires such as the fires in Michigan in the 19th century. The aftermath of a wildfire can be as disastrous if not more so than the actual fire itself. A particularly destructive fire burns away plants and trees that prevent erosion. If heavy rains occur after such a fire, landslides, ash flows, and flash floods can occur. This can result in property damage in the immediate fire area, and can affect the water quality of streams, rivers and lakes. Wildfires burned long before humans evolved. One main component of Carboniferous north hemisphere coal is charcoal left over by forest fires.

Behavior

charcoal When the water reserves in the soil are between 100% and 30%, the evaporation of water in plants is balanced by water absorbed from the soil. Below this threshold, the plants dry out, releasing flammable essences to keep some moisture. A consequence of a long hot and dry period is that the air contains flammable essences and plants are drier and highly flammable. The propagation of the fire has three mechanisms:
- "crawling" fire: the fire spreads via low level vegetation (e.g., bushes)
- "crown" fire: a fire that "crowns" (spreads to the top branches of trees) can spread at an incredible pace through the top of a forest
- "jumping" fire: burning branches and leaves are carried by the wind and start distant fires; the fire can thus "jump" over a road, river, or even a firebreak The Nevada Bureau of Land Management identifies several different wildfire behaviors. For example, extreme fire behavior includes wide rates of spread, prolific crowning and/or spotting, the presence of fire whirls, or a strong convection column. Extreme wildfires behave erratically and unpredictably. In southern California, under the influence of Santa Ana winds, wildfires can move at tremendous speeds, up to 40 miles (60 km) in a single day, consuming up to 1,000 acres (4 km²) per hour. Dense clouds of burning embers push relentlessly ahead of the flames crossing firebreaks without pause. firebreak The powerful updraft caused by a large wildfire will draw in air from surrounding areas. These self-generated winds can lead to a phenomenon known as a firestorm. French models of wildfires dictate that a fire's front line will take on the characteristic shape of a pear; the major axis being aligned with the wind. In the case of the fires in southeastern France, the speed of the fire is estimated to be 3% to 8% of the speed of the wind, depending on the conditions (density and type of vegetation, slope). Other models predict an elliptical shape when the ground is flat and the vegetation is homogeneous.

Prevention

For many decades the policy of the United States Forest Service was to suppress all fires, and this policy was epitomized by the mascot Smokey Bear and was also the basis of parts of the movie Bambi. The policy began to be questioned in the 1960s, when it was realized that no new sequoias had been grown in the redwood forests of California, because fire is an essential part of their life cycle. This produced the policy of controlled burns to reduce underbrush. This clears much of the undergrowth through forest and woodland areas, making travel and hunting much easier while reducing the risk of dangerous high-intensity fires caused by many years of fuel buildup. The previous policy of absolute fire suppression in the United States has resulted in the buildup of fuel in some ecosystems such as dry ponderosa pine forests. However, this concept has been misapplied in a "one-size-fits-all" application to other ecosystems such as California chaparral. Fire suppression in southern California has had very little impact over the past century. The amount of land burned in 6 southern California counties has been relatively unchanged. In fact, fire frequency has been increasing dramatically over the past century in lock step with population growth. Urbanization can also result in fuel buildup and devastating fires, such as those in Los Alamos, New Mexico, East Bay Hills, within the California cities of Oakland and Berkeley between October 19 and 22, 1991, all over Colorado in 2002, and throughout southern California in October 2003. Homes designed without considering the fire prone environment in which they are built have been the primary reason for the catastrophic losses experienced in wildfires. On average, wildfires burn 4.3 million acres (17,000 km²) in the United States annually. In recent years the federal government has spent $1 billion a year on fire suppression. 2002 was a record year for fires with major fires in Arizona, California, Colorado, and Oregon. The risk of major wildfires can be achieved partly by a reduction of the amount of fuel present. In wildland, this can be accomplished by either conducting controlled burns, deliberately setting areas ablaze under less dangerous weather when conditions are less volatile or physical fuel removal by removing some trees as is conducted in many American forests. Such techniques are best used within the wildland/urban interface where communities connect with wild open space. Prescribed burns in the backcountry, away from human habitations, are not particularly effective in preventing large fires. All the large catastrophic fires in the United States have been wind driven events where the amount of fuel (trees, shrubs, etc.) has not been the most important factor in fire spread. People living in fire-prone areas typically take a variety of precautions, including building their homes out of flame-resistant materials, reducing the amount of fuel near the home or property (including firebreaks, their own miniature control lines, in effect), and investing in their own firefighting equipment. Rural farming communities are rarely threatened directly by wildfire. These types of communities are usually located in large areas of cleared, usually grazed, land, and in the drought conditions present in wildfire years there is often very little grass left on such grazed areas. Hence the risk is minimized. However, urban fringes have spread into forested areas, for example in Sydney and Melbourne, and communities have literally built themselves in the middle of highly flammable forests. These communities are at high risk of destruction in bushfires, and should take extra precautions.

Fire suppression

Melbourne drops fire retardant on wildfires in Southern California]]Most fire-prone areas have large firefighter services to help control bushfires. As well as the water-spraying firetrucks most commonly used in urban firefighting, bushfire services use a variety of alternative techniques. Typically, forest fire fighting organizations will use large crews of 20 or more people who travel in trucks to the fire. These crews use heavier equipment to construct firebreaks, and are the mainstay of most firefighting efforts. Other personnel are organized into fast attack teams typically consisting of 5–8 people. These fast attack teams are helicoptered into smaller fires or hard to reach areas as a preemptive strike force. They use portable pumps to douse small fires and chainsaws to construct firebreaks or helicopter landing pads if more resources are required. Hand tools are commonly used to construct firebreaks and remove fuels around the perimeter of the fire to halt its spread, including shovels, rakes, and the pulaski, a tool unique to wildland firefighting. In the eastern United States, portable leaf blowers are sometimes used. In the western United States, large fires often become extended campaigns, and temporary fire camps are constructed to provide food, showers, and rest to fire crews. These large fires are often handled by 20 person hand crews, sometimes known as "hotshot" crews, specially organized to travel to large fires. Fast attack teams are often considered the elite of firefighting forces, as they sometimes deploy in unusual ways. If the fire is on a particularly steep hill or in a densely wooded area, they may rappel or fast-rope down from helicopters. If the fire is extremely remote, firefighters known as smokejumpers may parachute into site from fixed-wing aircraft. In addition to the aircraft used for deploying ground personnel, firefighting outfits often possess helicopters and water bombers specially equipped for use in aerial firefighting. These aircraft can douse areas that are inaccessible to ground crews and deliver greater quantities of water and/or flame retardant chemicals. Managing all of these various resources over such a large area in often very rugged terrain is extremely challenging, and often the Incident Command System is used. As such, each fire will have a designated fireboss who oversees and coordinates all the operations on the fire. This fireboss is ultimately responsible for the safety of the firefighters and for the success of firefighting efforts. fireboss Large fires are of such a size that no conceivable firefighting service could attempt to douse the whole fire directly, and so alternative techniques are used. In alternative approaches, firefighters attempt to control the fire by controlling the area that it can spread to, by creating "control lines", which are areas that contain no combustible material. These control lines can be produced by physically removing fuel (for instance, with a bulldozer), or by "backburning", in which small, low-intensity fires are started, using a device such as the driptorch, or pyrotechnic flares known as "fusees", to burn the flammable material in a (hopefully) controlled way. These may then be extinguished by firefighters or, ideally, directed in such a way that they meet the main fire front, at which point both fires run out of flammable material and are thus extinguished. flare] Unfortunately, such methods can fail in the face of wind shifts causing fires to miss control lines or to jump straight over them (for instance, because a burning tree falls across a line, burning embers are carried by the wind over the line, or burning tumbleweeds cross the line). The actual goals of firefighters vary. Protection of life (those of both the firefighters and "civilians") is given top priority, then private property according to economic and social value and also to its "savability" (for example, more effort will be expended on saving a house with a tile roof than one with a wooden-shake roof). In very severe, large fires, this is sometimes the only possible action. Protecting houses is regarded as more important than, say, farming machinery sheds, although firefighters, if possible, try to keep fires off farmland to protect stock and fences (steel fences are destroyed by the passage of fire, as the wire is irreversibly stretched and weakened by it). Preventing the burning of publicly owned forested areas is generally of least priority, and, indeed, it is quite common (in Australia, at least) for firefighters to simply observe a fire burn towards control lines through forest rather than attempt to put it out more quickly; it is, after all, a natural process. Ensuring the safety of firefighters takes priority over fire suppression when a situation becomes dangerous. When arriving on a scene a fire crew will establish a safe zone, known as an "anchor point", which they can retreat to if necessary, and are trained to keep aware of escape routes and designate lookouts (known by the acronym LCES, for lookouts, communications, escape routes, safety zones). They carry portable fire shelters that can be deployed if all else fails. This emphasis on safety is reinforced with a list of 18 "watch out situations" for firefighters to be aware of, which warn of potentially dangerous conditions.

French strategy

Forest covers about 28% of France (189,000 km², 46.7 million acres); the biggest forest is the forêt des Landes de Gascogne, a pine forest which covers over 10,000 km² (2.5 million acres), mostly part being in the Landes (6,193 km², 1.53 million acres). This relatively small area allows for excellent forest management. Preventive logging (used for the wood and paper industries) and mandatory clearing of undergrowth for private landowners are enforced. The law forbids the construction of isolated homes in fire-prone areas. These measures usually eliminate the need to send teams to remote zones that are not accessible from the ground; airborne teams are seldom used (there are no smokejumpers), but teams are occasionally deployed via helicopter (e.g., on the top of a hill). However, the regulations are not strictly applied, partly due to conflicting interest: undergrowth are interesting for hunters (an important lobby in rural area) because they hide boars, mayors allow the construction of isolated homes to attract rich citizens, pines are preferred to other species because they are more cost-effective (but burn much easier than, for example, cork oak)… It is symptomatic to note that there are fewer fires in the biggest forêt des Landes de Gascogne than in the massif des Maures, which is much smaller (334.85 km², 82,741 acres). The firefighting system is called DFCI (défense des forêts contre l'incendie, literally "Forest defense against fire"). The system used for the localization is called "DFCI coordinates" (coordonnées DFCI) and the access tracks are called "DFCI tracks" (chemins DFCI). Three different forces are involved in fire prevention and firefighting:
- the police forces (Police nationale, Gendarmerie and foresters), for the prevention (patrols, information of wanderers, possibly sanction of dangerous acts);
- département employees (sapeurs forestiers, forest sappers) and volunteers construct preventive firebreaks and keep a firewatch;
- sapeurs-pompiers (french firefighters); local firefighters are reinforced in summer by columns from lower risk départements and by military troops assigned to the civile defense (UIISC, Unité d'instruction et d'intervention de la sécurité civile). Météo France, the French national meteorology institute, computes an index for 40 locations in France (3 are in the Landes), the "forest meteo index" (indice forêt météo, IFM). This index ranges from 0 to 20, the higher the index, the higher the risk. This index helps in prepositioning men and vehicles. A strategy pioneered in France dictates that firefighters attack the sides of the fire to make the head as small as possible and limit its propagation until it dies. This attack can be performed by land teams or by air units. Excellent coordination is required between air and land teams: dropping tons of water on ground-based firefighters can cause severe injuries and death. Usually, land teams attack one side and air teams attack the other. To prevent accidents, land-based firefighters will raise their fire hose and shoot water into the air if they hear an aircraft. The water jet is easy to see from the air and allows air crews to avoid those firefighters' positions. French firefighters do not use backburning. The firebreaks are made preventively and are not aimed at stopping the fire. Rather, they are used as access lines and withdrawal routes. Land teams use four-wheel drive fire engines called "tank engines for wildfire" (CCF, camion-citerne pour feu de forêt), with three (sometimes four) firefighters and 2,000 to 4,500 L of water. These engines have a protection system that sprays water around the truck in case it is surrounded by the fire; in such a case, the firefighters lock themselves in the truck. For this reason, a minimum water level is always kept (300 to 500 L). Individual equipment also includes a filtering hood (similar to a gas mask) and a protective poncho in case the firefighter could not reach the truck. Unfortunately, this is sometimes not sufficient and several deaths occur each year in southern France and Corsica. Maintaining an adequate water supply to the front lines is very difficult. Inflatable tanks are often prepositioned in strategic places downwind of a fire. They also use 30-ton tank trucks, called "large capacity tank trucks" (CCGC, camion citerne de grande capacité). As in other jurisdictions, the main concern is the protection of people and houses. The population is always evacuated beforehand. The protection of a house consists of:
- parking the car inside the garage;
- closing the shutters;
- spraying water on the house to prevent the temperature rising via radiation;
- making a line of wet ground to direct the fire around the building. Protecting a house usually involves four fire engines; isolated houses are the greatest problem.

Atmospheric effects

Most of the Earth's weather and air pollution reside in the troposphere, the part of the atmosphere that extends from the surface of the planet to a height of between 8 and 13 kilometers. A severe thunderstorm in the area of a large wildfire can have its vertical lift enhanced to boost smoke, soot and other particles as high as the lower stratosphere (Wang, 2003). Previously, it was thought that most particles in the stratosphere came from volcanoes or were generated by high-flying aircraft. Collection of air samples from the stratosphere in 2003 led to detection of carbon monoxide and other gasses related to combustion at a level 30 times higher than can be accounted for by commercial aircraft. Satellite observation of smoke plumes from wildfires revealed that the plumes could be traced intact for distances exceeding 5,000 kilometers. This observation suggests that the plumes were in the stratosphere above weather conditions that would have brought the plume back to earth. Atmospheric models suggest that these concentrations of sooty particles could increase absorption of incoming solar radiation during winter months by as much as 15% (Baumgardner, et al., 2003).

Statistics

Every year, the burnt surface represents about:
- France: 300 km², 12,140 acres, 0.04% of the territory
- Portugal:
- 1991 : 1,820 km², 449,732 acres, i.e. 2% of the territory
- 2003 : 4,249 km², 1.05 million acres, i.e. 4.6% of the territory; 20 deaths ;
- 2004 : 1,205 km², 297,836 acres, i.e. 1.3% of the territory
- 2005 : 2,864 km², 707,668 acres, i.e. 3.1% of the territory; 17 deaths;
- United States: 17,400 km², 4.3 million acres i.e. 0.18% of the territory

References

- Baumgardner, D., et al. 2003. Warming of the Arctic lower stratosphere by light absorbing particle. American Geophysical Union fall meeting. Dec. 8-12. San Francisco.
- Fromm, M., et al. 2003. Stratospheric smoke down under: Injection from Australian fires/convection in January 2003. American Geophysical Union fall meeting. Dec. 8-12. San Francisco.
- Johnson, E.A. and Miyanishi K. (Eds.) 2001. Forest Fires - Behavior and Ecological Effects. Academic Press, San Diego.
- Pyne, S.J. et al. 1996. Introduction to Wildland Fire. Wiley, New York.
- Wang, P.K. 2003. The physical mechanism of injecting biomass burning materials into the stratosphere during fire-induced thunderstorms. American Geophysical Union fall meeting. Dec. 8-12. San Francisco.

External links

- [http://www.nifc.gov/information.html Current Wildland Fire Information]
- [http://www.usfa.fema.gov/applications/publications/tr060.cfm FEMA report on the East Bay Hills Fire]
- [http://www.fire.uni-freiburg.de/ Global Fire Monitoring Center (GFMC)]
- [http://www.infoaboutnetwork.com/view/news/531/ Interesting Forest Fire Policy]
- [http://www.nifc.gov/safety_study/10-18-lces.html The 10 standard fire orders and 18 watch out situations]
- [http://siadex.ugr.es/ SIADEX: A decision support system for fighting forest fires in Andalusia]
- [http://www.geomac.gov/ GeoMAC: Wildfire information and internet map viewer of current wildfires in the United States]
- [http://activefiremaps.fs.fed.us/ Locations of large fires in the US and Canada based upon MODIS satellite imagery] Category:Natural hazards Category:Climate forcing agents

Royal Court Theatre

The Royal Court Theatre is a non-commercial theatre in Sloane Square, in the Chelsea area of London noted for its contributions to modern theatre. Since 1956 it has been home to a resident company, the English Stage Company. The present building was constructed in 1888. It first attained prominence under the management of Harley Granville-Barker. Many of George Bernard Shaw's plays were initially produced at the Royal Court. After a brief period as a cinema, and after having been damaged by bombing during World War II, the theatre re-opened in 1952 and was acquired by the English Stage Company in 1956. The theatre became noted for its commitment to serious works by contemporary playwrights, often becoming involved in issues of censorship. There are two performance spaces in the building. The "Theatre Downstairs" is a 400-seat proscenium arch auditorium and the "Theatre Upstairs" is a 60-seat studio. The theatre received a major overhaul in the late 1990s, and reopened in February 2000. The auditorium was retained, but both the backstage and front of house facilities were radically improved. The Royal Court Theatre is known for its new writing. It has, since 1994 an artistic policy directed to finding and producing a new generation of playwrights. The writers have included Joe Penhall, Sarah Kane, Mark Ravenhill, Roy Williams amongst others. It is still inspired by the vision of first artistic director George Devine. The current Artistic Director is Ian Rickson as of 2005 and previous to that it was Stephen Daldry. Young writers (between 13 and 25) can apply to the Young Writers' Programme, which regularly catapults young writers into the limelight.

Bibliography

Bergan,Ronald (1992).The Great Theatres of London: An Illustrated Companion. London: Trafalgar Square Publishing. ISBN 1853750573 Roberts,Philip (1999). The Royal Court Theatre and the modern stage. Cambridge, UK ; Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521479622

External link

[http://www.royalcourttheatre.com/about_detail.asp?ArticleID=14 Royal Court Theatre website] Category:Kensington & Chelsea Category:Theatres in London Category:Theatre companies

Bush Theatre

The Bush Theatre, based in Shepherd's Bush, London, is one of Britain's leading new writing theatres.

External link

- [http://www.bushtheatre.co.uk/ The Bush Theatre]

Donmar Warehouse

The Donmar Warehouse is a small theatre in the Covent Garden area of the West End of London.

History

Theatrical producer Donald Albery formed the Donmar company in 1953, the name reputedly formed from DONald Albery and MARgot Fonteyn, the ballerina and a close personal friend. In 1961, Albery bought the site, a space that was once the vat room and hop warehouse of a brewery, as a private drama studio and rehearsal room for Fonteyn's London Festival Ballet. It was acquired as a theatre by the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1977. The theatre became an independent producing house in 1992.

Current status

The Donmar Warehouse produces predominantly high-brow plays and has a very high artistic reputation. Sam Mendes was the artistic director of the Donmar Warehouse for a number of years before he began to concentrate on film direction. Numerous well known British and non-British actors have appeared at the theatre, most famously Nicole Kidman in The Blue Room. The current artistic director is Michael Grandage.

External link

- [http://www.donmarwarehouse.com/ Official website] Category:Camden Category:Theatres in London ja:ドンマー・ウエアハウス

Duke of York's Theatre

The Duke of York's Theatre in London, UK, opened on 10 September 1892 with Wedding Eve, was built for Frank Wyatt and his wife, Violet Melnotte. Initially called the Trafalgar Square, the name was shortened to Trafalgar in 1894 and the following year became the Duke of York's to honour the future King George V. In 1900, Jerome K Jerome's Miss Hobbs was staged as well as David Belasco's Madame Butterfly, which was seen by Puccini, who later turned it into the famous opera. In the late 1970s the freehold of the theatre was purchased by Capital Radio and it closed in 1979 for refurbishment. It reopened in February 1980 and the first production under the patronage of Capital Radio was Rose, starring Glenda Jackson.The Ambassador Theatre Group bought the theatre in 1992 and this coincided with London's hottest show, The Royal Court's production of Ariel Dorfman's Death and the Maiden. A host of successes followed including Richard O'Brien's The Rocky Horror Show - celebrating its 21st Birthday and the hugely successful Royal Court Classics Season in 1995. Category:Westminster Category:Theatres in London

John Whiting

John Whiting (November 15, 1917–June 16, 1963) was an English dramatist and critic. Whiting, John Whiting, John Whiting, John

Royal National Theatre

The Royal National Theatre of Great Britain is a building and theatre company on London's South Bank, located immediately east of the southern end of Waterloo Bridge. It houses three separate auditoria: the Olivier Theatre (named for the theatre's first artistic director, Sir Laurence Olivier), the Lyttelton Theatre (after Oliver Lyttelton, the first chairman of the Theatre), and the Cottesloe Theatre (for Lord Cottesloe, chairman of the South Bank Theatre Board). The National Theatre was designed by architect Sir Denys Lasdun and opened in 1976. The honorific "Royal" was added to the name in c.2000. The largest space, the Olivier Theatre, is the main auditorium, and was modelled on the ancient Greek theatre at Epidaurus; it has an open stage and a fan-shaped audience seating area for about 1,160 people. The Lyttleton Theatre is a proscenium arch design holding up to 890 people. The Cottesloe Theatre is a small adaptable studio space holding up to 300 people. The National Theatre presents a highly varied programme, including Shakespeare and other classics, new plays by leading contemporary playwrights, and revivals of classic musicals. Each theatre runs in repertory, thus further widening the number of plays which can be put on during any one season. proscenium arch

Artistic directors

- Laurence Olivier (1963–1973)
- Peter Hall (1973–1988)
- Richard Eyre (1988–1997)
- Trevor Nunn (1997–2003)
- Nicholas Hytner (2003– )

Notable productions

- Jumpers and Arcadia by Tom Stoppard
- The Royal Hunt of the Sun, Equus, and Amadeus by Peter Shaffer
- Hamlet with Albert Finney, one of the opening productions in the Lyttelton
- Ken Campbell's The Illuminatus! Trilogy, which opened the Cottesloe
- Lark Rise and The Mysteries, both Promenade Productions in the Cottesloe
- Betrayal by Harold Pinter
- Plenty and Pravda by David Hare
- Jerry Springer - The Opera
- An Inspector Calls, 1992 (still touring 2005)
- His Dark Materials, 2004
- The Madness of George III and The History Boys by Alan Bennett

External link

[http://www.nt-online.org/ Official website] Category:Theatre companies Category:Lambeth Category:Brutalist structures Category:Theatres in London

Evening Standard

]] The Evening Standard is a newspaper published in London. It was launched as the Standard on May 21, 1827; for a short period during the 1990s it reverted to its original name. (Some other local newspapers have also been named "Evening Standard".) In the beginning of the 20th century the paper was owned by Canadian tycoon Lord Beaverbrook, who also owned the Daily Express. At this time there were 14 evening newspapers in London, but one by one they merged until there were three left. The Star merged with the Evening News in 1960, and the two remaining papers were great rivals until they shared ownership in the 1980s. In 1987 the Evening News was incorporated into the Evening Standard, leaving London with one single evening paper. The Evening News name still appears on the Standards masthead. The paper is currently owned by Daily Mail and General Trust, publishers of the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, and Metro. From the perspective of keeping up with London developments, new buildings and initiatives, showing how the city is changing, it is considered highly authoritative. The newspaper currently publishes four editions each day, from Monday to Friday excluding Bank holidays. The Evening Standard has sponsored the annual Evening Standard Theatre Awards since the 1950s. The newpaper has also awarded the annual Evening Standard Pub of the Year and the Evening Standard British Film Awards since the 1970s. Max Hastings was editor from 1996 until his retirement in 2002. Veronica Wadley is the current editor. On 14 December 2004 Associated Newspapers launched a freesheet edition of the Evening Standard called Standard Lite in a bid to stop the circulation of the publication falling further. This has 48 pages compared to approximately 80 in the main paper, which also has a supplement on most days. It is designed to be especially attractive to younger female readers, and features a wide range of lifestyle articles but less news and business news than the main paper. It is only available until 2.30pm. For many British people the plaintive Cockney cry of the newspaper's street sellers represents an essential part of the London fabric - "Eenin Stannard". This was the subject of a Morecambe and Wise sketch in which Ernie Wise, with some difficulty, managed to get Eric Morecambe to say "Morning Standard" rather than "Morny Stannit", only to find that the paper was in fact called the "Morny Stannit."
Supplements
On Fridays, the Evening Standard publishes ES, a glossy lifestyle magazine which contains articles on the lives of wealthy London socialites. Category:British newspapers Category:London media

Bush Theatre

The Bush Theatre, based in Shepherd's Bush, London, is one of Britain's leading new writing theatres.

External link

- [http://www.bushtheatre.co.uk/ The Bush Theatre]

Donmar Warehouse

The Donmar Warehouse is a small theatre in the Covent Garden area of the West End of London.

History

Current status

External link

- [http://www.donmarwarehouse.com/ Official website] Category:Camden Category:Theatres in London ja:ドンマー・ウエアハウス

Beautiful Thing

Arguably the first movie to show a realistic same-sex romance between two gay teens, Beautiful Thing is based on the play by Jonathan Harvey, who also wrote the screenplay for this 1996 Channel Four production. Initially, the movie was only intended for TV broadcast, but it was so well-received that it was later released theatrically. Set and filmed in Thamesmead, a working class area of London, Jamie (Glen Berry), a teen who is more than a little infatuated with his handsome classmate, Ste (Scott Neal), has to deal with his single mother Sandra (Linda Henry), who is totally occupied with her ambitious plans to open her own pub, and with her ever-changing lovers. Jamie's homosexuality, while he tries to hide it somewhat, is reason enough for his classmates to maltreat him wherever they can. Ste, who is living together with his drug-trafficking brother and his alcoholic father in the apartment next door, one night gets abused by his father so badly that Sandra takes pity and lets him sleep over. Lacking a third bed, Ste has to make do with sleeping head-to-toe with Jamie, who tries his best not to act too excited. However, after a memorable scene that demonstrates an imaginative use of peppermint foot lotion, the boys soon change sleeping arrangements to something more convenient. The next morning, Ste panics because he had sex with Jamie and runs away. A few days later, Jamie finally spots him at a nearby party and decides he will tell Ste about his feelings for him. Slowly it dawns on Ste, that he should accept another person's love, this most Beautiful Thing of all, no matter if other people find that idea repulsive. The movie ends with the two slowly dancing to the tunes of Cass Elliot, with a guarding Sandra, who has discovered that being a caring mother is for her more of a Beautiful Thing than sleeping around with men, at their side. Aside from the unusual teenage subject matter, this film achieves an amazing blend of realism and gay romanticism unparalleled by other works. Thus, while Ste's problems with family and Jamie's problems at school are probably recognizable for any gay teenager, the movie is really about gay feelings and not so much about the problems they may cause. The plot cleverly avoids the common trap many other supposed gay movies have fallen into, namely being more issue-driven than character-driven (e.g., Philadelphia starring Tom Hanks). Jonathan Harvey reportedly discovered Mama Cass and The Mamas And The Papas when shopping for second-hand records. This is fortunate, as the soundtrack perfectly mirrors the movie's tone and has lyrics that seem very fitting, in particular "Make Your Own Kind Of Music". For a slightly more adult take on a similar subject matter, see Presque rien by Sebastien Lifshitz.

Theatrical productions

The film is based on Jonathan Harvey's original play script.
- February 1998: The Australian premiere was directed by Michael Darragh and produced by Make Believe Productions in Sydney. A Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras festival event, the critically-acclaimed independent production starred Fiona Harris, Simon Corfield, Andrew Wallace, Natalie Murray and Charles Kevin.

External links

- Category:LGBT-related films Category:1996 films

Coronation Street

Coronation Street is Britain's longest-running television soap opera, and the UK's consistently highest-rated show. It was created by Tony Warren and first broadcast on the ITV network on Friday December 9, 1960. The working title of the show was Florizel Street, but Agnes, a tea lady at Granada Television, Manchester, (where Coronation Street is produced) remarked that "Florizel" sounded too much like a disinfectant. Jubilee Street was another option considered. Coronation Street (nicknamed Corrie or the street, or, less commonly, Coro or Corra and even Corruption Street) is set in a fictional street in the fictional industrial town of Weatherfield which is based on Salford, now part of Greater Manchester (a Coronation Street does exist in Salford). Its principal rival soap operas are ITV1's Emmerdale and BBC1's EastEnders. The show's iconic theme music, a brass-band throwback to the sounds of the 1940s, was written by Eric Spear and has been only slightly modified since the show's beginning. Coronation Street can be seen on ITV1 on Sunday, Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 7:30 p.m. There is also an extra episode on Monday night at 8:30 p.m. Granada and ITV executives, as well as the people in charge of distributing the show overseas, have called (and still call, as of 2005) Coronation Street the world's longest-running soap opera. The Guinness Book of Records recognises American soap opera Guiding Light as the world's longest-running soap opera, with over fifty years on television and an extra fifteen on radio.

Background to Coronation Street

Guiding Light Originally broadcast live, it is now pre-recorded, usually four to six weeks in advance of broadcast. Whereas rival British soap operas are known either for their gritty gloom (EastEnders) or their cutting, sharp one-liners (Emmerdale), Coronation Street is known on occasions for its light, almost camp humour, though it has tackled some controversial topics and storylines. See Most controversial storylines of Coronation Street for details. The "Street" is based in a terraced row of seven working-class houses (for some years, six, with a garden in the place of the seventh) with a public house, or pub, and a corner shop at each end. According to the storyline, the Street was built in 1902, and named after that year's big national event, the coronation of King Edward VII. The Street is located between Rosamund Street and Viaduct Street. The architecture of the Street was based on Archie Street, Salford, which appeared in the programme's original opening credits. The Street itself was originally a set built inside a studio, with the houses reduced in scale. This was awkward for the actors, who had to walk more slowly than normal to appear in scale with the set. Edward VII In 1968, Granada decided to build an outside set. All interactions on the outside street were previously filmed on a soundstage. This new set was built on some old railway sidings near the Granada Studios, and coincided with a storyline of the demolition of Ellison's Raincoat Factory and the Mission Hall and the subsequent building of maisonettes opposite the terrace. To usher in the erection of the new set, a special-effects-laden storyline involving a train wreck was filmed; the viewers did not know if Ena Sharples was dead under the rubble. In the early 1970s roofs and back yards were added, but the set was still reduced in scale and quite cramped. Also, the famous cobbles were not parallel to the houses. This site later became the New York Street at the now-closed Granada Studios Tour complex in the late 1980s and 1990s. In 1982 a modern, full-size exterior street was built in the Granada backlot; because it was meant to be permanent the houses were constructed from reclaimed Salford brick, rather than wood and scaffolding. However, the houses had no interior walls — the chimneys had to be made of fibreglass, since there would otherwise be insufficient support. Even now, several Granada towerblocks dominate the skyline over the street

Jonathan Harvey

Jonathan Harvey (composer)

United Kingdom

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Sport

Miscellaneous topics

External links

Playwright

History

See also

External links

Liverpool Playhouse

See also

External links

Mohair

Wildfire

Background

Behavior

Prevention

Fire suppression

French strategy

Atmospheric effects

Statistics

See also

References

External links

Royal Court Theatre

Bibliography

External link

Bush Theatre

External link

Donmar Warehouse

History

Current status

See also

External link

Duke of York's Theatre

John Whiting

Royal National Theatre

Artistic directors

Notable productions

External link

Evening Standard

Supplements

Bush Theatre

External link

Donmar Warehouse

History

Current status

See also

External link

Beautiful Thing

Theatrical productions

External links

Coronation Street

Background to Coronation Street