Tuesday, December 24

Interviews

Elizabeth Newman is keeping theatre alive in the hills
31May By Paul DownhamNo Comments
Interviews

Elizabeth Newman is keeping theatre alive in the hills

In the first of a two-part interview with Pitlochry Festival Theatre’s Elizabeth Newman our Features Editor Paul Clarke asks her about the challenges of being an artistic director in the midst of a worldwide pandemic. After eight successful years as Bolton Octagon’s Artistic Director, Elizabeth Newman moved across the border to lead the team at Pitlochry Festival Theatre, but just as she was preparing to launch a new season of productions COVID-19 struck. Elizabeth and her team at the Perthshire venue are in lockdown after scrapping that season of work. They’ve been using that time to create online work in the maelstrom of a totally unprecedented challenge for the theatre world that managed to keep the lights on even as the Luftwaffe were dropping bombs on London. There's not ...
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Lockdown Interviews – Peter Egan
4May By Paul DownhamNo Comments
Interviews

Lockdown Interviews – Peter Egan

Peter Egan has been appearing on stage and screen for over 50 years. He is probably most well-known for his roles as Paul in the television sitcom Ever Decreasing Circles with Richard Briers and as Hugh “Shrimpie” MacClare, Marquess of Flintshire in Downton Abbey. Despite being known for his numerous roles in TV and film he is an award winning stage actor and has acted with both the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) and The National. I started by asking what inspired him to become an actor. “I left school at 15 with no qualifications. My prospects were pretty dismal. I did a series of jobs all of which I hated. “When I was 16, I stumbled into acting by joining an amateur group in Ladbroke Grove, West London. “I became fascinated by the process of acting by watching this group ...
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