Lucien Freud portrait of Pinter to be exhibited

Posted on February 3, 2012 by Mark

A major new exhibition of Lucien Freud’s drawings and watercolours is to open at the Blain Southern Gallery, London, from February 17 to April 5. Included in this exhibition is an uncompleted portrait of Harold Pinter from 2007. Curator William Feaver stated:  “Lucian loved the idea of the two elder statesmen – the king of theatre and the king of painting – collaborating. He thought this was a curiously vivid and appropriate study of Pinter – laconic, sparse, suggestive and not completed.”

For tickets, visit www.blainsouthern.com or telephone 020 7493 4492

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‘Lost’ Pinter sketch discovered after 50 years

Posted on October 25, 2011 by Mark

A long-forgotten sketch written by Harold Pinter has been unearthed amongst papers at the British Library.

Entitled ‘ Umbrellas’, the sketch was performed once only at the Nottingham Playhouse in 1960 during an evening of revue sketches by various authors.

Pinter had previously scripted a collection of revue sketches that were presented at the Lyric Hammersmith and the Apollo theatre in 1959, alongside other pieces by writers such as Peter Cook, and performed by comic actors such as Beryl Reid, Kenneth Williams and Sheila Hancock.

The full sketch can be read here on the Guardian website

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‘Being Harold Pinter’ performed in US

Posted on February 5, 2011 by Mark
Belarus Free Theatre

A scene from the 'Ashes to Ashes' section of Being Harold Pinter

The Belarus Free Theatre have presented their ‘Being Harold Pinter’ in New York and are currently performing in Chicago. The play, which fuses a number of Pinter’s texts and devised material based on the troupe’s experiences of the regime in Belarus, offers a concentrated experience of Pinter’s Homecoming, Ashes to Ashes, Mountain Language and Old Times as well as elements of Pinter’s 2005 nobel acceptance speech. The company were given permission by Pinter to use his texts anywhere in the world to communicate their appeal against the excesses of dictatorship.

A special encore performance of the play was offered at the Public Theater, NYC,  on January 17 with Tom Stoppard and Tony Kushner acting as hosts. Benefit performances have also been held in Washington and Dallas. The play is currently running in Chicago (read the Chicago Tribune blog posting here)

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The Royal Court Theatre announces the Harold Pinter award

Posted on February 4, 2011 by Mark

royal-court-theatreThe Royal Court Theatre this week announced the establishment of a Harold Pinter award for playwrights.

The award is a new bursary offered by Pinter’s widow Dame Antonia Fraser.  The first recipient of the new award is to be announced later in 2011. Dominic Cooke, the artistic director of the Royal Court said: “This long-term investment in new plays and playwrights is essential to our cultural landscape and we’re very proud to be able to continue Harold’s legacy at the Royal Court.”

Read The Stage article here.

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Antonia Fraser given damehood in New Year honours list

Posted on January 7, 2011 by Mark

Harold Pinter’s widow, Antonia Fraser, is to swap her title from Lady to Dame, following her inclusion in the New Year Honours list as a ‘Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire‘. Harold Pinter declined a knighthood in 1996, but had accepted a CBE in 1966 and became a Companion of Honour in 2002.

Dame Antonia responded to the honour in this Telegraph article. She stated she was “very pleased and very surprised” to receive it.

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Harry Burton’s ‘Working with Pinter’ now on DVD

Posted on December 2, 2010 by Mark
Harry Burton's Working with Pinter

Click for more information, and to buy

Harry Burton’s fabulous 2007 film, Working with Pinter, is now available on DVD in the UK. The film captures Pinter’s collaborative spirit and offers a remarkable insight into his writing. Participating in a masterclass in 2005, the playwright contributes to the rehearsal of extracts from his own plays offering insight into his creative processes. Complementing this revealing footage is an interview with Harold Pinter speaking with his friend and theatrical ally Henry Woolf, as well as liberal quotations from film and television productions of his plays.

The title can be bought directly here, and is also currently available on the UK Amazon site here.

A review has been posted on the Socialist Worker website here.

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Jude Law, Ian McKellen and Sam West take to the stage in support of Belarus Free Theatre

Posted on November 23, 2010 by Mark

The Belarus Free Theatre, whose Being Harold Pinter debuted in 2007, are being presented by Index on Censorship at the Young Vic in London. The group will perform the UK premiere of Discover Love on 5 December with guest appearances by famous names including Jude Law, Ian McKellen and Sam West.

More details at:
http://uk.oneworld.net/article/view/166348/1/

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British Library acquires Harold Pinter honours

Posted on October 21, 2010 by Mark

Harold Pinter’s Nobel Prize medal and the bronze mask of the BAFTA fellowship are among more than 50 awards belonging to the late playwright that have been acquired by the British Library.

The national library acquired Pinter’s archive in 2007, and his widow Antonia Fraser said he would have been pleased his papers and awards were to be kept together.

“This is what Harold would have wanted,” the historian said on Wednesday.

“He was extremely proud of his awards but even prouder of his manuscripts, already in the British Library. He used to say that the manuscripts earned the awards so it is right that they should be together.”

The above is an excerpt from Reuters. Read the full story here

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Pinter Abroad: Other Stages, Other Rooms – 2011 Conference in Slovenia

Posted on October 13, 2010 by Mark
Conference website

Click for conference website

The Department of English and American Studies at the Faculty of Arts, University of Maribor, Slovenia has announced an international conference to be held from the 22rd to 24th September 2011: Pinter Abroad: Other Stages, Other Rooms,

Keynote speakers are confirmed as:

• Mark Taylor-Batty (University of Leeds)
• Elisabeth Sakellaridou (Aristotle University of Thessaloniki)

The conference will address a broad range of perspectives concerning Harold Pinter’s literary heritage set abroad, in a non-British context. Therefore, proposals for papers are invited in the following subject areas:

  • Reception and reviews of Pinter abroad
  • Pinter on international stages
  • (Inter)cultural studies of Pinter
  • Pinter in translation (linguistic, stylistic and other aspects)
  • Teaching Pinter abroad
  • Pinter and international politics

The conference has established a website where details of key deadlines for submission of abstracts is posted, and this will be regularly updated with important conference information: http://events.ff.uni-mb.si/pinterabroad/

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‘Last to Go’ 1959 performance on BBC6 on Pinter’s birthday

Posted on October 11, 2010 by Mark

Yesterday was Harold Pinter’s birthday, and this event was marked on BBC Radio 6 (6 Music) by Jarvis Cocker (on his Sunday Service) by the broadcast of the original 1959 recording of ‘Last to Go’ from the Pieces of Eight collection of revue sketches. The broadcast featured legendary comic actor Kenneth Williams alongside Peter Reeves. This can be heard again for the remaining days of this week at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00v760s#synopsis


The Sketch is at the 1:39.40 mark, and is followed by the theme tune to the 1967 film Accident, which of course was scripted by Pinter. The programme is worth listening to in its entirety, as it also contains an interview with Salman Rushdie. Territory restrictions may apply to the broadcast outside the UK.

Kenneth Williams

Kenneth Williams

More details of the original cast recording of Pieces of Eight is available here.

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