Meet The Playwrights In Derby

The Writers' Guild of Great Britain (WGGB), in association with Derby Theatre and In Good Company hosts its first regional Meet the Playwrights event, on Tuesday 20 February 2018 at Derby Theatre.

Four esteemed playwrights, with very different career paths and writing styles, will discuss today's theatre landscape, the trials and triumphs of crafting work for the stage, the commissioning process, working with directors and producers and the value of the single voice of the single writer.

They will also share their thoughts on the shape of things to come for British drama.

The discussion will be followed by an audience Q&A, plus there will also be an opportunity to meet and mingle with the playwrights after the event in the bar.

General tickets cost £14.50 and include a glass of wine served at the post-show event; WGGB members/University of Derby student tickets cost £5.

Book tickets online via the Derby Theatre website. Full story on the WGGB website: writersguild.org.uk/meet-playwrights-derby/

The panellists:

Amelia Bullmore

Amelia studied Drama at Manchester University. She started out as an actor and began writing professionally in 1994. She continues to do both. Her first play, Mammals, directed by Anna Mackmin, had an extended sell-out run at the Bush Theatre in 2005 and went on a national tour in 2006. The play was shortlisted for the WhatsOnStage Best New Comedy award and co-won the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. Her adaptation of Ibsen's Ghosts, directed by Anna Mackmin, had a sell-out run at the Gate in 2007 and has since been produced at the Citizens Theatre, Glasgow. Other writing credits include Di And Viv And Rose and Anyway (stage); This Life, Black Cab, Attachments (TV); Craven, Cash Flow, Family Tree, Looking for Mr King and The Bat Man (radio).

Zodwa Nyoni
Zodwa is a playwright and poet. She was the 2014 Writer-in-Residence at the West Yorkshire Playhouse via the Channel 4 Playwrights Scheme. She has previously been Apprentice Poet-in-Residence at Ilkely Literature Festival (2013) and Leeds Kirkgate Market (2012). Plays include: Ode to Leeds, Weathered Estates and Boi Boi is Dead. She was a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize 2015 and her radio credits include: Sonnets in the City and Love Again. Her work is published by Bloomsbury.

Amanda Whittington

Amanda Whittington has written over 30 plays for theatre and radio. Her stage career began in Nottingham with Take Away Theatre and she currently has two titles in Nick Hern Books' Top 10 Most Performed Plays. Her work is widely performed across the UK, with Be My Baby a GCSE and A Level text in English Literature and Theatre Studies. Recent stage productions include: Mighty Atoms, Kiss Me Quickstep, My Judy Garland Life, and an adaptation of Saturday Night and Sunday Morning. Amanda writes extensively for radio and in 2016 won Best Series/Serial in the BBC Audio Drama Awards with D for Dexter.

Nick Wood (panel moderator)
Nottingham-based Nick was an actor, freelance journalist and a teacher before becoming a full-time writer. Plays include: The Underground Man, Getting Better Slowly, Warrior Square, Mia, A Dream of White Horses, My Name is Stephen Luckwell and Children of the Crown. His plays have been translated into several languages and performed in France, Germany, Austria, Luxembourg, Hong Kong, USA, Canada, Albania, Croatia, Serbia, Poland, Denmark, Montenegro, Russia, Switzerland and South Korea. He started New Theatre Nottingham with Andrew Breakwell and recently returned to acting touring his new one-man play A Girl With A Book (there are currently 16 productions in Denmark, Germany, Austria and Switzerland).

Notes to editors

The Writers' Guild of Great Britain is a trade union representing writers for TV, film, theatre, radio, books, poetry, animation, comedy and videogames. It negotiates national agreements on pay and conditions with key industry bodies, including BBC, ITV and Pact; the Royal Court, National Theatre and Royal Shakespeare Company. It campaigns and lobbies on behalf of writers and offers a range of benefits to its members, including free contract vetting, support and advice; events and discounts; free training; a weekly ebulletin; a pension scheme and welfare fund.

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