The Play Podcast

• The Play Podcast - 093 - Three Sisters, by Anton Chekhov

  Episode 093: Three Sisters by Anton Chekhov Host: Douglas Schatz Guest: Rory Mullarkey Welcome to The Play Podcast where we explore the greatest new and classic plays. Each episode we choose a single play to talk about in depth with our expert guest. We’ll discuss the play’s origins, its themes, characters, structure and impact. For us the play is the thing. Anton Chekhov’s Three Sisters, the third of the quartet of great plays that he wrote in the last years of his short life, is a symphonic study of the search for purpose and love. Three Sisters premiered in January 1901 at the Moscow Arts Theatre, where his previous two major plays, Uncle Vanya and The Seagull had debuted. As we record this episode a spellbinding new production is on stage at Shakespeare’s Globe theatre in London. The text for that production is translated by playwright Rory Mullarkey, who joins us to explore Chekhov’s masterpiece.

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• The Play Podcast - 092 - A Raisin in the Sun, by Lorraine Hansberry

  Episode 092: A Raisin in the Sun by Lorainne Hansberry Host: Douglas Schatz Guest: Tinuke Craig Welcome to The Play Podcast where we explore the greatest new and classic plays. Each episode we choose a single play to talk about in depth with our expert guest. We’ll discuss the play’s origins, its themes, characters, structure and impact. For us the play is the thing. When Lorraine Hansberry’s play A Raisin in the Sun opened in New York in 1959, its author became the first African-American woman to have a play on Broadway, and this with her debut at age of 29. The play was ground-breaking for its realist portait of a black working-class family, spotlighting their personal dreams and the public prejudice they confront. We recorded this episode shortly after an acclaimed new production of the play completed its run at the Lyric Hammersmith theatre in London, and I am delighted to talk with the production’s director, Tinuke Craig, about this landmark play.

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• The Play Podcast - 091 - Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, by Tennessee Williams

  Episode 091: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof by Tennessee Williams Host: Douglas Schatz Guest: Arifa Akbar Welcome to The Play Podcast where we explore the greatest new and classic plays. Each episode we choose a single play to talk about in depth with our expert guest. We’ll discuss the play’s origins, its themes, characters, structure and impact. For us the play is the thing. Tennessee Williams’s third great play Cat on a Hot Tin Roof is a blistering drama of family conflict and repressed sexuality. The play opened on Broadway in 1955 to rapturous reviews, and the film that followed with Elizabeth Taylor and Paul Newman was a box-office hit, despite its egregious watering down of the play’s sexual trauma and family strife. As we record this episode a stunning new production of the play is on at the Almeida Theatre in London, and I am delighted to talk about this classic with Arifa Akbar, the Guardian newspaper’s chief theatre critic.

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• The Play Podcast - 090 - The Importance of Being Earnest, by Oscar Wilde

  Episode 090: The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde Host: Douglas Schatz Guest: Max Webster Welcome to The Play Podcast where we explore the greatest new and classic plays. Each episode we choose a single play to talk about in depth with our expert guest. We’ll discuss the play’s origins, its themes, characters, structure and impact. For us the play is the thing. Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest is arguably the most famous romantic comedy in theatrical history. The play is renowned for its effervescent portrait of aristocratic romance, and its impossibly clever wit, including some of the most quotable lines in dramatic literature. But it is also an anarchic parody of social custom and pretension – a serious statement of aesthetic principles and coded sexual politics. As we record this episode, a joyous new production of the play is running at the National Theatre in London, and I am delighted to talk about Wilde’s classic with its acclaimed director, Max Webster.

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• The Play Podcast - 089 - Waiting for Godot, by Samuel Beckett

  Episode 089: Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett Host: Douglas Schatz Guest: Matthew McFrederick Welcome to The Play Podcast where we explore the greatest new and classic plays. Each episode we choose a single play to talk about in depth with our expert guest. We’ll discuss the play’s origins, its themes, characters, structure and impact. For us the play is the thing. Samuel Beckett’s tragicomedy, Waiting for Godot, is a notoriously confounding work of theatre. The play is renowned for its lack of conventional plot or exposition, and for its existential predicament. Given its desolate philosophical landscape it is also surprisingly funny. Its theatrical imagery and intellectual provocation remain as potent as when it was first performed in Paris in 1953. As we record this episode an illustrious production is on stage at the Theatre Royal Haymarket in London starring Ben Whishaw and Lucian Msamati. I am delighted to be joined by Dr Matt McFrederick from the University of Reading to help survey this famously challenging landmark of modern drama.

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