Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Theatre director best known for dozens of outstanding productions; also a writer, television documentary maker, and presenter.
On the island
Eight records
I wanted something which would make me think that with a bit of practice... I could perhaps come up with something that was not too distant from this
Piano Concerto No. 3 in C major
In tribute to the piano and skilled pianism
Soll ich dich, Teurer, nicht mehr sehn?Favourite
Irmgard Seefried, Anton Dermota, Ludwig Weber
Moves me in a very particular way about childhood and magic and journeys
Russian Orthodox Cathedral Choir of Paris
In memory of travels to Romania and the quality of religious life under Ceausescu
Discovered James Taylor late; enjoyed his music while driving in the US
Giuseppe Valdengo and Ramon Vinay
The first LP I ever acquired; connection to directing Othello
Connected to a wonderful wink from Barbara Hendricks during a difficult rehearsal
Sinfonia Concertante for Violin and Viola, K. 364 - slow movement
Itzhak Perlman and Pinchas Zukerman
Heard at a concert for the Armenian disaster; awesome mastery
In conversation
Presenter asks
2:09Are you suited to the solitary existence [on a desert island]?
Well, I live on a famous desert island called Nottinghill Gage... I don't mind being alone. ... my idea of bliss is to have been invited to, you know, three or four nice parties or dinners and to have said no to all of them and to be at home reading a book. ... if they didn't invite you, desperate. You must be invited before you say no.
Presenter asks
4:16Tell me about Ronaire, the only child whose parents wanted so much for him.
I think they showed enormous imagination. Where they got it from, I just can't think. ... I think of my parents as extremely imaginative and gifted and clever and entirely unschooled.
Presenter asks
10:22What sort of director do you describe yourself as today?
I think what I do I think I'm a good listener. I like listening. And I think I can also listen, I think, sometimes to the things people aren't saying. So in a rehearsal room I can maybe tune into this secret station the secret woes of somebody trying to tackle a part and help them to be less scared of it.
The keepsakes
The luxury
a great supply of flower bulbs, labelled
a great supply of bulbs, flower bulbs, labelled so that I'd know when to plant them and how to treat them, so that all through the year, with any luck, I could be taken by surprise.
Presenter asks
17:45How did [The Long Search] change you? It must have affected the way you view the world.
The main thing was that I felt more animated and interested at the end of it than I had at the start, maybe because various fears had subsided, because I was fairly scared at the beginning. I found it endlessly fascinating. I got a great deal from every tradition, particularly I suppose from things which were absolutely opposite to the ones in which I'd been brought up.
Presenter asks
23:59You must have been sounded out about becoming artistic director of the National or the RSC.
Yes, we had lots of those conversations. In fact, it it was quite depressing really when I had to face up to the fact that I was really some sort of Peter Pan who didn't ever want to come back from some never-never land of his own. Now I think, although probably I wouldn't be capable of it now, but I think, yes, I'm now in a fit state to be the shoulder on which people cry. I think at that stage I thought, no, no, my shoulder's not really for that.
Presenter asks
31:52When at what age were you at your happiest?
I do know that making The Seven Ages, it did seem to me I related vividly to people who were under four... and vividly to people who are over 80. ... I think if you can keep a sort of childlikeness, if you have any capacity for that going, if you can keep various secrets from childhood and carry them into old age and see them blossom again in old age, probably that's the privileged state.
“Sitting in a field near the top of the coal mine... my father saying, You're going to go to Cambridge. Now, who told him about Cambridge? I can't imagine.”
“I probably shouldn't say this my mother got off a train from Sheffield, and my first remark to her was, Did you have to wear that dress?”
“In the middle of the crisis... to my side, and there was this small creature sitting there, and he just said, Hello. And I said hello.”
“It's hellish. It's like being stuck at the end of a diving board and pushed by other people wanting to dive and you wonder whether you'll ever make it.”