International conference: Acting with Facts

The Department opened its doors to playwright David Edgar, actors Sylvia Syms, Jan Ravens, and Patricia Hodge, and broadcaster Mark Lawson this week for an international conference on factual drama, part of the AHRC project ‘Acting with Facts’. Including screenings and a performance as well as different kinds of presentation and discussion, the conference provided a stimulating forum for exchange and debate between academics and industry professionals. Other delegates include Steven N. Lipkin, Mary Luckhurst, Carol Martin, Bella Merlin, Alan Rosenthal and Brian Winston.

Find more information about the conference and the research project at: http://www.reading.ac.uk/ftt/research/ftt-actingwithfacts.aspx

Movie: A Journal of Film Criticism launches

Today sees the launch of Movie: A Journal of Film Criticism, which is a free-to-access, online reinvention of Movie, involving members of the original editorial board and critics who have more recently entered the field. The first issue contains articles by George Toles on ‘The Shop Around the Corner’ and Deborah Thomas on John Sayles’ ‘Limbo’. Closer to home, there are pieces by Doug Pye on ‘No Country for Old Men’ and ‘The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada’, PhD student Lucy Fife Donaldson on ‘The Texas Chain Saw Massacre’ and John Gibbs on ‘The Cry of the Owl’. It also includes an excellent tribute to Ian Cameron, publisher and designer of the original Movie, written by V.F. Perkins, and reprints of one of his most important articles, ‘Films, Directors and Critics’. Read more here.

MA student Rosanna Jahangard at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2010

Current MA student Rosanna Jahangard has devised a cutting edge piece of theatre with BAFTA nominated writer Dawn Harrison, which is debuting at the Edinburgh Fringe this year. The production is called ‘All The Queen’s Children’ and is playing at C Aquila from 7 to 14 August. Sam Butler, Associate Director of Fevered Sleep, has called it ‘Mesmerising, vivid, utterly believable. When youth speaks this loudly everyone should listen’.

Alumni Liz Gaubert takes her acclaimed play to Edinburgh and London

2009 graduate Liz Gaubert’s play, ‘Stop, Look, Listen’ has appeared at theSpaces @ Surgeons Hall in Edinburgh, and in London at Theatre 503. The play began life as Liz’s final year theatre production and developed during her time on The Royal Court Young Writers Programme.