Sir Tom Stoppard is a Czech-born British playwright and screenwriter. He has written for film, radio, stage, and television, finding prominence with plays. His work covers the themes of human rights, censorship, and political freedom, often delving into the deeper philosophical thematics of society. Stoppard has been a playwright of the National Theatre and is one of the most internationally performed dramatists of his generation. Stoppard was knighted for his contribution to theatre by Queen Elizabeth II in 1997.
Donald Margulies is an American playwright and academic. In 2000, he won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play Dinner with Friends.
Travesties is a 1974 play by Tom Stoppard. It centres on the figure of Henry Carr, an elderly man who reminisces about Zürich in 1917 during the First World War, and his interactions with James Joyce when he was writing Ulysses, Tristan Tzara during the rise of Dada, and Lenin leading up to the Russian Revolution, all of whom were living in Zürich at that time.
William Gaither Crudup is an American actor. He was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Male Lead for his performance in Jesus' Son (1999). He went on to star in numerous high-profile films, including Almost Famous (2000), Big Fish (2003), Mission: Impossible III (2006), Watchmen (2009), Public Enemies (2009), The Stanford Prison Experiment (2015), Jackie (2016), and Alien: Covenant (2017), in both lead and supporting roles.
Simon James Holliday Gray was an English playwright and memoirist who also had a career as a university lecturer in English literature at Queen Mary, University of London, for 20 years. While teaching at Queen Mary, Gray began his writing career as a novelist in 1963 and, during the next 45 years, in addition to five published novels, wrote 40 original stage plays, screenplays, and screen adaptations of his own and others' works for stage, film and television and became well known for the self-deprecating wit characteristic of several volumes of memoirs or diaries.
Felicity LaFortune is an American actress and singer from Oak Park, Illinois. She has appeared in numerous theatre productions, including on Broadway, as well as in film and on television, including the daytime soap operas Ryan's Hope and All My Children.
Martin Faranan McDonagh is a British-Irish playwright and filmmaker. He is known for his absurdist black humour which often challenges the modern theatre aesthetic. He has received numerous accolades including an Academy Award, six BAFTA Awards, four Golden Globe Awards, three Olivier Awards, and nominations for five Tony Awards.
John Wood was an English actor, known for his performances in Shakespeare and his lasting association with Tom Stoppard. In 1976, he received a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for his performance in Stoppard's Travesties. He was nominated for two other Tony Awards for his roles in Sherlock Holmes (1975) and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1968). In 2007, Wood was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the Queen's New Year Honours List. Wood also appeared in WarGames, The Purple Rose of Cairo, Orlando, Shadowlands, The Madness of King George, Richard III, Sabrina, and Chocolat.
The Real Thing is a play by Tom Stoppard that was first performed in 1982. The play focuses on the relationship between Henry and Annie, an actress and member of a group fighting to free Brodie, a Scottish soldier imprisoned for burning a memorial wreath during a protest.
Betrayal is a play written by Harold Pinter in 1978. Critically regarded as one of the English playwright's major dramatic works, it features his characteristically economical dialogue, characters' hidden emotions and veiled motivations, and their self-absorbed competitive one-upmanship, face-saving, dishonesty, and (self-) deceptions.
Jumpers is a play by Tom Stoppard which was first performed in 1972. It explores and satirises the field of academic philosophy by likening it to a less-than-skilful competitive gymnastics display. Jumpers raises questions such as "What do we know?" and "Where do values come from?" It is set in an alternative reality in which some British astronauts have landed on the Moon and "Radical Liberals" have taken over the British government. It was inspired by the notion that a crewed Moon landing would ruin the Moon as a poetic trope and possibly lead to a collapse of moral values. It has been said that Jumpers is "a play often dismissed as too clever by half", but a number of other writers have listed it among Stoppard's highest achievements.
Scott Pask is an American scenic and costume designer. He has worked primarily on stage productions in the United States, on Broadway and Off-Broadway, and in regional theatre, as well as in the United Kingdom. He has won Tony Awards for his work on The Pillowman, The Coast of Utopia and The Book of Mormon.
Michael Keith Billington is a British author and arts critic. He writes for The Guardian, and was the paper's chief drama critic from 1971 to 2019. Billington is "Britain's longest-serving theatre critic" and the author of biographical and critical studies relating to British theatre and the arts. He is the authorised biographer of the playwright Harold Pinter (1930–2008).
Raúl Eduardo Esparza is an American actor and singer. Considered one of Broadway's most prominent leading men since the 2000s, he is best known for his Tony Award-nominated performance as Bobby in the 2006 Broadway revival of Company and for his television role as New York Assistant District Attorney (ADA) Rafael Barba in Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, where he had a recurring role in Season 14 and was promoted to a series regular in Seasons 15 to 19.
Jack O'Brien is an American director, producer, writer and lyricist. He served as the Artistic Director of the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego, California from 1981 through the end of 2007.
John Richard Easton was a Canadian actor, best known for his portrayal of Brian Hammond in the 1970s BBC serial The Brothers.
Jason Thomas Butler Harner is an American actor.
William Dudley is a British theatre designer.
David Jonathan Pittu is an American actor, writer and director.
Mia Barron is an American actor. She won the Lucille Lortel Award for her performance in the Lincoln Center production of The Coast Starlight, an Obie award for her performance in Hurricane Diane at New York Theatre Workshop, as well as a second Obie and a Drama Desk Award for her work in the ensemble of the Off Broadway production of The Wolves. She Co-Created, along with director Lars Jan, a Theatrical adaptation of Joan Didion's The White Album, which premiered in New York to sold out houses at BAM's Harvey Theatre as part of the Next Wave Festival.She is known for her extensive New York City theater credits, alongside her television and independent film work, most recently Half Empty Half Full, which received a New York Film Award nomination for Best Ensemble. She is also known as the voice of Molotov Cocktease and Sally Impossible on the Cartoon Network’s long-running comic science-fiction series, The Venture Bros.
