Director

Adrian Brown

A restless soul, Adrian Brown refuses to grow old. It would take up too much time, he says.

Having worked for the BBC, ATV, ABC, Granada, London Weekend and Thames Television, he has directed over one thousand television programmes of every conceivable kind from elaborate star-cast dramas – 'The Caucasian Chalk Circle' (a BAFTA Nomination) - to simple chat-shows; from hilarious comedy plays - 'The Noble Spaniard' with Margaret Rutherford and Kenneth Williams - to a science fiction serial – 'Target Luna'; from serious filmed documentaries on archaeological or physiological subjects to exploring pantomime in the company of Arthur Askey and Roy Hudd.  And more.

At the same time Adrian has been active in the theatre in many genres – comedy, drama, musicals and opera – has directed twelve of Shakespeare’s plays, the latest being 'Antony and Cleopatra' for the LOST Theatre Company only last year, while even more recently he has staged for them 'The Burial at Thebes', the version by Seamus Heaney of Sophocles’ Antigone.  An Emmy Award winner for the limpid 'The Belle of Amherst', staring Claire Bloom, he has six other awards, each one in a different category, such as ‘opera’ – Verdi’s 'Nabucco' – or ‘musical’ – 'Sweet Charity' – or ‘current affairs investigation’ – 'This Is Your Land'.  Specialising in period work, he has taught at different times at R.A.D.A, The Webber-Douglas Academy, The Guildford School of Acting, and The Birmingham School of Music, while he has been on the board of The Directors’ Guild of Great Britain and, more recently The Poetry Society.

So his life continues as it always has, occupied in directing plays, operas, musicals in theatre, television and - just now and then - on film; in travelling - in eighty countries so far, Ethiopia and Trinidad having been added to the list this year; in translating and writing; and in making plans for the future, with four plays and two musicals currently being prepared for production. After 'Troilus and Cressida', he immediately goes into rehearsal of the pre-Shakespearean drama 'The Spanish Tragedy' for the Rose Theatre on the South Bank, where it was originally presented in 1592.