Littlewood, Joan

▪ British theatrical director

in full  Joan Maud Littlewood  

born October 6?, 1914, London, England

died September 20, 2002, London

      influential British theatrical director who rejected the standardized form and innocuous social content of the commercial theatre in favour of experimental productions of plays concerned with contemporary social issues for working-class audiences.

      After studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, Littlewood in the 1930s founded Theatre Union, which specialized in open-air productions, and the Theatre of Action. In 1945, in Manchester, she founded Theatre Workshop—for working-class audiences—which in 1953 moved to the Theatre Royal, Stratford, in the East End of London. The productions were at first mainly of Shakespeare and other classics, with some topical plays written or adapted by her husband, Jimmy Miller (Ewan MacColl), a folk singer and political dramatist. Gradually the group developed a more definite style. Influenced by Bertolt Brecht (Brecht, Bertolt), she encouraged audience participation, allowed onstage improvisation, altered the text, and used techniques originally developed in the music hall. Her later productions were collective in that the actors shared in planning the presentations. After the success in 1955 of Miller's dramatic version of The Good Soldier Schweik, by Jaroslav Hašek, her influence grew. Oh! What a Lovely War (1963), an original evocation and criticism of World War I using popular songs of the period, projected newspaper headlines, and other devices to emphasize its message, became perhaps her most famous production. Other outstanding plays, full of vitality, noisy, and broadly humorous, yet with subtle characterization, include The Quare Fellow (1956) and The Hostage (1958) by Brendan Behan and A Taste of Honey (1958) by Shelagh Delaney. Her theatre workshop company was disbanded in 1964, and Joan Littlewood afterward became interested in projects less narrowly theatrical. In the early 1970s, however, Theatre Workshop was reformed under her direction. She was also active in the creation of Children's Environments, Bubble Cities linked with Music Hall around the Theatre Royal, Stratford (1968–75). Thereafter she left England to work in France.

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