doollee banner
The Playwrights Database
contact doollee


Peter Nichols

PETER NICHOLS

  (1927 - )
Nationality:    English
email:    n/a     Website:    n/a

Literary Agent:    Alan Brodie Representation Ltd  represented by Kara Fitzpatrick

Playwright Peter Nichols was born in Bristol in 1927, and is a multiple award-winning author of some of the most enduring British plays of the last four decades. With its controversial and subversive range of themes and styles, his work continues to be revived on both sides of the Atlantic. His many plays include A Day in the Death of Joe Egg (recently seen in the West End and on Broadway), Passion Play (originally produced by the Royal Shakespeare Company and recently seen at the Donmar Warehouse, directed by Michael Grandage), Privates on Parade (also originally produced by the Royal Shakespeare Company and recently revived at the Donmar Warehouse with James McAvoy as Steven Flowers), the Freeway, the National Health (National Theatre), Forget-Me-Not-Lane (Greenwich Theatre), Chez Nous (Gielgud Theatre), Born in the Gardens (Bristol Old Vic), Blue Murder (later Fig-Leaves) (Show of Strength Theatre Company, Bristol), So Long Life (the Tobacco Factory, Bristol) and A Piece of My Mind (Nuffield Theatre, Southampton). His awards include four Evening Standard Awards, an Olivier Award for Best Comedy and two Ivor Novello Awards for Best Musical. He has also written screenplays of A Day in the Death of Joe Egg, the National Health and Privates on Parade. His books include Feeling You're Behind, a memoir, published by Weidenfeld in 1984 and Peter Nichols: Diaries 1969-1977, published by Nick Hern Books in 2000. His Plays One and Two are published by Methuen. (Peter's 'papers' from 1945 to 2000 are now held in the British Library)

Buy Plays with Doollee

Each page of doollee.com has links to play/book outlets, either directly to the Publisher, through Stageplays.com and Amazon to the second hand and 1st editions of AbeBooks. These links will automatically take you to the relevant area obviating the need for further search.
AbeBooks.co.uk   AbeBooks.com   Stageplays.com   amazon.com   amazon.co.uk   amazon.ca
whether you are a Playwright who wishes to make their entry definitive, an unlisted Playwright or a User with a tale to tell - we want to hear from you.
download WORD submission template

below is a list of Peter Nichols's plays - click on a Play Title for more information

         Beasts Of England         Better Mousetrap, A         Blue Murder         Born In the Gardens         Chez Nous         Day In the Death Of Joe Egg, A         Forget-Me-Not-Lane         Freeway, The         Harding's Luck         HeArts And Flowers         Hooded Terror, The         Lingua Franca         National Health, The, or Nurse Norton's Affair         Neither Up Nor Down         Passion Play         Piece Of My Mind, A         Poppy         Privates On Parade         So Long Life
Beasts Of England

Synopsis:
planned at National theatre, 1973, prevented by Orwell's widow Sonia

Notes:
a portrait of England in the 1930s and 1940s expressed in the words of George Orwell'

1st Produced:
Unproduced    

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
anthology of readings

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Better Mousetrap, A

Synopsis:
stage play, not so far offered

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Unproduced    

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Blue Murder

Synopsis:
Subtitled 'a play or two', Blue Murder opens with Foreign Bodies, where Swinging London meets bourgeois Shrewsbury in 1963 and the drinks are laced with cyanide. the second half, A Game of Soldiers, is a Whitehall farce taking place in St James's Palace. A Dramatist has brought his completed play to be censored but the Lord Chamberlain's Men have a few shameful secrets of their own . . . Period 1963 and 1967

Notes:
Foreign Bodies & A Game of Soldiers

1st Produced:
Quakers Friars, Bristol     1995

Organisations:
Show of Strength

1st Published:

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  11            Female:  4            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Born In the Gardens

Synopsis:
Maud, a decidedly eccentric woman, lives in a dilapidated mock-Tudor Victorian house with her son Mo. the other children, Hedley, an ineffectual Labour MP, and Queenie, an expatriate in America, arrive and try to persuade Maud to go to a modem 'duplex' in London, and Mo to join Queenie in California, but both prefer to remain as they are. Not all of us, Mo says, 'want freedom. Captivity has its points as well.'

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London, 1980   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Satire

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Chez Nous

Synopsis:
about a relationship between a married adult and his friends teenage (under-age) daughter

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Globe Theatre, London     1974

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London, 1974   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Domestic Comedy

Parts:
Male:  4            Female:  3            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Day In the Death Of Joe Egg, A

Day In the Death Of Joe Egg, A
Parents of a spastic daughter attempt to come to terms with the situation through the humour of despair.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London, 1967   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Comedy

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  3            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Forget-Me-Not-Lane

Synopsis:
Flashbacks to World War II as man attempts analysis of the failure of his marriage.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Greenwich Theatre, London     1971

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London, 1971   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  5            Female:  4            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Freeway, The

Synopsis:
Family are trapped in mobile home in gigantic traffic jam on English roads, expressions of moral and political viewpoints fail to alleviate the situation.44

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
National Theatre At The Old Vic, London     1974

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London, 1975   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Futuristic Satire

Parts:
Male:  9            Female:  5            Other:  extras

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Harding's Luck

Synopsis:
-

Notes:
novel by E Nisbit

1st Produced:
Greenwich Theatre, London     1974

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Adaptation

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

HeArts And Flowers

Synopsis:
-

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
-    

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
-

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  -            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Hooded Terror, The

Synopsis:
-

Notes:
televised 1963

1st Produced:
Bristol     1964

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
-   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  3            Other:  extras

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Lingua Franca

Lingua Franca
We must learn to be Europeans. Forgive and forget is our only hope' Lingua Franca follows innocent abroad, Steven Flowers, as he travels from National Service in South-East Asia to 1950's Florence. He soon finds himself working for a chaotically-run language school, together with a cosmopolitan muddle of seven foreign misfits killing their post-war nihilism in the cafes of Florence, the cradle of Renaissance high culture. Based around a leading character in Peter Nichols' acclaimed work Privates on Parade, and inspired by his own experiences, Lingua Franca is a fast-paced, sexually-charged story, and both a damning indictment and a celebration of sexual freedom. Playing with notions of xenophobia and deep-seated cultural stereotypes, nationalist foibles and prejudices clash and sparkle to high comic effect as Steven tries to make sense of his own life and a Europe at peace after so many years of war.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
Cherub Company London in association with Neil McPherson

1st Published:

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  4            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

National Health, The, or Nurse Norton's Affair

National Health, The, or Nurse Norton's Affair
Television may glamorise life in a British Hospital, but there is a very British way of dealing with the terminally ill.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
National Theatre Company

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London, 1970   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Musical Comedy Musical

Parts:
Male:  12            Female:  8            Other:  extras

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Neither Up Nor Down

Synopsis:
married couple try to revive their flagging sexuality by following the illustrated instructions in a sex manual

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
London     1972

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
in "Plays I", Methuen, London, 1990   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Sketch

Parts:
Male:  1            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Passion Play

Passion Play
Infidelities by the husband cause a couple to examine their lives through their alter egos

Notes:
aka Passion

1st Produced:
Royal Shakespeare Company >>> at Aldwych Theatre, London     1981

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Serious Comedy Comedy

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  4            Other:  extras

Further Reference:
Theatre Record Volume I Issues 01/02 Page 5

Top of Page Top of Page

Piece Of My Mind, A

Synopsis:
Author has Dramatic writer's block which he attempts to resolve by writing an autobiographical play.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Comedy/Drama Comedy

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Poppy

Poppy
Victorian hypocrisy to the Opium Wars exposed through pantomime and Gilbert and Sullivan Parodies.

Notes:
music by Monty Norman

1st Produced:
Royal Shakespeare Company >>> at Barbican, London     25 Sep 1982

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Samuel French Ltd   

Music:
Original cast recording Warner (25-00001) 1982

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Musical Parody

Parts:
Male:  6            Female:  4            Other:  extras, musicians

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

Privates On Parade

Privates On Parade
British army ENSA group during Malay fighting in 1950 get up to peculiar adventure.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Royal Shakespeare Company >>> at Aldwych Theatre, London     1977

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London, 1977   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Play withsongs Play with Music

Parts:
Male:  8            Female:  1            Other:  extras

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page

So Long Life

Synopsis:
Bristol 1995. It is Alice's 85th birthday. An occasion for celebration. But like many family gatherings, it is also an occasion for parading long-held resentments as her children attempt to persuade her to relinquish her independence and move to a home. But Alice has other plans . . .

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
Show of Strength

1st Published:
Nick Hern Books, London, 2000   

Music:
-

To Buy This Play:
If Publisher (above) is underlined then the play may be purchased by direct click from the Publisher, otherwise (below) are AbeBooks for secondhand, signed & 1st eds and other Booksellers for new copies

Booksellers:

Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  4            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

Top of Page Top of Page