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BRIAN WAY

  (1923 - 2006)
Nationality:    British
email:    n/a     Website:    n/a

Literary Agent:    n/a

Brian Way, who died on February 23, 2006, established the Theatre Centre in 1953 with Margaret Faulkes, the company which originated the modern concept of Theatre for children in an educational context. Born in 1923, Way was the prime mover in a group of lecturers and teachers, who were in 1946 considering the relationship between Theatre and teaching. People such as Peter Slade, Warren Jenkins and Brian English had a considerable influence on Way's thinking and he edited Slade's book Child Drama.they worked together at Bristol Old Vic, where Way met his first wife, Kathleen. After his marriage to her in 1946, they came to London and Way continued to make a rather tenuous living from lecturing and teaching until the beginning of the fifties, when he provided a centre for unemployed actors, on occasional days, at a hall in Loudoun Road, St John's Wood. there he produced plays in the round including Philoctetes and Pinocchio, which he wrote with Warren Jenkins and an abbreviated version of the Man Born to be King by Dorothy L Sayers. Sayers herself saw this production and was so impressed she donated £200 to Way and Faulkes so they could establish Theatre Centre as a company, whose board of management she joined. Way, who had co-founded the West Country Children's Theatre Company after the war, again turned his attention to educational children's Theatre. He believed that plays in this context ought to be performed in the round, for specific age groups limited in number, with professional actors capable of interacting with the children. He believed the plays should be entertaining, as well as informative. That philosophy has remained the purpose of Theatre Centre ever since. It was not, however, until 1965 that Theatre in education became an accepted part of the educational system and of professional Theatre. Way stated his beliefs in two seminal books, Development Through Drama and Audience Participation, which have been translated into many languages. He retired from Theatre Centre in 1977 and he has to his credit more than 50 plays. He became a visiting professor in a number of distinguished universities, moving permanently to Canada in 1983 and living in Toronto with his second wife Perri. He is survived by her, by Kathleen and by his three children. He was a seminal figure in the development of educational Theatre.
Laurence Harbottle, the Stage

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

        Adventure Faces         Angel Of the Prisons         Balloon Faces         Bell, The         Christmas Carol, A         Clown, The         Crossroads         Decision, The         Discovery And Survival         Dog and the Stone, The         Grinling Gibbons And the Plague Of London         Hat, The         Island, The         Key, The         Ladder, The         Lantern, The         Leapday Shadows         Magical Faces         Mirrorman, The         Mr Grump And the Clown         Oliver Twist         On Trial         Opposites Machine, The         Pinocchio         Puss In Boots         Rainbow Box, The         Rescue, The         Sleeping Beauty, The         Speak the Speech I Pray You         Storytellers, The         Struggle, The         Three Musketeers, The         Treasure Island         Valley Of Echoes, The         Wheel, The