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Hugh Whitemore

HUGH WHITEMORE

  (1936 - )
Nationality:    British
email:    n/a     Website:    n/a

Literary Agent:    Alan Brodie Representation Ltd  

Hugh John Whitemore, playwright and screenwriter, born 16 June 1936; died 17 July 2018. He began his writing career in British television (contributing to the Wednesday Play, Armchair Theatre and Play for Today) and twice received Writers' Guild Awards. Movie credits include the Return of the Soldier (an adaptation of the novel by Rebecca West), Mel Brooks' production of 84 Charing Cross Road, Utz, (an adaptation of Bruce Chatwin's novel) and Franco Zeffirelli's Jane Eyre. His stage plays include Stevie, Pack of Lies , Breaking the Code, the Best of Friends, It's Ralph, A Letter of Resignation, Disposing of the Body, God Only Knows and a new version of Pirandello's As You Desire Me. these plays have been translated into many languages and produced throughout the world. Hugh Whitemore's work has twice been named Best Single TV Drama by the UK Broadcasting Press Guild, he has received the Scripter Award in Hollywood (for 84 Charing Cross Road), the Script Prize at the 1998 Monte Carlo Festival (for his adaptation of A Dance to the Music of Time) and a special Communications Award from the American Mathematical Society (for Breaking the Code). He was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and an Honorary Fellow of King's College, London.

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

         As You Desire Me         Best of Friends, The         Breaking the Code         Disposing Of the Body         God Only Knows         It's Ralph         Last Cigarette, The         Letter Of Resignation, A         Marvellous Year for Plums, A         My Darling Clemmie         Pack of Lies         Stevie         Towers of Trebizond, The
As You Desire Me

As You Desire Me
Elma is a singer in a sleazy 1930s Berlin nighclub. Having suffered an appalling assault during the First World War, she has no memory of her former life. A man appears and tells her that she is, in fact, the wife of an Italian aristocrat, and a new life awaits her. But when she goes to Italy to pursue this dream, she is greeted only by problems and disappointments. Pirandello uses this story to explore the mysteries of identity and memory, themes that preoccupied him throughout his life.

Notes:
Original Playwright - Luigi Pirandello

1st Produced:
The Capitol Theatre, Manchester     26 Nov 2003

Organisations:
-

1st Published:

Music:
-

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Genre:
Adaptation

Parts:
Male:  8            Female:  6            Other:  -

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Best of Friends, The

Best of Friends, The
In 1924, when George Bernard Shaw was 68, his friend Sydney Cockerell, then Director of the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, introduced him to a Benedictine nun at Stanbrook Abbey in Worcestershire. Dame Laurentia McLachlan, later to be elected Abbess, enjoyed a lively friendship with both Shaw and Cockerell for over twenty-five years.

Notes:
Adapted From the Letters And Writings of Dame Laurentia Mclachlan, Sir Sydney Cockerel And George Bernard Shaw

1st Produced:
London     1987

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Amber Lane Press, Oxford, 1988   

Music:
-

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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

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Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  1            Other:  -

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Breaking the Code

Breaking the Code
This compassionate play is the story of Alan Turing, who broke the code in two ways: He cracked the German Enigma code during World War II (for which he was decorated by Churchill) and also shattered the English code of sexual discretion with his homosexuality (for which he was arrested on a charge of gross indecency). Whitemore's play, shifting back and forth in time, seeks to find a connection between the two events.

Notes:
from Alan Turing: the Enigma of Intelligence by Andrew Hodges

1st Produced:
Theatre Royal Haymarket, London     21 Oct 1986

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Amber Lane Press, Oxford, 1987   

Music:
-

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Genre:
Adaptation. - - Gay/Lesbian, historical characters

Parts:
Male:  7            Female:  2            Other:  -

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Disposing Of the Body

Disposing Of the Body
A man leaves London for a secure early retirement in Gloucestershire, where an unexpected passion changes his life irrevocably.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Hampstead Theatre, London >>>     08 Jul 1999

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Samuel French, London,    

Music:
-

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Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  5            Female:  3            Other:  -

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God Only Knows

God Only Knows
Contentedly full of good Italian food and drowsy with wine, four holidaymakers are relaxing on the terrace of a villa in Tuscany. Suddenly, out of the evening shadows, there appears a fugitive - a man who claims to possess long-hidden knowledge that is both momentous and dangerous - an enigma involving the Vatican's Secretary Archieve, an Italian dealer in antiquities, and a Jewish preacher known as Yeshua Ben Pantera. And the answer to this riddle. . .?

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
Triumph Entertainment

1st Published:
Amber Lane Press   

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

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Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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It's Ralph

It's Ralph
frustrated couple spend weekend in country cottage which, like their marriage, is in need of repair

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Comedy, London     28 Oct 1991

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Amber Lane Press, Oxford, 1991   

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

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Genre:
Play/Drama

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Last Cigarette, The

Last Cigarette, The
Based on the critically acclaimed diaries of late playwright Simon Gray - Fat Chance, Enter A Fox, the Smoking Diaries and Coda - the Last Cigarette was completed just before Gray's death from cancer last year and shows the playwright facing life - and death - with unflinching courage and defiant humanity. Sardonic, humane, intelligent and witty, the Last Cigarette shows that even when writing about his own mortality, Gray did not lose his prodigious talent to entertain.

Notes:
by Simon Gray And Hugh Whitemore, from Gray's the Smoking Diaries

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Faber and Faber, London (2009)   

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

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Genre:
Biographical

Parts:
Male:  2            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Letter Of Resignation, A

Letter Of Resignation, A
the complex world of political morality. the War Minister had an affair with a call girl, the call girl with a Russian spy, the Russian spy was set up by MI5 and no one told the Prime Minister.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Amber Lane Press, Oxford, 1997   

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

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Genre:
Documentary Play Documentary

Parts:
Male:  3            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Marvellous Year for Plums, A

Marvellous Year for Plums, A
Britain in 1956: the Suez Crisis. Prime Minister Anthony Eden, described by a colleague as 'half mad baronet and half beautiful woman', is faced with the terrible possibility of leading his country into war. His health is collapsing. His friends, colleagues and opponents, among them Hugh Gaitskell and Ian Fleming and his wife Ann, are facing crises of their own, crises of conscience and crises of the heart. Hugh Whitemore's new play is a true epic: a suspenseful thriller, an achingly romantic love story and a fascinating examination of a flashpoint in our history which still resonates today. What is the cost of an 'illegal' war?

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

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Genre:
political thriller

Parts:
Male:  6            Female:  3            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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My Darling Clemmie

Synopsis:
Winston Churchill said, 'my most brilliant achievement was to persuade my wife to marry me.' This is the highly entertaining story of Clementine Churchill described by Lord Halifax as, 'the guardian angel of our country's guardian.'

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Tower Arts Centre, Winchester     15 Nov 2008

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:
Biographical

Parts:
Male:  -            Female:  1            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Pack of Lies

Pack of Lies
Events leading up to the arrest of the Krogers, two Americans spying for the Russians, in London in 1961.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Brighton     1983

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Amber Lane Press, Oxford, 1983
Oberon Books, school edition   

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:  5            Other:  -

Further Reference:
-

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Stevie

Stevie
Smart writing people think it's not at all chic to live in the suburbs with an aunt, but I don't care what they think. I've never cared about chic things, fashion and so on. What does it matter? I love Aunt and Aunt loves me. That's what really matters.' Nervous and droll, Stevie Smith spends her days as a private secretary at the Newnes Publishing Company and her evenings in the London suburbs eating Battenberg cake and Ginger Nuts with her beloved Aunt. All the time she is writing the piercing poetry and prose that will make her famous. In between there are diverting visits from a series of men and, later on, tussles with literary celebrity. Beyond everything there is her greatest, often darkly comic, struggle: to keep waving when she feels like drowning.

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Richmond, Surrey     1977

Organisations:
-

1st Published:
Samuel French, London, 1977
Amber Lane 1988 (revised edition)   

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:  1            Female:  2            Other:  -

Further Reference:

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Towers of Trebizond, The

Synopsis:
-

Notes:
-

1st Produced:
Physician's Hall - Edinburgh     1991

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:

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