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Comedy Of Menace
Comedy of menace is the body of plays written by David Campton, Nigel Dennis, N. F. Simpson, and Harold Pinter. The term was coined by drama critic Irving Wardle, who borrowed it from the subtitle of Campton's play ''The Lunatic View: A Comedy of Menace'', in reviewing Pinter's and Campton's plays in ''Encore (magazine), Encore'' in 1958. (Campton's subtitle ''Comedy of Menace'' is a jocular play-on-words derived from ''comedy of manners''—''menace'' being ''manners'' pronounced with somewhat of a Judeo-English accent.)See Merritt 5, 9–10, 225–28, 240, 310, and 326, citing articles by Wardle, Gussow's ''Conversations with Pinter'', and various performance reviews by Wardle, Gussow, and others. Background Citing Wardle's original publications in ''Encore'' magazine (1958), Susan Hollis Merritt points out that in "Comedy of Menace" Wardle "first applies this label to Pinter's work … describ[ing] Pinter as one of 'several playwrights who have been tentatively lumped together ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
David Campton
David Campton (2 May 1924 – 9 September 2006) was a prolific British dramatist who wrote plays for the stage, radio, and cinema for thirty-five years. "He was one of the first British dramatists to write in the style of the Theatre of the Absurd"."David Campton, Playwright", ''Samuel French London''. Biography Campton was born in Leicester, in 1924. He was educated at Wyggeston Grammar School for Boys. From 1942 to 1945, he served in the RAF, and then, for another year, in the Fleet Air Arm. He worked as a clerk in the City of Leicester Department of Education until 1949 and then moved to the East Midlands Gas Board, where he worked until 1956. Campton worked with Stephen Joseph in developing theatre in the round in the United Kingdom, and played a major role in establishing theatre-in-the-rounds in both Scarborough, North Yorkshire (now in the well-known Stephen Joseph Theatre, a converted 1930s Odeon cinema) and Staffordshire in the English West Midlands. He worked as writer, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |