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Peter Shaffer
Sir Peter Levin Shaffer (; 15 May 1926 – 6 June 2016) was an English playwright, screenwriter, and novelist. He wrote numerous award-winning plays, of which several were adapted into films. Early life Shaffer was born to a Jewish family in Liverpool, the son of Reka (née Fredman) and estate agent Jack Shaffer. He grew up in London and was the identical twin brother of fellow playwright Anthony Shaffer. He was educated at the Hall School, Hampstead, and St Paul's School, London, and subsequently he gained a scholarship to Trinity College, Cambridge, to study history. Shaffer was a Bevin Boy coal miner during World War II, and took a number of jobs including bookstore clerk, and assistant at the New York Public Library, before discovering his dramatic talents. Theatrical career Shaffer's first play, ''The Salt Land'' (1955), was presented on ITV on 8 November 1955. Encouraged by this success, Shaffer continued to write and established his reputation as a playwright in 1958, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2.24 million. On the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary, Liverpool historically lay within the ancient hundred of West Derby in the county of Lancashire. It became a borough in 1207, a city in 1880, and a county borough independent of the newly-created Lancashire County Council in 1889. Its growth as a major port was paralleled by the expansion of the city throughout the Industrial Revolution. Along with general cargo, freight, and raw materials such as coal and cotton, merchants were involved in the slave trade. In the 19th century, Liverpool was a major port of departure for English and Irish emigrants to North America. It was also home to both the Cunard and White Star Lines, and was the port of registry of the ocean li ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New York Drama Critics' Circle
The New York Drama Critics' Circle is made up of 22 drama critics from daily newspapers, magazines and wire services based in the New York City metropolitan area. The organization is best known for its annual awards for excellence in theater.Jones, KennethPassing Strange and August: Osage County Win 2007–08 NY Drama Critics Circle Award" playbill.com, May 12, 2008. Retrieved May 26, 2018.Hetrick, Adam"NY Drama Critics' Circle Awards Matilda and Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike With Top Honors"playbill.com, May 3, 2013. Retrieved May 26, 2018. The organization was founded in 1935 at the Algonquin Hotel by a group that included Brooks Atkinson, Walter Winchell, and Robert Benchley. Adam Feldman of ''Time Out New York'' has been President of the organization since 2005; Joe Dziemianowicz is currently Vice President, and Zachary Stewart of TheaterMania serves as Treasurer. Member affiliations *''amNewYork'' *''The Hollywood Reporter'' *''New York (magazine), New York'' *''New ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Equus (play)
''Equus'' is a play by Peter Shaffer written in 1973, telling the story of a psychiatrist who attempts to treat a young man who has a pathological religious fascination with horses. Shaffer was inspired to write ''Equus'' when he heard of a crime involving a 17-year-old who blinded six horses in a small town in Suffolk. He set out to construct a fictional account of what might have caused the incident, without knowing any of the details of the crime. The play's action is something of a detective story, involving the attempts of the child psychiatrist Dr. Martin Dysart to understand the cause of the boy's (Alan Strang) actions while wrestling with his own sense of purpose. The original stage production ran at the National Theatre in London between 1973 and 1975, directed by John Dexter. Alec McCowen played Dysart, and Peter Firth played Alan Strang. Later came the Broadway productions that starred Anthony Hopkins as Dysart (later played by Richard Burton, Leonard Nimoy, and An ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Shaffer, 1975
Peter may refer to: People * List of people named Peter, a list of people and fictional characters with the given name * Peter (given name) ** Saint Peter (died 60s), apostle of Jesus, leader of the early Christian Church * Peter (surname), a surname (including a list of people with the name) Culture * Peter (actor) (born 1952), stage name Shinnosuke Ikehata, Japanese dancer and actor * ''Peter'' (album), a 1993 EP by Canadian band Eric's Trip * ''Peter'' (1934 film), a 1934 film directed by Henry Koster * ''Peter'' (2021 film), Marathi language film * "Peter" (''Fringe'' episode), an episode of the television series ''Fringe'' * ''Peter'' (novel), a 1908 book by Francis Hopkinson Smith * "Peter" (short story), an 1892 short story by Willa Cather Animals * Peter, the Lord's cat, cat at Lord's Cricket Ground in London * Peter (chief mouser), Chief Mouser between 1929 and 1946 * Peter II (cat), Chief Mouser between 1946 and 1947 * Peter III (cat), Chief Mouser between 1947 a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Black Comedy (play)
''Black Comedy'' is a one-act farce by Peter Shaffer, first performed in 1965. The premise of the piece is that light and dark are transposed, so that when the stage is lit the cast are supposed to be in darkness and only when the stage is dark are they supposed to be able to see each other and their surroundings. A young sculptor and his fiancée have borrowed some expensive antique furniture from a neighbour's flat without his permission to impress an elderly millionaire art collector. When the power fails, the neighbour returns early, other people also arrive unexpectedly, and matters descend into near-chaos. Background and first production In the early spring of 1965, Kenneth Tynan, dramaturge of the Royal National Theatre, National Theatre, commissioned Shaffer to write a one-act play to accompany a production of ''Miss Julie'' starring Maggie Smith and Albert Finney. Shaffer later wrote in the introduction to his 1982 Collected Plays: Shaffer set about composing the play. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Francisco Pizarro
Francisco Pizarro González, Marquess of the Atabillos (; ; – 26 June 1541) was a Spanish conquistador, best known for his expeditions that led to the Spanish conquest of Peru. Born in Trujillo, Spain to a poor family, Pizarro chose to pursue fortune and adventure in the New World. He went to the Gulf of Urabá, and accompanied Vasco Núñez de Balboa in his crossing of the Isthmus of Panama, where they became the first Europeans to see the Pacific Ocean from the Americas. He served as mayor of the newly founded Panama City for a few years and undertook two failed expeditions to Peru. In 1529, Pizarro obtained permission from the Spanish crown to lead a campaign to conquer Peru and went on his third, and successful, expedition. When local people who lived along the coast resisted this invasion, Pizarro moved inland and founded the first Spanish settlement in Peru, San Miguel de Piura. After a series of manoeuvres, Pizarro captured the Incan emperor Atahualpa at the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Conquistador
Conquistadors (, ) or conquistadores (, ; meaning 'conquerors') were the explorer-soldiers of the Spanish and Portuguese Empires of the 15th and 16th centuries. During the Age of Discovery, conquistadors sailed beyond Europe to the Americas, Oceania, Africa, and Asia, colonizing and opening trade routes. They brought much of the Americas under the dominion of Spain and Portugal. After arrival in the West Indies in 1492, the Spanish, usually led by hidalgos from the west and south of Spain, began building an American empire in the Caribbean using islands such as Hispaniola, Cuba, and Puerto Rico as bases. From 1519 to 1521, Hernán Cortés waged a campaign against the Aztec Empire, ruled by Moctezuma II. From the territories of the Aztec Empire, conquistadors expanded Spanish rule to northern Central America and parts of what is now the southern and western United States, and from Mexico sailing the Pacific Ocean to the Philippines. Other conquistadors took over the Inca ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Atahuallpa
Atahualpa (), also Atawallpa (Quechua), Atabalica, Atahuallpa, Atabalipa (c. 1502 – 26-29 July 1533) was the last Inca Emperor. After defeating his brother, Atahualpa became very briefly the last Sapa Inca (sovereign emperor) of the Inca Empire (Tawantinsuyu) before the Spanish conquest ended his reign. Before the Inca Emperor Huayna Capac died in Quito in 1524 (possibly assassinated by the Spanish to claim the treasures or rumored to have died from smallpox, a disease brought by Europeans), he had appointed his son Ninan Cuyochi as his successor. Ninan died of the same disease. Huáscar, another son of Huayna, was named Sapa Inca by the Cusquenian nobles and he appointed his brother Atahualpa as governor of Quito. The Inca Civil War began in 1529 when Huáscar declared war on Atahualpa, for fear that he would try to carry out a coup d'état against him. Atahualpa became Inca emperor in May 1532 after he had defeated and imprisoned Huáscar and massacred any pretenders to the t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Inca
The Inca Empire (also known as the Incan Empire and the Inka Empire), called ''Tawantinsuyu'' by its subjects, (Quechua for the "Realm of the Four Parts", "four parts together" ) was the largest empire in pre-Columbian America. The administrative, political and military center of the empire was in the city of Cusco. The Inca civilization arose from the Peruvian highlands sometime in the early 13th century. The Spanish began the conquest of the Inca Empire in 1532 and by 1572, the last Inca state was fully conquered. From 1438 to 1533, the Incas incorporated a large portion of western South America, centered on the Andean Mountains, using conquest and peaceful assimilation, among other methods. At its largest, the empire joined modern-day Peru, what are now western Ecuador, western and south central Bolivia, northwest Argentina, the southwesternmost tip of Colombia and a large portion of modern-day Chile, and into a state comparable to the historical empires of Eurasia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Royal Hunt Of The Sun
''The Royal Hunt of the Sun'' is a 1964 play by Peter Shaffer that dramatizes the relation of two worlds entering in a conflict by portraying two characters: Atahuallpa Inca and Francisco Pizarro. Performance history Premiere ''The Royal Hunt of the Sun'' was first presented at the Chichester Festival by the National Theatre and subsequently at the Old Vic in July 1964. It was directed by John Dexter and designed by Michael Annals with music composed by Marc Wilkinson and movement by Claude Chagrin. The cast was led by Robert Stephens as Atahuallpa and Colin Blakely as Francisco Pizarro and included Oliver Cotton, Graham Crowden, Paul Curran, Michael Gambon, Edward Hardwicke, Anthony Hopkins, Derek Jacobi, Robert Lang, John McEnery, Edward Petherbridge, Louise Purnell and Christopher Timothy. The production was a critical and commercial success. In addition to its run at the Old Vic, it played at the Queen's Theatre, London, and toured to Aberdeen, Glasgow, Stratford, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Royal National Theatre
The Royal National Theatre in London, commonly known as the National Theatre (NT), is one of the United Kingdom's three most prominent publicly funded performing arts venues, alongside the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Royal Opera House. Internationally, it is known as the National Theatre of Great Britain. Founded by Laurence Olivier in 1963, many well-known actors have performed at the National Theatre. Until 1976, the company was based at The Old Vic theatre in Waterloo. The current building is located next to the Thames in the South Bank area of central London. In addition to performances at the National Theatre building, the National Theatre tours productions at theatres across the United Kingdom. The theatre has transferred numerous productions to Broadway and toured some as far as China, Australia and New Zealand. However, touring productions to European cities was suspended in February 2021 over concerns about uncertainty over work permits, additional costs and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Evening Standard Theatre Awards
The ''Evening Standard'' Theatre Awards, established in 1955, are the oldest theatrical awards ceremony in the United Kingdom. They are presented annually for outstanding achievements in London Theatre, and are organised by the ''Evening Standard'' newspaper. They are the West End's equivalent to Broadway's Drama Desk Awards. Trophies The trophies take the form of a modelled statuette, a figure representing Drama, designed by Frank Dobson RA, a former Professor of Sculpture at the Royal College of Art. Categories Three of the awards are given in the names of former ''Evening Standard'' notables: *Arts editor Sydney Edwards (who conceived the awards, and died suddenly in July 1979) for the Best Director category. *Editor Charles Wintour (who as deputy-editor in 1955, launched the awards after a nod from the proprietor, Lord Beaverbrook') for Most Promising Playwright. *Long-serving theatre critic Milton Shulman (for several years a key member of the judging panel) for the Ou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
