Tim Sutton is an award-winning composer and musical director. He has worked extensively with the National Theatre, Royal Shakespeare Company, National Theatre of Scotland, Young Vic, Shakespeare’s Globe, Almeida Theatre and Sonia Friedman Productions. Music includes: Measure for Measure (Globe), The Omission of the Family Coleman (Ustinov, Bath), As You Like It and Titus Andronicus (RSC), Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (NT), Alexei Sayle’s Imaginary Sandwich Bar Series 1, 2 & 3, The Now Show, and Paul Sinha’s Perfect Pub Quiz (BBC Radio 4), and The Lavender Hill Mob. Other scores for theatre include: The Secret Garden (West Yorkshire Playhouse), Dreamfighter (Lichfield Festival), The Bacchae (NToS), As You Like It (Wyndham’s) and As You Desire Me (Playhouse). His community opera Cycle Song won the Royal Philharmonic Society Learning & Participation Award 2012. He is twice recipient of the Stiles and Drewe Best Song Award, and won the Vivian Ellis Prize for Best Musical for Beauty and the Beast. Tim is an Associate Member of the Inner Magic Circle. He is also committed to the development of new musical theatre, and has mentored aspiring writers on the Book, Music and Lyrics course since its inception in 2011.
Roy Williams began writing plays in 1990 and is now arguably one of the country’s leading dramatists. In 2000 he was the joint-winner of The George Devine Award and in 2001 he was awarded the Evening Standard Award for Most Promising Playwright. He was awarded an OBE for Services to Drama in the 2008 Birthday Honours List and was made a fellow of The Royal Society of Literature in 2018. Plays include: The Fellowship (Hampstead Theatre), Go, Girl (Lyric Hammersmith), Death of England (Dorfman Theatre, National Theatre), Death of England: Delroy (Olivier Theatre, National Theatre) both co-written with Clint Dyer, The Firm (Hampstead Theatre, Downstairs), Soul: The Untold Story of Marvin Gaye (Royal and Derngate/ Hackney Empire, Antigone (Pilot Theatre/UK Tour), Wildefire (Hampstead Theatre) Advice For The Young at Heart (Theatre Centre), an adaptation of The Loneliness of The Long Distance Runner (Pilot Theatre/ UK Tour), Sucker Punch (Royal Court Theatre, nominated for Olivier Award for Best Play), Kingston’14 (Theatre Royal Stratford East), Category B (Tricycle Theatre), Angel House (Eclipse Theatre, UK Tour), Days of Significance (RSC), Joe Guy (Tiata Fahodzi), There’s Only One Wayne Matthews (Polka Theatre), Baby Girl (NT Connections), Absolute Beginners (Lyric Hammersmith), Little Sweet Thing (Nottingham Playhouse), Slow Time (NT Education), Fallout (Royal Court Theatre), Sing Yer Heart Out For The Lads (NT), Clubland (Royal Court Theatre), The Gift (Birmingham Rep/Tricycle Theatre), Local Boy (Hampstead Theatre), Souls (Theatre Centre), Lift Off (Royal Court), Starstruck (Tricycle, Winner of John Whiting Award, Alfred Fagon Award & EMMA Award for Best Play), Josie’s Boy (Red Ladder Theatre Co), The No-Boys Cricket Club (Theatre Royal, Stratford East). He also contributed to the Royal Court’s Peckham The Soap Opera. Screen includes: the BAFTA nominated Death of England: Face to Face (co-written with Clint Dyer for Sabel Productions/National Theatre/Sky Arts), BAFTA nominated Soon Gone: A Windrush Chronicle (Douglas Road Productions/BBC4), Fallout (Company Pictures/ Channel 4, Screen Nation Award for Achievement in Screenwriting), Offside (BBC, Winner of BAFTA Children’s Film & TV Award for Best Schools Drama) and Babyfather (BBC). Film includes: he has co-written Fast Girls (DJ Films). Radio includes: adaptations of ER Braithwaite’s A Choice of Straws and To Sir With Love and John Wyndham’s The Midwich Cuckoos, as well as original plays Tell Tale and HomeBoys. He has also created and written seven series of Interrogation for BBC Radio 4.
Christopher Haydon is artistic director of the Rose Theatre, Kingston. Prior to this he was artistic director of the Gate Theatre from 2012-2017. And from 2008-2011 he was associate director at the Bush Theatre. He was recently included in The Stage’s list of the 100 most influential people in British Theatre. He was a 2017 fellow of the Clore Leadership Programme. Christopher studied and Cambridge University and trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama, the National Theatre Studio, the Lincoln Center in New York and with Cicely Berry at the RSC. Directing credits at the Rose include: Leopards and Caucasian Chalk Circle starring Carrie Hope Fletcher. Directing credits at the Gate include The Convert, Grounded (Also Traverse Theatre, Studio Theatre Washington DC, national and international tour, winner: Fringe First, Best Production – Off West End Awards), Diary of a Madman (Traverse Theatre), The Iphigenia Quartet, The Christians (also Traverse Theatre, winner: Fringe First), Image of An Unknown Young Woman (winner: Best Production – Off West End Awards), The Edge Of Our Bodies, Trojan Women, Purple Heart, The Prophet, Wittenburg. Freelance directing credits include Macbeth (Manchester Royal Exchange); The Remains of the Day (Royal and Derngate, Northampton/Out of Joint); Trying It On (China Plate/RSC/Royal Court/Traverse Theatre), On The Exhale (China Plate/Traverse Theatre, released as an audiobook by Audible, winner: Fringe First), The Caretaker (Bristol Old Vic/Royal and Derngate, Northampton), Twelve Angry Men – starring Martin Shaw and Robert Vaughn (Birmingham Rep/West End), Sixty-Six Books, In The Beginning (Bush Theatre/Westminster Abbey); Grace (On Theatre/Théatre Du Poche, Brussels, Belgium) Pressure Drop – starring Billy Bragg and his band (On Theatre/Wellcome Collection). His first independent short film In Wonderland was longlisted for a BAFTA. Funded through Film London’s London Calling scheme it screened internationally, winning several awards including Best Drama at the Aesthetica Short Film Festival. His second short film Martha was funded by the BFI/Film London and has screened around the world at a number of Oscar accredited festivals including Flickers’ Rhode Island, L.A. Shorts and Foyle. Other film credits include Passages: a Windrush Celebration (as producer, Royal Court/Black Apron), Longing to Belong (BBC) Devil in the Detail (Royal Court/Guardian), Two Gentleman of Verona, Taming of the Shrew (Globe Theatre/BBC iPlayer). His first feature This Modern Love is currently in development with Independent Entertainment and the Electric Shadow Company and is a collaboration with writer Matt Jones and musician Kele Okereke – lead singer of the platinum selling band Bloc Party. As a journalist he has written for The Scotsman, The Financial Times, The Independent, The Guardian, The New Statesman, The Stage and Prospect Magazine. Publications include The Art of the Artistic Director (Methuen) Conversations on Religion, Conversations on Truth (Continuum), Identity and Identification (Wellcome Collection/Black Dog). He was a contributor to Adapting Translation for the Stage (Routledge). His report Where are the Workers? – Class Diversity in British Theatre Audiences Was funded by the AHRC and can be downloaded from the Clore Leadership Programme’s website.