A challenge for educational theatre: directing Edward Bond’s The Children: an interview with David Allen

Abstract

David Allen is the Artistic Director of the Midland Actors Theatre. He has produced plays such as Waiting for Godot (2000), Lady Chatterley’s Lover (2001) and Macbeth (2004) but undoubtedly his greatest challenge as director was the production of The Children by Edward Bond in 2003. The experience took place at Washwood Heath Technology College in Birmingham with a group of Year 10 and 11 pupils. As part of the Theatre in Education paradigm, the play demands the involvement of young people in the problems of their own lives.