Exciting line-up of actors announced for Wagner: The Writers' Cycle
Three renowned actors to perform in an exclusive evening of Wagner-inspired drama, poetry and prose with BBC Radio 3.
This Friday, acclaimed actors Harriet Walter, Geraldine James and Siobhan Redmond will join writers Timberlake Wertenbaker, Glyn Maxwell, Jackie Kay and Andrew O’Hagan to showcase work inspired by Wagner’s epic Ring Cycle. Tickets are still available for only £7 (£4 students) and can be booked here.
Wagner: The Writers’ Cycle consists of contemporary literary responses to Wagner’s great story. Each writer has chosen one opera from Wagner’s epic cycle and, using a mix of short stories, poetry, prose and theatre, has written their own innovative and imaginative interpretation.
Timberberlake Wertenbaker, who is the recipient of numerous awards including an Olivier Award and the 1990 New York Drama Critics Award for Our Country’s Good, will present a play starring the three actors.
Harriet Walter, who has performed extensively on stage and on screen – most recently in Women Beware Women in the Olivier NT, Siobhan Redmond, whose has performed recently in the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Twelfth Night and Dunsinane, and BAFTA-nominated Geraldine James, whose credits include the outrageous breast-feeding mum in the controversial Little Britain and David Fincher’s film The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, will all perform in Wertenbaker’s work.
Jackie Kay, a critically-acclaimed short story writer, novelist and poet who was awarded an MBE for her services to literature, will present a short story, while the multiple-award winning Andrew O’Hagan will present an essay.
Writer Glyn Maxwell, who has also written the libretto for John Fulljames’ production of The Firework-Maker’s Daughter, which will have its premier in April 2013, will present a poem.
The evening, which takes place in the Linbury Studio on 21 September, is to be recorded and each new work will subsequently be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 alongside their live transmission of the operas.
Wagner: The Writers’ Cycle is part of a series of Insight events that accompany the full staging of Keith Warner’s production of the cycle, which opens on 24 September. Find out more about Insight events surrounding The Ring. You can book tickets to Wagner: The Writer’ Cycle here.
