Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
Thursday 5 July 2007 21:45-22:30 (Radio 3)
Forty years after Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead made Tom Stoppard's name overnight, Matthew Sweet and guests explore its origins and legacy with those that have been involved in bringing it to the stage, including the director of the very first production, Derek Goldby.
Staged at the Edinburgh Festival when the playwright was an unknown 29 year old, the play is famously set simply 'within and around the action of Hamlet' and has since been widely admired for its verbal wit and dramatic ingenuity, becoming a contemporary classic of British theatre.
Tom Stoppard
Tom Stoppard 
Playlist
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
As part of BBC Radio 3's Stoppard season, Night Waves Landmarks examines Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.
Staged at the Edinburgh Festival and brought to the National Theatre when the playwright was an unknown 29 year old Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead is famously set simply 'within and around the action of Hamlet'. It has since been widely admired for its verbal wit and dramatic ingenuity and has gone on to become a film, an A-level set text and a contemporary classic of British theatre.
40 years after this unique play made Tom Stoppard's name overnight, Matthew Sweet explores its origins, its legacy and its enormous appeal. He talks to writer Lawrence Norfolk, the director of the very first production, Derek Goldby, theatre critic Susannah Clapp and Professor of Shakespeare Studies, Michael Dobson.
Tom Stoppard's new version of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead will be broadcast on Radio 3 on 15th July at 9.40pm.
BBC - Radio 3 - Tom Stoppard Interview
