Pillars of the Community

Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906), Norwegian poet and playwright, was one of the shapers of modern theatre, who tempered naturalism with an understanding of social responsibility and individual psychology. His earliest major plays, Brand (1866) and Peer Gynt (1867), were large-scale verse dramas, but with Pillars of the Community (1877) he began to explore contemporary issues. There followed A Doll's House (1879), Ghosts (1881) and An Enemy of the People (1882). A richer understanding of the complexity of human impulses marks such later works as The Wild Duck (1885), Rosmersholm (1886), Hedda Gabler (1890) and The Master Builder (1892), while the imminence of mortality overshadows his last great plays, John Gabriel Borkman (1896) and When We Dead Awaken (1899). Samuel Adamson's plays include: The Ballad of Hattie and James, Wife (both Kiln Theatre), Some Kind of Bliss (Trafalgar Studios), All About My Mother (from Almodovar; Old Vic), Gabriel (Shakespeare's Globe), Fish and Company (Soho Theatre/National Youth Theatre), Southwark Fair (National Theatre), Drink, Dance, Laugh and Lie (Bush Theatre/Channel 4), Grace Note (Peter Hall Company/Old Vic), Clocks and Whistles (Bush Theatre), Frank & Ferdinand (National Theatre Connections); as well as contributions to the 24 Hour Plays (Old Vic), Hoard (New Vic, Stoke), A Chain Play (Almeida Theatre), Decade (Headlong Theatre) and Urban Scrawl (TheatreVoice/Theatre 503).

Adaptations include: Jack Maggs, from Peter Carey's novel (State Theatre Company of South Australia); Ibsen's Pillars of the Community and Mrs Affleck, from Ibsen's Little Eyolf, (both at the National Theatre) A Doll's House (Southwark Playhouse); Chekhov's Uncle Vanya (Leeds Playhouse), The Cherry Orchard (Oxford Stage Company/Riverside Studios) and Three Sisters (OSC/Whitehall Theatre); Running Wild, based on the novel by Michael Morpurgo (Chichester Festival Theatre/Regent's Park Open Air Theatre); Schnitzler's Professor Bernhardi (Dumbfounded Theatre/Arcola Theatre/Radio 3); Bernhard Studlar's Vienna Dreaming (National Theatre Studio); a musical based on George MacDonald's The Light Princess, with Tori Amos (National Theatre); Ostrovsky's Larisa and the Merchants (Arcola Theatre). Radio includes: Tomorrow Week (Radio 3). Film includes Running for River (Directional Studios/Krug). He was Pearson Writer in Residence at the Bush in 1997-8.