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THERE IS NOTHING LIKE A DANE!

CLIVE FRANCIS

An affectionate compilation of funny bits and pieces about Hamlet - illuminated with Clive Francis's witty theatrical caricatures.

Hamlet is the best-known play in the English language. Every great actor - and some great actresses - have strutted their stuff as the Prince of Denmark. There Is Nothing Like a Dane! draws on the mountains of memoirs - and the anthills of anecdotes - to furnish a largely irreverent account of their various, and often accident-prone, attempts, interwoven with Clive Francis's delectable caricatures.

Clive Francis's self-caricature from Laugh Lines

Here are glimpses in word and picture of the likes of Wolfit, Branagh, Gielgud, Irving, Burton, Guinness, and, of course, Olivier. And the literary tone is elevated now and then by contributions from Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, Henry Fielding and PG Wodehouse. But the chief delight is in the unexpected: a stubbornly moustachioed Ophelia in Poona, an inadvertently horn-rimmed Hamlet in the Waterloo Road - and would you believe Tony Hancock, Tommy Cooper and even June Whitfield as the gloomy Dane?

This is a book for actors and audiences - and Shakespeare buffs on their day off.

CLIVE FRANCIS is well-known as an actor as well as a caricaturist. He has made over a hundred television appearances. His London stage career began in 1966 with There's a Girl In My Soup, followed by a large number of West End shows. He joined Alan Ayckbourn's company at the National Theatre in 1986 and was Scrooge for two years running in the Royal Shakespeare Company's Christmas Carol.

Clive Francis began caricaturing professionally in 1983 and has had seven solo exhibitions. His first book of theatrical caricatures, Laugh Lines, was published by Hodder & Stoughton in 1989, and in 1994, to coincide with Gielgud's 90th birthday, he produced for Robson Books Sir John: The Many Faces of Gielgud.

1 85459 401 X

HOUSE OF GAMES

CHRIS JOHNSTON

Making Theatre from Everyday Life

Full of games and exercises, House of Games is an immensely valuable resource book for drama leaders, facilitators and theatre directors. Whether the drama group is based in a youth club or a theatre, a hospital or a community hall, this book offers strategies for developing improvisations and productions which are rooted in the everyday experiences of group members.

House of Games is divided into three sections:

• Foundations - the essential understanding which underpin drama work.
• Facilitation - the responsibilities and challenges of facilitating a group.
• Animations - games and exercises for improvisation, narrative, image work, movement and devising performance.

CHRIS JOHNSTON has been active in drama for twenty years and has worked with groups of all kinds from prisoners to old age pensioners, from youth clubs to professional actors. He is currently running the Insight Arts Trust in Islington, London.

1 85459 309 9

SWASHBUCKLING

RICHARD LANE
The Art of Stage Combat and Theatrical Swordplay

Swashbuckling is the definitive guide to stage fighting technique and basic swordplay. In words and in pictures - about 400 of them, almost all taken expressly for this large format book - it covers everything an actor must know and everything an actor must do to give a performance as a stage combatant.

This resource book also has a glossary of stage combat terms, a world-wide directory of teachers and colleges offering training, suppliers of weapons, props and costumes and a comprehensive bibliography and further reading lists.

RICHARD LANE is one of only 25 instructors certified by the Society of American Fight Directors. He has choreographed hundreds of plays and operas ranging from Shakespeare and Mozart to Arthur Miller and Caryl Churchill.

1 85459 425 7