International Play Development
The Royal Court Theatre works with hundreds of playwrights across the world. All plays submitted to the international department are read in the original language by ...… Read more
Near East and North Africa
Since 2007
In spring 2007, the Royal Court and the British Council started a unique new project across the Near East and North Africa. Twenty One writers from Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Palestine, Tunisia and Syria (three from each country) were invited to Damascus in April 2007 to work with Elyse Dodgson and playwrights April De Angelis and David Greig.
The project continued in October and November 2007 when the same team travelled to Tunis for the second phase of work, after an unprecedented number of writers submitted first drafts of their plays. In March 2008, they returned to the region again, this time with Royal Court Artistic Director Dominic Cooke, for a third phase in Cairo. This is the first time that the Royal Court has worked abroad regionally in this way and the project has provided the unique experience of collaborating across a number of different countries which share the same language.
In November 2008, as a result of this project, the Royal Court presented a series of rehearsed readings as part of I Come From There: New Plays from the Arab World. To complement this, readings in the Near East and North Africa took place in Spring 2009, directed by local directors in Amman, Beirut and Tunis and full productions of some of the plays have now been performed at different venues across the region.
Current work
In April 2010, five of the plays were presented at the Martin E. Segal Theatre Center at the City University of New York as part of the PEN World Voices Festival .
Arzé Khodr
Playwright
Laila Soliman
Playwright
Jaouad Essounani
Playwright
Kamal Khalladi
Playwright
Amani Zawawi
Playwright
Mohammad Al Attar
Playwright
Imad Farajin
Playwright
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