Joan Maud Littlewood (b.6 October 1914, Stockwell, London d.20 September 2002) was a British theatrical director, famous for her work in developing the left-wing Theatre Workshop. At her influential peak in the 1950s and 1960s, she was a well-known international figure not only in the area of theatre but in politics as well.

Career

She had trained as an actress at RADA but left after an unhappy start and moved to Manchester in 1934 where she met Jimmie Miller (better known as folksinger Ewan MacColl) and joined his troupe Theatre of Action. Littlewood and Miller were soon married. After a brief move to London, they returned to Manchester and set up the Theatre Union in 1936.

In 1941 the BBC banned her from broadcasting. The ban was lifted two years later when MI5 said she had broken off her association with the Communist Party. She was under surveillance by MI5 from 1939 until the 1950s^[1].

In 1945, after the end of World War II, Littlewood, her husband, and other Theatre Union members formed Theatre Workshop, touring for the next 8 years. Shortly afterwards, when Gerry Raffles joined the troupe, MacColl and Littlwood divorced, though they still worked together for many years and Littlewood was godmother to MacColl's two children. Littlewood and Raffles were life partners until his death in 1975.

In 1953, Theatre Workshop took up residence at the Theatre Royal in east London, where it gained international fame, performing international plays across Europe and in the USSR. One of Littlewood's most famous productions was the British première of Bertolt Brecht's Mother Courage and Her Children (1955), which she directed and also starred in the lead role. Her production of Fings Ain't Wot They Used T'Be, a musical about the London underworld, became a hit and ran from 1959 to 1962, transferring to the West End.

The works for which she is now best remembered are probably Shelagh Delaney's A Taste of Honey (1958), which gained great critical acclaim, and the satirical musical Oh, What a Lovely War! (1963), which she also wrote. Both were subsequently made into films. Theatre Workshop also championed the work of Irish playwright Brendan Behan, and Littlewood is often rumoured to have a significant role in his work.

After Raffles's death in 1975, Littlewood left Theatre Workshop and stopped directing. After a time of drifting she settled in France and became the companion of Baron Philippe de Rothschild, the vintner and poet, and wrote his memoirs, Milady Vine. In the mid-1980s, she commenced work on her autobiography, which was published in 1994, entitled Joan's Book.

Film of Joan Littlewood rehearsing young actors is available on the DVD of Bronco Bullfrog.

Littlewood died, in 2002, of natural causes at the age of 87 in the London flat of Peter Rankin, her UK base for the previous 23 years^[2]

References

Bibliography

• Howard Goorney and Ewan MacColl (eds.) Agit-Prop to Theatre Workshop, Political Playscripts, 1930-1950, 1986 ISBN 0-7190-2211-8
• Joan Littlewood Joan's Book: Joan Littlewood's Peculiar History As She Tells It (Methuen Drama, 1994) ISBN 0-413-77318-3
• Ewan MacColl Journeyman, an Autobiography, 1990, ISBN 0-283-06036-0

External links

• History of Theatre Workshop at Stratford East
• A tribute to Joan Littlewood by Jackie Fletcher
• BBC Obituary: Theatre's defiant genius 21 September, 2002
• Joan Littlewood (1914 - 2002) (The British Theatre guide)