Christopher Haydon Archives - The Play Podcast

Christopher Haydon

by Douglas Schatz | Oct 18, 2022 | Contributor

Christopher Haydon

Christopher Haydon is Artistic Director of the Rose Theatre, Kingston. Prior to that, he was Artistic Director of the Gate Theatre from 2012-2017, and from 2008-2011, was associate director at the Bush Theatre. He was a 2017 fellow of the Clore Leadership Programme.

Directing credits at the Gate include The Convert, Grounded (also Traverse Theatre, Studio Theatre Washington DC, national and international tour, winner: Fringe First, Best Production – Off West End Awards), Diary of a Madman (Traverse Theatre), The Iphigenia Quartet, The Christians (also Traverse Theatre, winner: Fringe First), Image of An Unknown Young Woman (winner: Best Production – Off West End Awards).

Freelance directing credits include Macbeth (Manchester Royal Exchange), The Remains of the Day (Royal and Derngate, Northampton/Out of Joint), Trying It On (China Plate/RSC/Royal Court/Traverse Theatre), On The Exhale (China Plate/Traverse Theatre, released as an audiobook by Audible, winner: Fringe First), The Caretaker (Bristol Old Vic/Royal and Derngate, Northampton), Twelve Angry Men starring Martin Shaw and Robert Vaughn (Birmingham Rep/West End) and Pressure Drop starring Billy Bragg and his band (On Theatre/Wellcome Collection).

Photo: Iona Firouzaba

Podcast Episode(s)

Carrie Hope Fletcher in The Caucasian Chalk Circle. Photo by Iona Firouzabadi

053 - The Caucasian Chalk Circle, by Bertolt Brecht

Recommended Play(s)

Chris recommended two plays:
Black Watch by Gregory Burke, and
The Drowned World by Gary Owen.

053 – The Caucasian Chalk Circle, by Bertolt Brecht

by Douglas Schatz | Oct 18, 2022 | Podcast Episodes

Carrie Hope Fletcher as Grusha
The Rose Theatre, Kingston, 2022
photo: Iona Firouzabadi

053 – The Caucasian Chalk Circle, by Bertolt Brecht

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Bertolt Brecht wrote the first draft of The Caucasian Chalk Circle in 1944 while in exile in the United States. The play is a parable about the chaos and costs of war, which Brecht updated after his return to East Germany in 1948, including a new prologue that set the play in the context of post-war Communism and the rebuilding of his divided country.

Brecht is renowned for his distinctive dramatic philosophy, which challenged the traditional relationship between theatrical artifice and its audience. The Caucasian Chalk Circle comprises a play-within-a-play that is a timeless tale of romance and war, a moving story of maternal love, and a political allegory, complete with songs and comic turns. It is also a fable with a purpose, because its author’s intention is to prompt us to consider the moral, social and political points it makes in relation to our own time. To rationally apply learnings toward changing the world. Which is not to say that we will not be amused or emotionally engaged by the story and its performance.

As we record this episode, the play is enjoying its first major revival in London for twenty-five years at the Rose Theatre in Kingston, in a new adaptation by Steve Waters, directed by the Rose’s Artistic Director, Christopher Haydon. I’m delighted that Chris has taken time out to join me to talk about Brecht and this challenging, compelling, complicated, even crazy play.

The Rose Theatre production runs until 22nd October 2022. Click here for more information and to book.

Christopher Haydon

Recommended Play

Chris recommended two plays:
Black Watch by Gregory Burke, and
The Drowned World by Gary Owen.

Photo: Iona Firouzabadi

We have footnotes for this episode …

The Footnotes to our episode on The Caucasian Chalk Circle include notes on the origin of the chalk circle, the Soviet setting of the Prologue, Brecht’s views on the purpose of art, and the pleasures of the language in the play.

Footnotes for Patrons

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Douglas

The Texts

If you are interested in buying the play text or other related books, we’d be delighted if you choose to purchase them from our selected partners Bookshop.org and Blackwell’s. Not only will you be supporting independent booksellers, we will also earn a small commission on every book you purchase, which helps to keep the podcast going. Click on the cover to buy from our chosen partner. Thank you.

113 – Arcadia by Tom Stoppard

Aug 21, 2026 | Podcast Episodes

Published 24th August

Tom Stoppard’s 1993 play, Arcadia is viewed by many as his finest play, renowned for the breadth of its intellectual interrogations and its formal invention. The play is a structural masterpiece of ideas, as well as a teasing detective story, joyous comedy, and emotionally rich exploration of love and loss.

As we record this episode a wonderful new production of Arcadia is playing at the Duke of York’s theatre in London’s West End, following its acclaimed run at the Old Vic theatre earlier this year. I am delighted to share the challenge and the pleasure of exploring Stoppard’s dazzling drama with the director of the new production, Carrie Cracknell.

112 – Glengarry Glen Ross by David Mamet

Jul 27, 2026 | Podcast Episodes

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David Mamet’s modern American classic, Glengarry Glen Ross, is a blistering commentary on the cut-throat reality of the American dream, and its poisonous impact on those who have bought into the myth and machismo of that dream. The play had its world premiere in the small Cottesloe theatre at the National Theatre in London in September 1983, and was first performed in New York the following year, winning the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Mamet also wrote the extended screenplay for the star-studded 1992 film version.

As we recorded this episode a new production of the play was playing at the Old Vic theatre in London, with an all-female cast. This is a particularly provocative idea, because one of the primary themes of this play is masculine identity, and the salesmen in this Chicago office do not hold back in their display of machismo.

To explore Mamet’s unflinching slice of 1980s dog-eat-dog capitalism, I am joined by arts journalist Mark Lawson.

111 – The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui by Bertolt Brecht

Jul 2, 2026 | Podcast Episodes

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Bertolt Brecht’s ‘gangster spectacle’, The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui, is both an exuberant and funny piece of theatre, and a chillingly topical political satire. Set in the 1930s Chicago of Al Capone, Brecht presents a parody of the rise of Hitler through the character of the gangster Arturo Ui. The play is a universal cry for vigilance against the rise of unscrupulous, populist leaders who threaten democratic societies and global peace.

As we recorded this episode a new production of the play by the Royal Shakespeare Company was playing in Stratford-upon-Avon, starring Mark Gatiss as the title character.

I am delighted to be joined by both the show’s translator, playwright Stephen Sharkey, and by Brecht scholar, Professor Tom Kuhn, to guide us through Brecht’s political parody.