Gaslight (1961)

Author:
New Play:

Venue:
Location:
Staging:

First performance:
Opening night:
Final performance:
Patrick Hamilton
No

Library Theatre
Concert Room, Scarborough Library
Round

29 June 1961
29 June 1961
26 July 1961
Director:
Alan Ayckbourn
Character
Mrs Manningham
Mr Manningham
Rough
Nancy
Policeman
Actor
Hazel Burt
David Jarrett
Stanley Page
Rosamund Dickson
Philip Clifford

Why is this play significant?

Gaslight marked Alan Ayckbourn's professional debut as a director. From this point, he would become renowned as one of the foremost exponents of directing in-the-round and would go on to direct more than 400 professional productions. Indeed for much of his life, Alan Ayckbourn said he considered himself a director first and foremost, rather than a writer, as he spent so much more time directing rather than writing.

Notes

○ Gaslight marked the directorial debut of Alan Ayckbourn; at the time predominantly an actor who had also had three of his own plays produced by the company. From this point forward, playwriting and directing would begin to dominate his career in theatre.
All research for this page by Simon Murgatroyd.