Play Adaptations

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark. Two months after the king's sudden death, his widow has married his brother. The court celebrates while the dead king's son—Prince Hamlet—drowns in grief and suspicion. Then guards report an impossible sighting: the dead king's ghost, walking the battlements in full armor. When Hamlet confronts the apparition, he learns a terrible truth: his father was murdered. Poisoned by his own brother. And the ghost demands revenge. But how do you kill a king? How do you trust a ghost? How do you act when your mother has betrayed your father's memory, ...

Ideal for students of Shakespeare and Dance Studies, Choreographing Shakespeare explores how dance adaptations strive to design legible and intelligible stories, while ultimately celebrating the beauty of pure movement.

Fall in love with this Shakespearean comedy about finding and losing love. A host of characters try to act as matchmakers for a young couple, while another couple is to be married. But everything doesn't go as planned when a meddling villain schemes to ruin the wedding.

“Gilbert writes so well that you half-suspect he could give up the day job." The Independent. This dramatic version of Robert Louis Stevenson's novel, "The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde", brings out the full horror of the original story as well as being a compelling play in its own right. Stevenson's narrative has been adapted so that six actors can perform it. This is the only stage version which is genuinely faithful to the text, using Stevenson's words where appropriate, as well as his chapter headings. It would be ideal for students to perform in small groups, particularly if ...

This prose adaptation of Shakespeare's Hamlet includes: Complete retelling of the tragedy as a novel (18,700 words) Original afterword on the art and tradition of adapting Shakespeare Author biography of William Shakespeare Adapter biography with translation credentials A king is murdered by his brother. The dead man's son discovers the truth — and cannot act on it. Between the knowing and the doing, a kingdom falls. Hamlet is the most performed, most studied, and most quoted play in the English language. It is also one of the most difficult to actually read. Shakespeare wrote for actors,...

Seven legendary unproduced screenplays, resurrected and reinvented for BBC Radio 4 The annals of movie history are full of lost treasures – spectacular scripts from world-renowned writers that could have been classics, had they only been made. Now, for the first time, some of these forgotten...

Alfred Hitchcock and Ernest Lehman's unfinished screenplay, completed by Mark Gatiss 'Achingly tense scenes... and a masterpiece of a climax' Radio Times The annals of movie history are full of lost treasures - spectacular scripts from world-renowned writers that could have been classics, had...

A major motion picture (2007) from Oscar-winning director Ang Lee (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; Brokeback Mountain): an intensely passionate story of love and espionage, set in Shanghai during World War II. In the midst of the Japanese occupation of China and Hong Kong, two lives become...

Ten contemporary reimaginings of Ovid’s iconic tales, with star-studded casts including Toby Jones, Shaun Dooley and Robert Glenister The Roman love poet Ovid has influenced writers past and present, with his witty, sexy tales inspiring authors from Shakespeare to Ezra Pound. Included here are...

In The Unquenchable Thirst of Dracula, one of seven 'unmade movies' available on audio, it is 1934, and young Englishwoman Penny is travelling by train across India in search of her missing sister. En route, she meets sibling artistes Prem and Lakshmi, who have been hired by a Maharajah and his wife, the Rani, to entertain their aristocratic European guest. But evil lurks in the hidden caverns beneath the ancient palace, where the acolytes of a fiendish blood cult await their next human sacrifice....

The White Hotel, one of seven 'unmade movies' available on audio, centres around circus performer Lisa, who visits famous Berlin psychoanalyst Dr Probst to discover the cause of her mysterious breast and pelvic pains. Reading her sexually charged journal, Probst concludes that the answer lies in her past. But then Lisa reveals her unsettling premonitions - 'I see what is going to happen. And what is going to happen cannot be endured.' Is her trauma really the result of childhood memories or a dark vision of the future?

Badger is happy living in his neat and tidy burrow - until Big Bad Bully Goat decides to move in! Bully Goat has such a fearsome reputation that even Badger’s biggest friends are too scared to help. All seems lost until help arrives from a very unexpected quarter and Badger realizes that size isn't everything. This traditional Iberian tale is retold with a twist by storyteller, poet, and anthologist Andrew Fusek Peters.

The Hook, one of seven 'unmade movies' available on audio, is set in New York's docks in 1951, where hundreds of longshoremen queue up at dawn hoping to be given a counter and a place in the day's gang. It's hard, dangerous work, but in a world ruled by corrupt union bosses on the take, they have no choice but to accept it. Then a tragedy occurs, and one man, Marty Ferrara, decides to fight back....

Full-cast dramatisations of three insightful novels by Christopher Isherwood, plus a bonus interview Novelist and playwright Christopher Isherwood is best known for The Berlin Stories of pre-Hitler Germany, which inspired the musical Cabaret. Many of his works have been adapted for stage and...

A jubilant, inclusive audiobook that features families at play, each with a family member who has a disability. With love and adaptation, this is how we play! This joyful listen-along with an empowering refrain, from disability rights activists Jessica Slice and Caroline Cupp, demystifies and...

The annals of movie history are full of lost treasures - spectacular scripts from world-renowned writers that could have been classics, had they only been made. Now, for the first time, some of these forgotten gems have been brought to life, fully realised as vivid, cinematic radio productions. Scripted by major 20th-century writers, including Harold Pinter, Arthur Miller, Alfred Hitchcock and Dennis Potter, they star a host of A-list actors and feature richly evocative, atmospheric soundtracks.

Presence, the Play offers a penetrating perspective on the vital role personal presence plays in the essence of life. This timely, captivating novel speaks to a growing hunger for a way of life that’s real and tangible, the opposite of an artificial existence lived in a realm of mediated connectivity.

Three theatrical adaptations of ancient stories: Agamemnon A queen, her son, and his teacher await the return of their king after ten years of brutal war. Gilgamesh The oldest story in the world, in which a king finds and loses a great friend, and then sets off in search of an answer to the question of eternal life. The Golem In 17th-century Prague, a rabbi and his family turn to ancient mysticism in a desperate attempt to protect their community from approaching violence.

What price power? Murder and madness follow Macbeth in his rise to become the crime king of 1940s New York. Spectral forces spin a maelstrom of paranoia and deception in this frightening drama. Slaughtered children and strangled sleep. Unbridled violence. Prophecy. “Boscutti’s Macbeth” is a transfixing screenplay. An unholy look at unchecked ambition and tyranny. Will Macbeth control his own righteous destiny? Or succumb to fate everlasting? ‘Brave high-wire act between classicism and modernity.’ Dan Sanford ‘Bold, strident adaptation of Shakespeare’s timeless tragedy where ...

An adaptation for the stage of Charles Dickens' classic Christmas story. See Scrooge meet Marley and the three ghosts. Will Scrooge learn about the true meaning of Christmas? Will Tiny Tim survive? Who is the mysterious girl selling matches in the town square? An original take on a classic tale: witty, spooky and uplifting. Perfect for a quiet read or a production; and suitable for all ages.