Ken Campbell – författare

Four short plays for young actors Making Scenes 1 is an exciting selection of plays commissioned by the Royal National Theatre for the BT National Connections festival for young actors in 1995.Each play includes Production Notes, dealing with setting and staging, costume, lighting and casting. Also included are a set of questions and exercises for workshop classes.

"I don't think there is a more hilariously anarchic talent on the loose in British theatre" (The Times) Life for the amazing Faz and his twitty assistant Twoo, has become listless and lacking in sparkle. That is, until Faz invents skungpoomery or "thinking up a word and then doing it. "Examples of skungpoomery are: "shankfinerbling" (going up to someone's legs and finerbling them with your nose) or "whangbungkling" (firing off bunklies into the air with the aid of a ruler) or even "bunkjamjarmering" (smearing strawberry jam on your pyjamas and doing a bunk into the street). And so saying, Faz and Twoo bunjamjarmer into the world outside, a world now a-glitter with excitement and adventure - thanks to skungpoomery. First produced for audiences of 7-13 year olds by the Nottingham Playhouse Roundabout Company, and subsequently by the Richmond Orange Tree."The only time I feel like dusting down the term "genius", in the pure sense of an influential demonic character, is when I'm confronted by a great Ken Campbell show." (Michael Coveney, Observer)

"The only time I feel like dusting down the term 'genius', in the pure sense of an influential demonic character, is when I'm confronted by a great Ken Campbell show." (Michael Coveney, Observer) "Campbell is conducting us on a guided tour of the wilder shores of his own imagination. The stories pour out of him...Things become curiouser and curiouser as Campbell explains his theory of enantiodromia and relates the terrible adventures of his other self, Pigspurt, adventures too dangerous and depraved to be described in a family newspaper. Suffice it to say that this nasal infestation indulges in "carnal nosilage" and "cunnisneezus"...Campbell is an inspired original who reaches the parts other entertainers haven't even heard of." (Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph)"Demonstrates Ken Campbell's talent for capturing a comic moment and blowing it up into a great balloon of idiotic fantasy" (Jane Ellison, Evening Standard)

"British Theatre's antic visionary" (Guardian) "We're doing three David Hare plays all on one day, you see and we're calling that a trilogy - The Hare Trilogy - So if we had yours on, it would seem like trilogies were in the wind." (Richard Eyre to Ken Campbell)

"I don't think there is a more hilariously anarchic talent on the loose in British theatre" (The Times) This monologue, premiered in 1996 at The National features a mysterious female French book thief, an oriental violinist and the Temple of Mankind, Damanhur."It is no accident he went to school in Barking. His contribution to British theatre is radical and immense." (Financial Times)

Class 4S are taking a coach trip to Alton Towers. Or are they? Tricia seems to think otherwise, and convinces her classmates that they're really journeying to the centre of the Earth as part of an experiment by terrorists, who are robots made to look like Simon Cowell. It's all part of The Spirisy, apparently, which their form teacher, Miss Sheehan is part of, not to mention the Nasties, the Arabesques and the Funny Mentalists. School Journey to the Centre of the Earth gives a hilarious insight into an eight-year-old imagination and casts the world of adults in a whole new light It was commissioned by the National Theatre as part of the Shell Connections Festival in 2006 and can be performed by 15 young people from Year 6 upwards.

Will the courageous Cyril defeat the weedy Baron Wadd and win the hand of Princess Daphne? Or will his heroic efforts be thwarted by the mischievous interlopers Fazand Twoo? The answers to these important questions are revealed in Ken Campbell''s reimagining of the familiar Old King Cole story. Old King Cole has been performed in many countries and translated into many languages.

Will the courageous Cyril defeat the weedy Baron Wadd and win the hand of Princess Daphne? Or will his heroic efforts be thwarted by the mischievous interlopers Fazand Twoo? The answers to these important questions are revealed in Ken Campbell’s reimagining of the familiar Old King Cole story. Old King Cole has been performed in many countries and translated into many languages.