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Find out moreJim Cartwright was born in Lancashire. He is the author of many prize-winning plays, including ROAD, BED, TWO, and THE RISE AND FALL OF LITTLE VOICE, which won the Evening Standard Best Comedy Award and the Olivier Award in 1992 and was made into the film LITTLE VOICE starring Jane Horrocks. His plays have been translated into 25 languages.
An unlikely rags-to-riches story of a young supermarket girl who becomes a supermodel – the charm of the tale is in the telling. It fizzes along, the dialogue is perfectly alive, riveting stuff that turns dark in a most satisfying manner. He is the creator of Little Voice, a play which was filmed and which starred Jane Horrocks. Comparison: Willy Russell, Ben Elton, James Hawes.
A new play by Jim Cartwright premiered at the Royal Court Theatre in March 2000 From the author of Road and The Rise and Fall of Little Voice comes a new play about life in the North. Sump and Choke are the Little and Large of the local pub. They are friends who have bonded together though a shared passion for the martial arts. What happens to them during their bonding exercises surprises them both. Jim Cartwright's comic drama looks at two northern hard men and explores the idea of masculinity in an age when every certainty is in doubt.He's large as life at the star and garter Saturday afternoons. He bit a pool ball in half last week. He might be a hundred years old but he's the same as ever. A rough tuff puff.
Road: A surreal vision of the contemporary urban landscape...uncomfortable and magical, funny and bitter. It is a northern Under Milk Wood, high on pills and booze (Sunday Times). Bed: Cartwright writes better about old people than anyone I know, except perhaps Beckett. This is an odd, harrowing and hilarious piece, entirely without sentimentality, sturdy but moving. (John Peter, Sunday Times) Two: A sharp, salty quickfire evocation of the surface gaiety and underlying melancholia of English pub life. (Michael Billington, The Guardian). The Rise and Fall of Little Voice: A northern showbiz fairytale, a backstreet Cinderella story, with a built-in kick. (Guardian)
Little Voice (LV) lives alone with her mother Mari, whose sole purpose in life is to find a man. When Mari's latest catch - Ray -hears LV's impersonations of famous singers, he rushes to exploit it, and the result destroys LV. Finally, however, LV regains the courage to speak and sing in her own voice. This Jim Cartwright comedy, in turn savage and sentimental, was originally presented at the National and Adwhych Theatres with Jane Horrocks, Alison Steadman and Pete Postlethwaite in the starring roles.
'Jim Cartwright is one of the mavericks of British theatre' Daily Telegraph Two: 'A sharp, salty, quickfire evocation of the surface gaiety and underlying melancholia of English pub life.' The Guardian Bed: 'It's insights into the twilight world of old age are remarkable, Cartwright's ode to sleep fizzes with puns and free association and brims with the confidence of a craftsman who can work as happily with surrealism as naturalism as he teases out snippets of life story from the ancient occupants of the bed.' City Limits 'This extraordinarily gifted and original voice ...populates the space with broad humour, dry wit and often shudderingly moving poetry.' Time Out
Winner of the 1992 Evening Standard Best Comedy Award and the 1993 Olivier Award for Best Comedy, The Rise and Fall of Little Voice is a cracker, original, hilarious and hauntingly sad (Daily Telegraph) Like everything Cartwright writes, Little Voice is playful, magical and terrifying, a view of the world from an unexpected angle, perpetrated by an imagination that notices the dust in the grooves of old records and finds poetry in garish, swanky clothes or the glitterball of a rowdy northern club (Sunday Times) A northern showbiz fairytale, a backstreet Cinderella story, with a built-in kick (Guardian)
Under the guidance of the rum-soaked wideboy Scullery, we are taken on an evening's tour of a scruffy, depressed road in a small Lancashire town. Moving from street corner to living room, from bedroom to kitchen, we meet the inhabitants of young, middle-aged, and old, glimpsing their socially and emotionally wretched lives, in this sharp, sad, funny, and angry play.
Worth and Cartwright have compiled a comprehensive discography documenting this exceedingly long career. In a chapter devoted to `The Art of John McCormack and the Phonograph,' McCormack's vocal technique is examined, and his artistic development chronicled. His talent for blending the intellectual and the intuitive in his musical interpretation is pointed out. An account of the events of his career adds to the history of singing. Recordings are listed chronologically by recording session, and a useful alphabetic listing by song title is provided. . . . The authors carefully acknowledge indebtedness to a number of McCormack discography researchers. A bibliography and artist index conclude the volume, which is sturdily bound. All undergraduate and graduate music libraries with McCormack recordings will want this book. Choice
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