Rupert Goold - Director

Rupert Goold is artistic director of Headlong Theatre, and an associate director of the RSC. Productions for Headlong include King Lear, Six Characters in Search of an Author, The Last Days of Judas Iscariot, Rough Crossings, Faustus, Restoration and Paradise Lost. From 2002 to 2005 Rupert was artistic director of the Royal and Derngate Theatres in Northampton where productions included Hamlet, Othello, Waiting for Godot, Insignifi cance, The Weir, Betrayal, Arcadia and Summer Lightning. He was associate artist at Salisbury Playhouse from 1996 to 1997 where he directed The End of the Affair, Dancing at Lughnasa and Travels with My Aunt (tour). He was a trainee director at the Donmar Warehouse 1995-96. His work as a freelance director includes No Man's Land (Dublin Gate, Duke of York's), The Glass Menagerie (Apollo), Frank McGuinness's new play Speaking Like Magpies (world premiere, RSC), Scaramouche Jones (UK and international tour) and The Tempest (RSC). Rupert's Macbeth with Patrick Stewart transferred from Chichester Festival Theatre to the Gielgud in 2007, then to Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York and fi nally to Broadway, fi nishing in May 2008. Opera includes Le Comte Ory (Garsington Opera) and L'Opera Seria, Gli Equivoci and Il Pomo d'Oro (Batignano). Rupert won the 2007 Evening Standard, Critics' Circle and Olivier Awards for Best Director.

"There's a rawness to this production, a heartfeltness...
Yes, there's darkness in there but it's Oliver!, not Sweeney Todd... This is a family show with a great story and score, and my three-year-old can't wait to see it. Lionel Bart wasn't as interested as Dickens in exploring the social darkness of the book, but both men were fascinated by the theatricality of London working class life, of the influence of music hall and vaudeville, and that's very present on stage. Despite the old adage about never working with animals or children, we have both in Oliver!, and the sheer energy that the kids provide is extraordinary. At our fi rst audition 40 kids burst into ‘Consider Yourself', and it was amazing. Re I'd Do Anything… At first I wasn't going to watch it. I thought I'd just see who I was to end up working with at the end of the series. But of course I did have a look at it, and like everyone else I was hooked. I was carried away by the drama of it – and the right person won."