Mike Bartlett Plays: Two (NHB Modern Plays)

Five ambitious and exciting plays by the multi-award-winning playwright, hailed as 'one of the prime movers in a new golden generation of British playwrights' (Independent), and introduced by the author.

Earthquakes in London (National Theatre & Headlong, 2010) is an epic drama about climate change, population explosion, social breakdown and worldwide paranoia, travelling from 1968 to 2525 and back again. 'The theatrical equivalent of a thrilling roller-coaster ride' (Daily Telegraph)

Love, Love, Love (Paines Plough & Drum Theatre Plymouth, UK tour, 2010; Royal Court & Paines Plough, 2012) examines the baby boomer generation, from coming-of-age in the 1960s to retirement-age more than forty years later, in a play that 'does the clash of generational world views with a devastating precision' (Guardian).

The Enemy is a short play in which a journalist seizes an opportunity to interview the man who shot Osama bin Laden. It was staged by Headlong as part of Decade (St Katherine's Dock, London, 2011), exploring 9/11 and its legacy.

13 (National Theatre, 2011) is a panoramic drama in which a young man returns to London, a city riven by social protest and upheaval, with a radical vision for the future. Premiered on the National's largest stage, it confirmed Bartlett's ability to tackle epic themes with supreme assurance: 'His ambition is distinctive and immense' (Evening Standard).

Medea (Headlong, UK tour, 2012) is a startlingly modern version of Euripides' tragedy, exploring a woman's private fury at her husband's infidelity, while imprisoned in her marital home. 'A savage play for today, superbly well done' (Mail on Sunday)

Auteur

Mike Barlett is an award-winning playwright whose plays include: Scandaltown (Lyric Hammersmith, 2022); The 47th (Old Vic, London, 2022); Mrs Delgado (Old Fire Station, Oxford, 2021); Vassa, adapted from Maxim Gorky's play Vassa Zheleznova (Almeida Theatre, London, 2019); Snowflake (Old Fire Station, Oxford, 2018; revived at Kiln Theatre, London, 2019); Albion (Almeida Theatre, 2017); Wild (Hampstead Theatre, 2016); Game (Almeida Theatre, 2015); King Charles III (Almeida/West End/Broadway, 2014-15); An Intervention (Paines Plough/Watford Palace Theatre); Bull (Sheffield Theatres/Off-Broadway); Medea (Glasgow Citizens/Headlong); Chariots of Fire (based on the film; Hampstead/West End); 13 (National Theatre); Love, Love, Love (Paines Plough/Plymouth Drum/Royal Court); Earthquakes in London (Headlong/National Theatre); Cock (Royal Court/Off-Broadway); Artefacts (Nabokov/Bush); Contractions and My Child (Royal Court).

He was Writer-in-Residence at the National Theatre in 2011, and the Pearson Playwright-in-Residence at the Royal Court Theatre in 2007. Cock won an Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre in 2010. Love, Love, Love won the TMA Best New Play Award in 2011. Bull won the same award in 2013. King Charles III won the Critics' Circle Award for Best New Play in 2015.

He has written several plays for BBC Radio, winning the Writers' Guild Tinniswood and Imison prizes for Not Talking.

His work for television includes Press (BBC One, 2018); Trauma (ITV, 2018); two series of Doctor Foster (BBC One, 2015 and 2017, Best New Drama at the National Television Awards); and The Town (ITV1, 2012).