Creative Writing (Playwriting and Screenwriting)  MA

Teaching and Assessment

Teaching is based around a mix of practical workshops, seminars and lectures. All this is supported by one-to-one tutorials and by independent study: notably reading and preparing presentations on set texts and performing set writing exercises. As the course progresses, the emphasis shifts to independent study and is supported by workshops and one-to-one tutorials.

Central to all three Creative Writing MA courses is the requirement to finish a full-length novel, memoir, play or screenplay. The course culminates in a showcase of your work to an audience of industry professionals and other interested parties.

Staff lecturers

• Barbara Norden
• Phil O'Shea
  

Industry ties

The course has strong ties with leading playwrights and screenwriters. Recent visiting speakers include Richard Bean, Alan Bennett, Ronan Bennett, J Blakeson, Adam Brace, Laurence Coriat, Rib Davies, Martha Fiennes, Stuart Hazeldine, Olivia Hetreed, Mike Leigh, Rebecca Lenkiewicz, Patrick Marber, Paul Mayeda Berges, Anthony Neilson, Diane Samuels, Sue Teddern, Colin Teevan and Roy Williams.

You will have the opportunity to meet agents, producers, and directors. Recent guests have included Matthew Bates, Matthew Dench, Tony Garnett, Nick Marston, Margaret Matheson, Jeremy Mortimer, George Perrin, David Thompson, Tessa Walker, Mervyn Watson, Anthea Williams and screenwriting author Linda Aronson.

Visiting lecturers

Barbara Cox

Barbara is a professional scriptwriter and script editor. She has worked on numerous TV series for both adults and children, including Wycliffe, Dangerfield, 99-1, Love Hurts, I Was a Rat!, Bootleg and the multi-award-winning Pig Heart Boy. She won a BAFTA for Best Adapted Script in 2005 for the children's drama Wipe Out.

Penny Gold

Penny is a writer and dramaturg/director/producer working in theatre, television, film and radio. Her recent stage plays include The President's Holiday (Hampstead) and When We Are Rich (Nuffield). Recent radio plays include A Chaos of Wealth and Want and Three Days that Shook the World (both BBC Radio 4).

She has undertaken literary/dramaturgical work for a wide range of theatres including the RSC, Soho Theatre, Hampstead Theatre, Kali and the Nuffield Theatre where she was literary manager.  For BBC TV she was a script editor and later producer. For ten years she was Commissioning Editor for BBC Radio Drama. A keen-eyed talent-spotter, she loves working with new writers.

Jim Hill

Jim teaches television drama writing on the MA. His background is as a freelance writer, director and producer. He has worked on many prime time television series including Casualty, Pie in The Sky, Minder, Lovejoy, Byker Grove and The Bill as well as directing They Came From Somewhere Else (Channel 4), Playing for Real (BBC Scotland) and Full Stretch (ITV).

Jim co-created the long-running series Boon. He has been a story team leader for Fremantle TV (formerly Grundy) working throughout Europe establishing new daily drama series.  He was recently the consultant for Interaktiv-Fiction, a Hungarian-based production company, and a drama advisor for the emerging independent drama company Fireback.

David Lane

David is a professional playwright and dramaturg, and  has been a Literary Associate to established London and regional new writing companies such as Soho Theatre & Writers' Centre and Theatre and Beyond in Brighton. He has been a workshop leader and script reader for various companies including The Royal Court, Hampstead Theatre, The Gate, Old Vic New Voices, Polka Theatre, New Writing South and ACT Productions.

He has acted as a dramaturg and researcher to both commissioned and developing writers from the National Theatre (Mark Ravenhill), BBC Radio 4 (Ed Harris), Royal Court Theatre (Ali Taylor, Robin French), Southwark Playhouse (Peter Elkins) and the joint winner of the International Playwriting Festival (Hannah Ashwell).

Karen Lee Street

Karen has worked in the film industry for almost twenty years as a script analyst/editor, development executive and trainer.  She was head of development at the European Script Fund (MEDIA Programme, European Commission) and co-developer of numerous award-winning films. She assisted writers and producers in 18 countries with the development of their projects. She also created the first pan-European script analysis service and her prototype script analysis report has been adopted by numerous funding bodies, educational institutions, and consultants in Europe.

Karen subsequently worked in Los Angeles as a script editor and screenwriter on several projects, spent a year in Copenhagen as programme manager of screenwriting training programmes for professional writers, and two years heading the screenwriting department (international programme, MA Film Arts) at the Baltic Film and Media School, Tallinn University.
 
She continues to consult for the Media programme as national/transnational adviser and to work as a freelance script consultant for a number of European producers, funding bodies, and training organisations. She is on the management and selection committees of the Tipping Point Film Fund, a funder of documentary films about international social justice issues. Karen is also a published novelist, produced screenwriter, and a member of the Writers' Guild of Great Britain and the Society of Authors.

Paul Sirett

Paul is a playwright and dramaturg. As a playwright his work includes the Olivier-nominated Ska musical The Big Life which opened at Stratford East in 2004 and had two successful runs there before transferring to the West End in 2005. Paul has a long association with the Theatre Royal Stratford East where productions of his plays include: Bad Blood Blues; A Night in Tunisia; Worlds Apart; Crusade; and Jamaica House.
 
Productions elsewhere include Paul's adaptation of Shawn Levy's book Rat Pack Confidential for Nottingham Playhouse and Bolton Octagon, which transferred to the West End in 2003; Ghosts in the Gallery (Polka Theatre); Running the Silk Road (Yellow Earth Theatre); Lush Life (Live Theatre, Newcastle); A Couple of Poor Polish-Speaking Romanians (Soho Theatre, translation with Lisa Goldman); This Other Eden (Gilded Balloon, Edinburgh); and Skaville (Soho Theatre and Edinburgh).
 
Awards include: Best Play, Pearson (Worlds Apart); Best Production, City Life (Rat Pack Confidential); Best Comedy, London Fringe/Time Out (This Other Eden) and nominations for TMA, Evening Standard and Olivier awards (The Big Life). Paul has also won two Best Writer awards for his radio plays at the New York International Radio Festival.
 
Paul has worked extensively as a dramaturg, having been Literary Manager at Soho Theatre and Dramaturg at the Royal Shakespeare Company as well as working as a freelance dramaturg on numerous projects.
 
Paul has taught playwriting and dramaturgy at a number of universities and drama schools including RADA, Rose Bruford, Central, Warwick University, Essex University, Goldsmiths, Oxford University, Cambridge University and Yale. Paul is an Associate Teacher of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.

Study Abroad

Recommended Reading

Sample Course Materials