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" We never want to update 'Black Watch,' because it's about a moment in time, and through that moment, it manages to speak about Afghanistan and all other wars. This play is 'about' Iraq, but it's actually about every war that's ever been or will ever be. "

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" If you're going to be hosting any event or a performance or having dinner with people after a performance, it is work, but it's also social: food and a glass of wine would be involved often. "

John Tiffany

Work

People

Food

" It blows my mind that you get Shakespeare where the 'low' comedy characters have got Northern or Welsh accents. "

" Pinocchio's really naughty. He's all impulse: 'I want to sleep now. I want to eat that. I want to run off to Pleasure Island.' It's commedia dell'arte meets Grimm's tales. "

" I thought a director was like a pillow who sat under the writer, supporting them and submitting to their vision. It took me a long time to realise that what a writer really wants is a production that matches the play and the writing. It is the only way the play can achieve its full potential. "

John Tiffany

Long

Writing

" 'Philistines' was so beautiful, and it bored me to death. I never want to see another production where the rain splashes against a window and actors wander around in drab cardigans saying, 'I'm so bored.' "

" I realise that there's something about fantasy, whether it's written by the Grimm Brothers or J. K. Rowling or Thorne or J. M. Barrie, that it gets closer to the human experience than realism every could. "

" I've never felt opera was a party I've been invited to, and maybe I've got a bit of a chip on my shoulder about it. "

" When you tell a story that you know is having an effect on the audience, that, for me, is the transforming thing. "

" I want to understand the anger in the world. "

" The idea of audiences becoming part of the show is, I think, where theatre is going. "

" 'Black Watch' has taken its place in the canon of Scottish theatre, and that's fantastic. It's a very particular kind of theatre. It's about the music, the movement, the whole 'event' of it. "

" I never get star-struck. I never fanboy. Ever, ever, ever. "

" I don't think it's good, culturally, to base all critical judgments on a single performance. "

" I don't like the idea of stepping-stones in art forms: that you do your time at a regional theatre, and then you work in London and go to the West End, and then you do films. I've never felt like following that trajectory. "

" Theatre is a playground. It really is, and we should use that playground more. "

John Tiffany

Theatre

Playground

" I tend to work quite a lot during the weekends. My weekend can often be about two hours on Sunday. "

" Broadway is full of crazy people. "

" How do we compete with the 3D superscreens at the cineplex? We just make it better - because theatre is better because it's live. Instead of trying to be like the poor cousin, we need to accept that we're the king. "

" It couldn't interest me less, the idea of putting a living room on stage. I just think, what's the point of walking into a theater to see a living room? A sofa in a forest? Now you're talking. "

" Sometimes on Broadway, you don't know who the investors are, and you end up making a million dollars for somebody awful. "

" Only when you don't impose things on it do you get real political theatre. "

" What has started to interest me is how you use all the different disciplines and tools we have at our disposal, and that includes going into different art forms, like music and movement, because often they can tap into things that characters can't necessarily express through words. Audiences really enjoy that total experience. "

John Tiffany

Music

Words

" I studied theatre at Glasgow University and then was lucky enough to land a scholarship with a theatre group in Edinburgh. "

" Trump is like an eater of worlds from an 'Avengers' movie, but there seem to be different rules for him. What are Twitter doing, for example? He's constantly breaking their rules, the sort of stuff other people get thrown off for. "

" I suppose what I aspire to do is to make it easy for the audience to connect with a story. "

" I was obsessed with theatre and loving the work of Caryl Churchill, Edward Bond, Howard Brenton, and Howard Barker, people doing real formal experimentation. But 'Road' was the first time I'd read a play written in a very true Northern dialect that seemed to have that excitement running through it. "

" There are always discussions about casting stars in lead roles in theater - especially when you're working with commercial producers - and it's not something I'm against, not at all. But any casting has to be right for the project. "

" You can only really get to any truth by telling peoples' stories. "

" Some actors just have a quality, a way of combining music and character and story, where everything just falls into place. "

" Sometimes it should be the job of Broadway to introduce stars as well as cast them. "