I totally agree with Jim Dixon's comments. It's a risk that an author/playwright always takes in handing his "baby" over to someone else. He must either direct the piece himself, or take the consequences of other people's interpretations and inventiveness.

Alan Ayckbourn has always chosen to direct his plays himself in a theatre in Scarborough, before they go to the West End. His dialogues are very carefully crafted, right down to the last "Hmmm" and "Well..." (and are therefore *hell* to learn) - but that's what makes his dialogue and hence his characters so real. Likewise, Harold Pinter specifies the exact length of pauses in his plays.

But even Ayckbourn and Pinter have had to "let go" at some point and their plays are directed and performed with successful inventiveness all over the world.

Every performance of exactly the same script, by exactly the same cast, is different. That's the magic of it.

- Jeanie