A special one-off screening of Hamlet will be followed by a Q&A with award-winning Swansea born Director Sean Mathias. Joining him on stage will be theatre and film writer Rebecca Lenkiewicz,.
It takes place at the Taliesin Cinema on Tuesday 13th August at 7:30pm.
Recently awarded an honorary fellow at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama on the 5th July 2024, Sean Mathias is eager to share this iconic film and discuss his career.
In becoming an Honorary Fellow at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, Sean joins a group of luminary artists including Dame Shirley Bassey, Dame Sian Phillips, Sir Anthony Hopkins and Sir Jonathan Pryce. Having left Wales at the formative age of 17 Sean now resides in the Gower.
ASean’s 2019 production of A Prayer For Wings transferred to the Kings Head Theatre from Swansea Grand – the Grand’s first London transfer in a century. That year he also directed Ian McKellen Onstage which toured the UK and played a season at the Pinter Theatre raising a staggering five million pounds for theatre charities across the UK.
Sean’s first season as Artistic Director of Theatre Royal Windsor, produced Hamlet and The Cherry Orchard, with an ensemble of fifteen actors led by Ian McKellen and Francesca Annis. He is now embarking on his fourth season having produced seven plays, two tours, one West End transfer, one movie with a second movie in pre-production.
He directed the award-winning film BENT and the recently released film HAMLET.
He has won various awards including The Standard Award, WhatsOnStage Award, Cardiff International Film Festival award, the Critics’ Circle Award, a Fringe First at Edinburgh, and the Prix de la Jeunesse at Cannes. He has been nominated for the Olivier and Tony awards.
Hosting the Q & A is Rebecca Lenkiewicz, a prominent British playwright and screenwriter. She gained widespread acclaim as the writer of Her Naked Skin (2008), the first original play by a living female playwright to grace the Olivier stage at the Royal National Theatre. Lenkiewicz’s theatrical repertoire includes a diverse array of plays such as The Night Season (2004), The Lioness (2010), and Jane Wenham: The Witch of Walkern (2015).
Beyond the stage, Lenkiewicz has made a strong mark in cinema, co-writing the screenplay for the Oscar Winning Ida (2013). Her screenwriting credits also include Disobedience (2017), Colette (2018), and the recent Me-Too drama She Said (2022), for which she was nominated for a BAFTA.
Lenkiewicz and Mathias became firm friends when he directed her play Shoreditch Madonna at the Soho Theatre in 2005
Ian McKellen, reprising his lead role as Hamlet, leads a cast including Steven Berkoff, Frances Barber (King Lear, Chekhov’s The Seagull), Jonathan Hyde (King Lear, Titanic, Crimson Peak), Jenny Seagrove and BAFTA-winner Francesca Annis,.
Film trailer:
https://kaleidoscope1.app.box.com/s/pznhte7ptkpnfuolgj3kvfzf77zbzpuo
For more information and tickers:
https://www.taliesinartscentre.co.uk/en/cinema?id=60095
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Run Time: 117 Mins
Cert: 12A