[Deathwatch] Joan Littlewood, theater director, 87

[Deathwatch Central <cdw@slick.org>]

'Oh What a Lovely War' Director Littlewood Dies
Sat Sep 21, 2:42 PM ET

LONDON (Reuters) - British theater director Joan Littlewood, who
brought the musical "Oh What a Lovely War" to the stage, has died,
London's Theater Royal Stratford East said on Saturday. She was 87. 

Littlewood and her Theater Workshop transformed British drama in the
1950s and 1960s with productions of Brendan Behan's "The Hostage,"
Shelagh Delaney's "A Taste of Honey" and Frank Norman's "Fings Ain't
Wot They Used To Be." 

With her partner Gerry Raffles she brought international fame to the
Theater Royal Stratford East, based in an unfashionable area of London
well away from the bright lights of the capital's West End theaterland.


Her subversive and radical approach is best known from "Oh What a
Lovely War," a revue-style collection of satirical sketches and songs
from World War One she devised in 1963. 

The British critic Kenneth Tynan once wrote of her: "It now seems quite
likely that when the annals of British Theater in the middle years of
the 20th century are written, Joan's name will lead all the rest." 

Littlewood died in her sleep on Friday evening in London.