A PIECE OF WORK

Extraordinary A fabulous read SIMON SCHAMA Wonderful He writes with eloquence and wit NICHOLAS HYTNER Fascinating EIMEAR McBRIDE Simon Russell Beale is one of Britain s most recognisable and well loved actors He has played many roles on stage film television and radio ranging from Winston Churchill to Stalin George Smiley to King Arthur But ever since his appearance at school as a glamorous Desdemona complete with false eyelashes that rendered him half blind he has been captivated by Shakespeare In A Piece of Work Russell Beale tries to get under the skin of the playwright and find out what interested him Was Shakespeare an instinctive conservative or rather gently subversive How collaborative was he Did he add a line to Hamlet in order to accommodate his ageing and increasingly chubby principal actor Richard Burbage Did he suffer from insomnia and experience sexual jealousy Russell Beale describes what it is to approach and live with some of Shakespeare s most famous characters Some of the actor s inspiration comes from surprising sources Watching Coronation Street gave him an idea for how Richard III might react on hearing of the death of the two Princes in the Tower a visit to elderly patients in a local hospital gave him ins