The Habit of Art
a new play by Alan Bennett
5 STARS 'Another absolute cracker, often wonderfully and sometimes filthily funny, but also deeply and unexpectedly moving.' Daily Telegraph
5 STARS 'Bennett the maestro returns with a multi-layered masterpiece.' Independent
Alan Bennett’s new play is as much about the theatre as it is about poetry or music. It looks at the unsettling desires of two difficult men, and at the ethics of biography. It reflects on growing old, on creativity and inspiration, and on persisting when all passion’s spent: ultimately, on the habit of art.
Auden often said that metre and rhyme led him down unexpected paths to thoughts he wouldn’t otherwise have had, and in this respect versification and fornication are not so different.
Benjamin Britten, sailing uncomfortably close to the wind with his new opera, Death in Venice, seeks advice from his former collaborator and friend, W H Auden. During this imagined meeting, their first for twenty-five years, they are observed and interrupted by, amongst others, their future biographer and a young man from the local bus station.
You are a rent boy. I am a poet. Over the wall lives the Dean of Christ Church. We all have our parts to play.
‘In the end,’ said Auden, ‘art is small beer. The really serious things in life are earning one’s living and loving one’s neighbour.’
NT Live – performances of National Theatre plays broadcast live to cinema screens around the world including the Historic Lincoln Theatre in downtown Mount Vernon.
The Habit of Art will be performed live in London on Thursday, April 22nd, 2010, filmed in high definition and presented exclusively at participating movie theatres across the US.
NT Live is supported internationally by TRAVELEX www.travelex.com/
Thursday, April 22nd Live Date
Sunday, April 25th Encore Performance
Ticket Prices: Adults: $14 Seniors: $12 Students $10