Alan Ayckbourn Encyclopaedia: E
Early Writing: Alan began writing as a child. His notable work during his youth includes a performed school play based on the Jennings novels, a published poem Dawn and contributions to his school magazine which he also edited.Early Plays: Alan's earliest play was an adaptation of Anthony Buckeridge's Jennings novels whilst still at school. Between 1957 and 1959, he wrote a number of plays prior to his first professional commission. The majority of these plays have been lost and whose title and content are unrecorded, but early works which are still in existence include The Season, The Party Game, Relative Values and Mind Over Murder.
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Ecraf: Since the late 1960s, Alan Ayckbourn has noted in interviews how he would like to write a backwards-running farce which would be called Ecraf. During 2019, he essentially admitted that he had used the idea for his 83rd play Birthdays Past, Birthdays Present.
Edinburgh Festival: Alan Ayckbourn's first professional job as an actor was with Donald Wolfit's company for three weeks at the Edinburgh Festival during 1956. He was an acting stage manager (a stage manager with acting responsibilities) for The Strong Are Lonely.
Elevator / Escalator play: Alan Ayckbourn has frequently mentioned he would like to write a play which involved vertical as well as horizontal movement involving either escalators or elevators. It is possible that the abandoned 1994 version of Private Fears In Public Places, set in an airport, might have featured escalators.
End-stage Plays: Alan Ayckbourn has written the vast majority of his plays with the intention they should be ideally staged in-the-round. However, a number of plays were conceived specifically for end-stage performance, these are Bedroom Farce, A Small Family Business, Haunting Julia, Things We Do For Love, Virtual Reality and All Lies. It should be noted, that several of these plays have been successfully performed in stagings other than end-stage.
Erhardt, Tom: Alan Ayckbourn's second agent, who represented Alan between 1991 and 2013. Aged 91, Tom Ehardt died on 28 December 2019.
Ernest And Delia: An aborted attempt by Granada Television to develop a spin-off television series from the play Bedroom Farce. It would have concentrated on the elderly characters of Ernest and Delia - and was dependent on Michael Gough and Joan Hickson reprising the roles they played in the National Theatre's production - and a pilot was written by the playwright Peter Tinniswood. The project was aborted though and the screenplay has not been seen since.
Ernie's Incredible Illucinations: A one-act play for performance by young people, written in 1969. Young Ernie is taken to the Doctor because of his 'illucinations', surprising everyone when they turn out to be real.
Ernie's Incredible Illucinations (television): The play was adapted for television by the BBC and first broadcast on 11 November 1987 on BBC1. According to the BBC website, there is every possibility this was intended as a pilot for a series based on the premise of the play.
Evening Standard Awards: These awards are regarded amongst the most prestigious British theatre awards after the Oliviers. The awards were established in 1955 and are sponsored by the Evening Standard newspaper. Alan has won seven Evening Standard Awards during his career for Best Play and Best Comedy. In addition, Michael Gambon, Janie Dee and Julia McKenzie have won Evening Standard Wards for their performances in Ayckbourn-directed productions.
An Evening With PALOS: One of the Grey Plays (produced but unpublished), An Evening With PALOS received its only professional performance on 4 October 1987 at the Lyric Theatre, London, as part of the Colin Blakely: A Celebration event. The short one act play was written to commemorate the death of Colin Blakely, whose last theatrical role was Dafydd ap Llewellyn in the West End production of A Chorus Of Disapproval. and features that play's amateur dramatic society PALOS. The short one-act play has never been published and is not available to produce.
Events On A Hotel Terrace (Intimate Exchanges): One of the eight major permutations of Intimate Exchanges in which Celia and Toby go on holiday only to find Lionel is a waiter, still pursuing the love of Celia. It has two possible permutations for the final scene comprising A Funeral and A Service Of Thanks-Giving.
Original research for the The Alan Ayckbourn Encyclopaedia section is by Simon Murgatroyd and copyright of the author.