David Lan

David Lan is a playwright, theatre director and social anthropologist. Since 2000 he has been artistic director of the Young Vic where he has produced more than 150 shows and directed, amongst others, A Raisin in the Sun, Doctor Faustus, The Daughter-in-Law, The Skin of Our Teeth, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone and Blackta as well as As You Like It in the West End. He led the campaign to rebuild the Young Vic which reopened to acclaim in 2006. He was writer in residence at the Royal Court theatre 1995/7. In addition to his many plays, libretti and films, he has published an anthropological study Guns and Rain: Guerrillas & Spirit Mediums in Zimbabwe. He chairs the Belarus Free Theatre, co-founded the What Next? movement and is co-director of World Stages. He has received the John Whiting Award, the George Orwell Award, an Olivier Award and an Honorary Doctorate from the University of the South Bank. He received a CBE for services to theatre in 2014.