Tim Supple

Timothy (Tim) Supple (born 1962) is a British theatre director.

Tim Supple has directed and adapted theatre throughout the UK and in Europe, North and South America and the Middle and Far East. He has worked regularly at the Royal National Theatre and Royal Shakespeare Company and was Artistic Director of the Young Vic from 1993 to 2000. He is currently co-director of Dash Arts.

At the Young Vic he directed A Servant To Two Masters (national & international tour & West End), As I Lay Dying, Twelfth Night, Blood Wedding, The Jungle Book, Grimm Tales (& international tour), More Grimm Tales (& Broadway), The Slab Boys Trilogy, Oedipus; for the National Theatre: Haroun and the Sea of Stories, The Epic of Gilgamesh, Billy Liar (national tour), Accidental Death of an Anarchist (national tour), Whale, Romeo and Juliet, The Villains Opera; for the RSC: Midnight’s Children (Barbican, national tour & Apollo Theatre, New York), Love in a Wood, Tales from Ovid (Young Vic), The Comedy of Errors (national/ international tour & Young Vic), Spring Awakening: for Kenneth Branagh’s Renaissance Theatre Company: Coriolanus (with Branagh, Judi Dench, Richard Briers and Iain Glenn) and Traveling Tales.

Other work in the theatre includes: Beasts and Beauties, Too Clever By Half (Norwegian National Theatre, Bergen); Much Ado About Nothing (Maxim Gorki Theatre, Berlin); The Cosmonauts Last Message...(Donmar Wharehouse); Oh What a Lovely War, Guys and Dolls (Haymarket Theatre, Leicester); Billy Budd (Crucible Theatre, Sheffield). As associate director at the Theatre Royal, York, Tim directed work by Kroetz, Arthur Miller, Willy Russell and Brecht.

Supple’s adaptations for the theatre include: Accidental Death of an Anarchist (with Dario Fo & Alan Cumming); Billy Budd (with David Holman); The Epic of Gilgamesh; Grimm Tales and More Grimm Tales (with Carol Ann Duffy); The Jungle Book; Haroun and the Sea of Stories (with Salman Rushdie & David Tushingham); Midnight's Children (with Salman Rushdie & Simon Reade); Tales from Ovid (with Ted Hughes & Simon Reade); Beasts and Beauties (with Carol Ann Duffy & Melly Still); One Thousand and One Nights (with Hanan Al Shaykh)

Supple has worked outside the theatre on several occasions: his Opera includes Hansel and Gretel, The Magic Flute (Opera North); Babette's Feast (Linbury Studio, ROH) and his film work includes: Twelfth Night (Projector/Channel 4), Rockabye (IWC/Channel 4). Tim is the recipient of a NESTA Invention and Innovation Award for experiments in film.

In 2005 Supple launched Dash Arts with Josephine Burton to create new performance in collaboration with artists from abroad. His work for Dash Arts includes What We Did To Weinstein (Menier Chocolate Factory, 2005), As You Like It (Leicester Curve, 2009) and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, commissioned by the British Council and created in India (2006-2008): an international success known widely as The Indian Dream, the production subsequently completed two tours of India, extensive tours of the UK, Australia and North America, two seasons at Stratford-upon-Avon and a season at the Roundhouse in London. The Guardian hailed it as: ‘the most life-enhancing production of Shakespeare’s play since Peter Brook’s'

In 2008 Supple started work on a new theatrical adaptation of One Thousand and One Nights with the celebrated Lebanese author Hanan al Shaykh. Commissioned by Luminato Festival, Toronto and produced by Dash Arts, the production was developed over two years of research and rehearsal in North Africa and the Middle East. Created with a cast and creative team drawn entirely from the Arabic speaking world and performed in three languages over six hours, One Thousand and One Nights opened in June 2011 in Toronto and had its European premier at Edinburgh International Festival in August where the Independent hailed it as ‘an instant classic of engaged storytelling…a rediscovered literary masterpiece’.

Tim Supple’s awards and nominations include: Time Out, Evening Standard, TMA, Olivier, BAFTA, Herald Angel.