Polly Stenham
| Polly Stenham | |
|---|---|
Polly Stenham
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| Born |
16 July 1986 United Kingdom |
| Occupation | Playwright, screenwriter |
| Nationality | British |
Polly Stenham (born 16 July 1986) is an English playwright known for her play That Face, which she wrote when 19 years old.
The daughter of Anthony 'Cob' Stenham, a City businessman, she had little contact with her mother after her parents' divorce, and she and her younger sister, Daisy, lived with their father.
She attributes her love of theatre to her father (who was chair of various arts organisations such as the Royal College of Art and Institute of Contemporary Arts), as he took her to various shows from a young age, including many at the Royal Court Theatre which would later stage her first play.
Educated at the private boarding school Wycombe Abbey and later Rugby, she spent a gap year travelling and working for the Ambassador Theatre Group and the Arcola Theatre. It was during this time that she enrolled in the Royal Court Young Writers Programme and wrote her first play.
She began a degree in English at University College London, but abandoned her place to work on her debut play after hearing it was to be staged and following the death of her father in 2006.
Stenham's debut play That Face premiered at the Royal Court Theatre in London in April 2007. It was directed by Jeremy Herrin and starred Lindsay Duncan as the alcoholic mother Martha and Matt Smith as her son Henry. Stenham won the Evening Standard's 2007 Charles Wintour Award, the Critics' Circle Award for Most Promising Playwright and the 2007 Theatrical Management Association Award for Best New Play.
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