Ray Cooney: Biography and Creativity

Raymond Cooney was born on 30.05.1932 in London. He graduated from Dulwich College - one of the most prestigious educational institutions in the UK. He is married to Linda Dixon since 1962. They have two sons. The eldest, Danny, lives with his wife and two children in Australia, the younger, Michael, is also a screenwriter. In 1995, Cooney unveiled a commentary on his own plays.

Carier start

As a teenager, Cooney began his career in the theater. At the age of 14 he went to the stage of the Palace Theater. We can safely say that he has absorbed the smell of the wings since childhood. Since 1948, Ray Cooney plays in theatrical companies from Worthing to Blackburn and hones his theatrical skills.

In 1956, he graduated in the Whitehall Theater from Brian Ricks. In 1961 he wrote the first play "The Hunter for the State" co-authored with Tony Hilton. With him, he wrote the comedy script "What a section!". The beginning of his career as a playwright was brought by the West End Theater 17 premieres. In London, he directed more than thirty performances as director and producer Ray Cooney. His plays are listed below:

• They're Playing Our Song ("They're playing our song").
• Bodies.
• Clouds.
• Whose Life is it Anyway? ("Whose life is this, anyway?").
• Chicago (Chicago).
• Duet for One ("Duet for One").

Comedy Theater

Ray Cooney organized the Theater of Comedy in London, under his guidance on the stage were the West End stars, and the newly revived plays were noisy. Kuni often played on stage himself and wrote more than twenty new plays, including:

• Funny Money.
• Out of Order ("No. 13").
• Passion Play ("The Game of Passion").

Kuni's comedies are notable for the plotting of the plot and for some frivolity of the language. Heroes often pretend to be someone who is not really, and increasingly confuse the plot. And at some point the viewer has a feeling that just about the whole situation will become implausible. But Ray Cooney is a master of his craft and feels the viewer. He knows that you will shake it lightly - and you will get clumsy work.

As Ray says, the viewer also sometimes wants to play funny games. When the audience goes to a dramatic performance, then no one specifically promises anything to him. But comedy is another matter. Here you are promised that you though only twice, but smile. And indeed it is. Kuni does not have comedies of the lungs, where the audience simply laughs, his comedies are "laughter through tears."

World Recognition

What can we say about the recognition of this great master of comedy, if his plays are translated into more than forty languages and play them in theaters around the world! A huge success and recognition was given to the play written by Ray Cooney, "Too Married Taxi Driver." In London's West End, she lasted more than nine years. The following are screenings of Cooney's comedies in Russian:

• "Too married a taxi driver";
• "Funny money";
• "Clinical case";
• "Number 13".

Prizes and awards

The play "Number 13" was awarded the Laurence Olivier Award in 1999, and in 2000 it was recognized in Europe as the best comedy. "Too married taxi driver" (1983) received the title of the most "long-running" comedy in England and was included in one hundred of the best plays of Great Britain. For merits in the field of drama Ray Kuni was awarded a high award - the Order of the British Empire in 2005.

He invented incredible ties and interchanges for his plays, and the action takes place at times in such a rapid rhythm that the viewer sometimes even has time to translate his breath. Not for nothing in the theatrical world they called him a farce. The way it is. As an actor and playwright, Cooney has done much to make viewers laugh for decades.