Hutchinson's Burning Issues Opens 25 Apr

Ron Hutchinson's new play about the cut-throat world of modern publishing opens at the Hampstead Theatre next month. Starring John Gordon Sinclair and directed by Denis Lawson, Burning Issues opens at the north London fringe theatre on Tuesday, 25 April, previews from 14 April, and continues until 3 June 2000.

Set against a backdrop of book deals, secret negotiations, huge literary advances and even huger egos, Burning Issues dissects an intriguing ethical conundrum - a firm of publishers discovers the diaries they are about to publish by one of their best-selling authors are racist and morally offensive. To reject the diaries risks losing their most profitable author, to publish them risks provoking public outrage.

Hutchinson's many stage plays include the multi award-winning Rat in the Skull (Royal Court and Broadway), Pygmies in the Ruins (Belfast's Lyric Theatre and Royal Court) and an acclaimed adaptation of Mikhail Bulgakov's Flight (National Theatre). His TV credits include Murderers Among Us, for which he was awarded an Emmy award for Best Writer. Until recently, he was also a key scriptwriter for Steven Spielberg's Dreamworks film studio in Hollywood.

John Gordon Sinclair is best known as the gawky Scottish teen from the hit 1981 film Gregory's Girl. His stage credits include Peter Hall's production of Kafka's Dick (Piccadilly) and She Loves Me (Savoy). His other film credits include Local Hero, My Summer with Des and the 1999 follow up to his big hit, Gregory's Two Girls. He's joined in the cast of Burning Issues by William Chubb, Kenneth Colley, Miranda Pleasance, Rob Spendlove and Andrew Wooddall.

Actor-turned-director Denis Lawson returns to the Hampstead after directing his nephew, Ewan Macgregor, at the theatre last year in a revival of Little Malcolm and His Struggle against the Eunuchs, which later transferred to the West End.

Burning Issues is designed by Anthony Ward with lighting by Howard Harrison and sound by Steve Brown.

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