Christopher Webber
Christopher Webber is a prominent writer, actor and stage director. As an actor he has been particularly associated with the works of Alan Bennett, having given seven productions (including the British repertory and European premieres) of A Chip in the Sugar from Talking Heads; and Alan Ayckbourn, with whom he worked closely at Scarborough and the Chichester Festival. He also created Owl in the box-office record-breaking British and West End stage premieres of Winnie the Pooh. Other favourite roles have included an acclaimed Jaques in As You Like It (Northcott Theatre, Exeter); Inspector Truscott in Loot (Dundee), Rupert Cadell in Patrick Hamilton’s Rope (Leeds Grand) and the murderous crime writer Andrew Wyke in Sleuth (Perth Theatre).

As a stage director, he has worked in opera and theatre around the world. His many productions have included The Mikado (D’Oyly Carte Opera Company, Britain and Los Angeles), Birth of an Opera, Death of a Composer (Nottingham Playhouse), Carmen (Tokyo, with José Carreras and Maria Ewing), The Revenger’s Tragedy (Canterbury Festival), Haydn’s L’Infedelita Delusa (Kent Opera), Mozart and Salieri (London, King’s Head), Peter Grimes (Carlos Opera), Timon of Athens and Lady Audley’s Secret (Riverside Studios, London) and 2084 (Barcelona). He has also worked extensively as director of drama-based communication and personal presentation workshops and seminars, for leading corporate players on both sides of the Atlantic.

An enthusiastic champion of Hispanic and British music, his recent publications include The Zarzuela Companion (foreword by Plácido Domingo) which is the standard English-language reference work on Spain’s special operatic genre. He is a major contributor to the current Oxford Companion to Music, and also wrote (with Peter Gammond) Bluff Your Way in Opera. His stage plays include the award-winning Tatyana (Nottingham Playhouse) and Dr Sullivan and Mr Gilbert (Glasgow Citizens Theatre) as well as commissions from Mull Theatre, London’s Riverside Studios, Santa Fé Opera and Welsh National Opera. His best-selling Bluff Your Way at the Races reflects another facet of Christopher’s wide-ranging enthusiasms.