Deborah Warner

Stating that her objective is to take a classic and "make it real for now", Warner has been alternately praised as an innovator and blasted for her unorthodox approaches in her stagings of works like "Footfalls" (1994) and "Richard II" (1995), the former being curtailed by the playwright's estate due to Warner's disregard of Samuel Beckett's stage directions, the latter starring actress Shaw as the monarch.

Raised as a Quaker in the picturesque …