Simon Farquhar

Simon Farquhar (born 15 December, 1972) is a Scottish writer hailing from Cullen, Aberdeenshire. During his time at the University of Aberdeen he was an active writer and performer in the university's drama group, Centre Stage. His early one-act plays were staged at the Aberdeen Arts Centre, until a radio script set in Cullen, "Candy Floss Kisses", was picked up by actor and producer Martin Jarvis and commissioned for BBC Radio 4. This was followed by another Cullen-based drama, "Elevenses with Twiggy", set during the dying days of the Sixties and featuring a cameo performance by Twiggy herself.

His first full-length stage play, the Aberdeen-based Rainbow Kiss, starring Joseph McFadden and Dawn Steele and directed by Richard Wilson, opened at the Royal Court in April 2006 as part of the theatre's 50th anniversary season and received warm reviews from the British press [http://arts.guardian.co.uk/reviews/story/0,,1752212,00.html] [http://enjoyment.independent.co.uk/theatre/reviews/article358089.ece] . "What makes the play so impressive" wrote Michael Billington in The Guardian, "is Farquhar's portrait of the grimness behind Aberdeen's oil-fuelled boom. This is not just another sex'n'violence play: what it grippingly shows is the disastrous effect of a money-mad materialist culture on society's marginalised no-hopers."

In October 2006 he was invited to take part in the Old Vic 24 Hour Plays Celebrity Gala. The annual fund-raising event sees six writers asked to each choose from a pool of available actors and each write a ten-minute play for them overnight which is then learned and performed the following evening on the Old Vic stage. The result was "Dream Me a Winter", which was remarked on for featuring cocaine abuse and an on-stage kiss between its two leading ladies, Tamzin Outhwaite and Patricia Hodge.

He has also written many articles and appeared on television and radio as a champion of television drama, particularly of the 1970s. In 2007 he wrote and presented the documentary Razor Sharp: The Story of Peter McDougall.

In late 2007 it was announced that Rainbow Kiss will be opening in New York in Spring 2008, directed by Will Frears and produced by The Play Company.

Radio

* "Candy Floss Kisses" (2004) — Afternoon Play, BBC Radio 4
* "Elevenses with Twiggy" (2006) — Afternoon Play, BBC Radio 4

Stage

* "I Do Solemnly Declare" (2001) — Aberdeen Arts Centre
* "Rainbow Kiss" (2006) — Royal Court
* "Dream Me a Winter" (2006) — Old Vic (part of "The 24 Hour Plays")