Christopher Hampton

Christopher Hampton
Born	Christopher James Hampton 26 January 1946 (1946-01-26) (age 65) Fayal, Azores, Portugal
Spouse	Laura d Holesch' (1971-present)

Christopher James Hampton CBE, FRSL (born 26 January 1946) is a British playwright, screen writer and film director. He is best known for his play based on the novel Les Liaisons dangereuses and the film version Dangerous Liaisons (1988) and also more recently for writing the nominated screenplay for the film adaptation of Ian McEwan's Atonement.

Personal life

Hampton was born in Faial, Azores, to British parents Dorothy Patience (née Herrington) and Bernard Patrick Hampton, a marine telecommunications engineer for Cable & Wireless.^[1][2] His father's job led the family to subsequently settle in Aden and Alexandria in Egypt and later Hong Kong and Zanzibar. The Suez Crisis in 1956 necessitated that the family flee under cover of darkness, leaving their possessions behind.

After a prep school at Reigate, Hampton went to the independent boarding school Lancing College at the age of 13, where he won house colours for boxing and distinguished himself as a sergeant in the CCF. Fellow dramatist David Hare was a school contemporary; poet Harry Guest was a teacher.

In 1964 he attended New College, Oxford, as a Sacher Scholar, to study German and French and graduated with a starred First Class Degree in 1968.^[3]

Career

Hampton became involved in the theatre while at Oxford University where OUDS performed his play When Did You Last See My Mother?, about adolescent homosexuality, reflecting his own experiences at Lancing.^[1] Hampton sent the work to the play agent Peggy Ramsay, who interested William Gaskill in it.^[1] The play was performed at the Royal Court Theatre in London, and that production soon transferred to the Comedy Theatre, resulting in Hampton, in 1966, becoming the youngest writer to have a play performed in the West End in the modern era.^[1] From 1968-70 he worked as the Resident Dramatist at the Royal Court Theatre, and also as the company's literary manager.^[1]

Hampton won the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay in 1988 for the screen adaptation of his play Dangerous Liaisons. He was nominated again in 2007 for adapting Ian McEwan's novel Atonement.

Hampton forthcoming project is the translation into English of Michael Kunze & Sylvester Levay's Austrian musical Rebecca based on Daphne du Maurier's book which is scheduled to premiere in 2009 in Canada, and then move to Broadway in 2010.

Plays

• 1964 - When Did You Last See My Mother?
• 1967 - Total Eclipse
• 1969 - The Philanthropist
• 1974 - Savages
• 1975 - Treats
• 1984 - Tales From Hollywood
• 1991 - White Chameleon
• 1994 - Alice's Adventures Under Ground
• 2002 - The Talking Cure

Musicals (Book & Lyrics)

• 1993 - Sunset Boulevard with Don Black (Book & Lyrics), for Andrew Lloyd Webber
• 2001 & 2004 - Dracula, The Musical with Don Black (Book & Lyrics), for Frank Wildhorn
• 2010 - Rebecca (musical) (Book & Lyrics, translated from German)

Adaptations

• 1977 - Tales from the Vienna Woods, Ödön von Horváth
• 1982 - The Portage to San Cristobal of A.H. from the novella by George Steiner
• 1983 - Tartuffe, Molière
• 1985 - Les Liaisons Dangereuses from the novel by Choderlos de Laclos for the Royal Shakespeare Company
• 1993 - Sunset Boulevard for Andrew Lloyd Webber
• 2001 & 2004 - Dracula, The Musical for Frank Wildhorn
• 2006 - Embers^[3] from the novel by Sándor Márai
• 2009 - The Age of the Fish (in German Jugend ohne Gott) from the novel by Ödön von Horváth for the Theater in der Josefstadt

Filmography

• 1973 - A Doll's House (screenwriter) starring Claire Bloom
• 1979 - Tales from the Vienna Woods (screenwriter; directed by Maximilian Schell)
• 1981 - The History Man (screenwriter) for the BBC
• 1983 - Beyond the Limit (screenwriter)
• 1984 - The Honorary Consul (screenwriter) based on a novel by Graham Greene starring Michael Caine and Richard Gere
• 1986 - The Wolf at the Door (screenwriter)
• 1986 - Hotel du Lac (screenwriter/director, from the novel by Anita Brookner)
• 1986 - The Good Father (screenwriter) based on a novel by Peter Prince
• 1986 - Arriving Tuesday (producer)
• 1988 - Dangerous Liaisons (play author/screenwriter/ co-producer) directed by Stephen Frears and starring John Malkovich, Glenn Close, Michelle Pfeiffer and Uma Thurman.
• 1989 - Cookie (screenwriter)
• 1989 - Tales from Hollywood for BBC
• 1989 - The Ginger Tree for BBC
• 1995 - Carrington (screenwriter/director)
• 1995 - Total Eclipse (play author/ screenwriter/ actor: The Judge) directed by Agnieszka Holland, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and David Thewlis
• 1996 - Mary Reilly (screenwriter) based on the Valerie Martin novel about Dr. Jekyll's housemaid, directed by Stephen Frears and starring Julia Roberts and John Malkovich
• 1996 - The Secret Agent (1996 film) (screenwriter/ director) based on a Joseph Conrad novel, starring Gérard Depardieu, Bob Hoskins and Patricia Arquette
• 2002 - The Quiet American (screenwriter)
• 2003 - Imagining Argentina (screenwriter/ director)
• 2007 - Atonement (screenwriter)
• 2008 - Tokyo Rose (screenwriter) in development Frank Darabont to direct.
• 2009 - Cheri (screenwriter)
• 2009 - Sunset Boulevard (original material)
• 2011 - A Dangerous Method (play author/screenwriter) based on Hampton's The Talking Cure, directed by David Cronenberg and starring Viggo Mortensen, Michael Fassbender, Keira Knightley and Vincent Cassel.

Translations

• The Seagull
• Uncle Vanya
• Hedda Gabler
• Don Juan by Molière
• 1973 - A Doll's House
• 1996 - 'Art' by Yasmina Reza
• 1998 - Enemy of the People"
• 2000 - Conversations After a Burial by Yasmina Reza
• 2001 - Life x 3 by Yasmina Reza
• 2008 - God of Carnage by Yasmina Reza
• 2010 - Rebecca (musical) by Michael Kunze

Librettos

• 2005 - Waiting for the Barbarians, music by Philip Glass
• 2007 - Appomattox, music by Philip Glass

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d e} John O'Mahony "Worlds of his own", The Guardian, 21 April 2001. Retrieved on 9 August 2008.
2. ^ Christopher Hampton Biography (1946-)
3. ^ ^{a b} Michael Coveney Hampton "A talent to adapt", The Guardian, 4 March 2006. Retrieved on 9 August 2008.

Bibliography

• Massimo Verzella, “Embers di Christopher Hampton e la traduzione della malinconia”, Paragrafo, II (2006), pp. 69–82

External links

• Christopher Hampton at the Internet Broadway Database
• Christopher Hampton at the Internet Movie Database
• Christopher Hampton at the British Film Institute's Screenonline

Persondata
Name	Hampton, Christopher
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	26 January 1946
Place of birth	Fayal, Azores, Portugal
Date of death
Place of death