Reader – BA (Hons) Acting for Stage & Screen

Qualifications – BA (Hons), MA, PhD, Equity, AFHEA

David read English at King’s College London before studying Acting at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama. The ensemble training he received at the latter has informed his whole career, from professional work to teaching. He has worked for the BBC, ITV and various national theatre companies and in 2006, he established Vivid Theatre. Vivid has produced over twenty-seven plays, ranging from classical works to contemporary plays and new writing. They have regularly received Arts Council funding.

David completed his PhD in ‘Psychophysical Performance and the Representation of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder on the Stage’ and his specialisms include this current research as well as contemporary performance and directing theories. He still acts and directs professionally, as well as delivering workshops at both educational and corporate levels. Clients have included the Royal Shakespeare Company, Headlong and a variety of public and private professional bodies.

David has presented papers and practical work at a variety of theatre conferences, from the Central European Drama Conference in Slovakia, the Milan Teatro Lita Festival and UK conferences including Birkbeck’s Theatres of Contagion and St Mary’s Mental Health and Theatre multidisciplinary event. His current research questions both the approaches to theatrical interpretations of mental health as well as mental health representation within the cinematic genre of horror. Current publications surround this latter area with work forthcoming for Bloomsbury, Palgrave and WUP. In 2024, David became a member of the Horror Writers Association.