Biographies

Improbable Thinkers

John, an Executive Coach, has operated at board level in the international division of PricewaterhouseCoopers. He had a previous career as a Chartered Engineer, who reached senior rank in the Royal Air Force, before leaving to develop further his management, interpersonal and facilitator skills in the commercial world of a major consultancy. John thrives in an international environment, and now focuses on helping people and organisations to realise their potential for effectiveness and growth.

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After retiring from the theatre in the mid 1980s, following a successfully unpaid career lasting several weeks, Mark has been a features journalist working for a variety of magazines and national newspapers including Today, The Telegraph, the Evening Standard, the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday.

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Paul Crewes is a producer for Metal. Until July 2004 he was Producer of the West Yorkshire Playhouse in Leeds, where he programmed the Quarry and Courtyard Theatre, alongside the Artistic Director. He was responsible for setting up co-productions with Kneehigh Theatre Company, Improbable Theatre Company, and the international collaboration of Homage to Catalonia with Northern Stage and Teatro Roma. He also co-produced commercial and West End transfers. Before working at the Playhouse, he was at Theatre Royal Plymouth, Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, London Contemporary Dance Theatre, Paines Plough Theatre Company and Bristol Old Vic. He is on the advisory board at the Scottish Dance Theatre.


Christine Gettins has produced seven shows with The Right Size, including DO YOU COME HERE OFTEN? which won an Olivier Award for Best Entertainment in 1999. She joined Michael Morris at Cultural Industry as Associate Producer in 1999. Cultural Industry is an independent, international company that produces and presents new work across a complete spectrum of the performing arts. The company is responsible for on-going presentation of work in the UK by Robert Lepage and Pina Bausch and, most recently, Irish director and choreographer, Michael Keegan-Dolan.


Richard’s production of The Trojans for ENO won the Olivier Award for best opera production. In 2000 Richard was awarded Designer of the Year with Antony McDonald for Un ballo in maschera in Germany. He was nominated for a South Bank Show award for his production of The Queen of Spades at WNO and for an Olivier Award for Pelleas and Melisande at ENO. He was awarded the Barclays/TMA Award 2001 for The Queen of Spades at WNO. His production of Julius Caesar was the Opernwelt Production of the Year, and, for the WNO, he directed the Olivier Award-winning Hansel and Gretel. Titanic was the winner of 5 Tony awards on Broadway. He has directed Too Clever by Half and The Illusion for the Old Vic, which won an Olivier Award and an Evening Standard Award respectively. His production of Into The Woods also won Olivier and Evening Standard Awards. Furthermore, he has directed A Midsummer Night’s Dream for the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Barbican, London and Teatro Liceo, Salamanca.


Alison Sparks graduated with a BA (Hons) in Mathematics from Oxford University and worked in the City for 14 years, initially at Goldman Sachs and then at Credit Suisse First Boston where she rose to be a Managing Director in Debt Capital Markets.

Since retiring from investment banking in 2001, Alison has been active in the voluntary sector, including coaching Maths at a Camden primary school, devising & implementing the first phase of a £1mn fundraising programme for repairs and a new social exclusion project at the local church, and the development & marketing of various fundraising events.

She is a trustee of Scene & Heard, a Kings Cross based charity, which mentors inner-city children through the process of writing and performing plays with theatre professionals.