The Lady in the Van

NOW A MAJOR FILM STARRING DAME MAGGIE SMITH 'The first book that ever made me laugh out loud' Adam Kay 'Utter genius' Daily Mail In 1974, the homeless Miss Shepherd moved her broken down van into Alan Bennett's garden. Deeply eccentric and stubborn to her bones, Miss Shepherd was not an easy tenant. And Bennett, despite inviting her in the first place, was a reluctant landlord. And yet she lived there for fifteen years. This account of those years was first published in 1989 in the London Review of Books. The play premiered in 1999, directed by Nicholas Hytner and starring Dame Maggie Smith, who reprise their roles in this new film adaptation. Shot on location at Bennett's house, Alex Jennings plays the author, alongside household names including Frances de la Tour, Jim Broadbent and Dominic Cooper.

Alan Bennett has been one of our leading dramatists since the success of Beyond the Fringe in the 1960s. His television series Talking Heads has become a modern-day classic, as have many of his works for the stage, including Forty Years On, The Lady in the Van, A Question of Attribution, The Madness of King George Ill (together with the Oscar-nominated screenplay The Madness of King George) and an adaptation of Kenneth Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. The History Boys won Evening Standard, Critics' Circle and Olivier awards, as well as the South Bank Award. On Broadway, The History Boys won five New York Drama Desk Awards, four Outer Critics' Circle Awards, a New York Drama Critics' Award for Best Play, a New York Drama League Award and six Tonys including Best Play. The film of The History Boys was released in 2006. Alan Bennett's collection of prose, Untold Stories, won the PEN/Ackerley Prize for Autobiography, 2006. His 2009 play, The Habit of Art, received glowing reviews and was broadcast live the following year by National Theatre Live. In 2012 People premiered at the National Theatre to widespread critical acclaim. The film of The Lady in the Van starring Maggie Smith was released in 2015, sending Bennett's memoir of the same name to the top of the bestseller list for nine weeks.