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 Variety of inspiration
Tony's love of both the theatre and poetry is long standing and draws from his childhood experiences and beyond spanning his career, family life and wide variety of interests.
Tony has used his writing skills within his local community for a number of years including writing the Millennium Revue, The Man That Gave The Year Its Number.
Tony's poetry has also been used for the benefit of communities further afield. Following a sponsored bike ride in Kenya, Tony's imagination and heart was captured by the charity, New Ways, and he went on to publish a book of poems sold to raise funds for this charity.
Most recently, Tony received the Michael Caine Award for Best New Writing at the Leatherhead Drama Festival 2009 for his play inspired by current affairs, The Door.
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Tony's love of the theatre |
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Tony has loved the theatre from an early age. Both his parents were active members of a local dramatic society with his father also acting as guest director for a range of other societies. His own amateur stage career started with gang shows and moved on to school, student and amateur dramatic productions.
It was as a student that Tony started to write for the productions as well as acting and directing. Since then he has written a stream of sketches and revues culminating in the millennium revue, The Man Who Gave The Year Its Number, which was performed by a broad community cast drawn from local churches, schools and societies.
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Interest and inspiration |
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A keen interest in faith, belief systems, economics and politics means there is no shortage of material. And Tony's interest in people also means that there is no shortage of characters.
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Balancing working, writing and family life |
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After a spell writing a novel, Tony switched his focus to the theatre and took advantage of the fact that his three children were now independent to change his working life enabling him to spend more time on writing. In 2008, Tony Earnshaw moved away from the American bank for which he had managed an asset management subsidiary and joined a professional trustee firm to act as a trustee and investment governance specialist for pension schemes on a part time basis - freeing up two or three days a week for writing. He now balances his work and writing with playing sax and the odd bike ride.
Over the years when family and career dominated his time, Tony continued to write poetry and this remains important, with an interest in Haiku added to the more conventional western approaches. Tony remains a family man, with another generation arriving on the scene.
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Currently working on... |
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Tony is currently working on a play exploring the boundaries between myth and reality and a book for children illustrated by Katie Brent.
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| Tony's experience at a glance |
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Involvement in amateur plays throughout childhood |
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Acting and directing as part of the student amateur dramatic group inspired Tony to write his first sketches and revues |
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Writing poetry and sketches alongside family life and working full time in the financial services industry |
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The local community performed Tonys' revue, The Man Who Gave The Year Its Number, for the Millennium |
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Following a brief spell writing novels, Tony returned his focus to the theatre |
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Making the most of his children being independent, Tony changed his working life to allow him to spend more time on his writing whilst still continuing to be involved in the financial services industry |
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Tony's plays, The Door (a success on the Edinburgh Fringe, after a run of other festivals) and Visiting Time both won the Sir Michael Caine Award for Best New Writing - in 2009 and 2011 |
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Tilly the Tadpole a book for children illustrated by Katie Brent will be published shortly |
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About Tony
