When Bryony Shanahan was launching herself as a theatre director, she went for an interview at the Manchester Royal Exchange. They asked her who her favourite director was. She did not hesitate in her reply. “Alex Ferguson,” she said.
They thought she was joking. Did this young woman from Stoke-on-Trent not know anything about theatre? But she was in earnest. A life-long football fan, she believed the Manchester United manager was the epitome of good direction. She still does.
“Football is my cultural identity,” says Shanahan, who played for Stoke City Ladies as a teenager. “I saw far more football growing up than I ever did theatre and the parallels are so obvious. The game has been worked out, there’s a strategy at play but it is live and it needs a crowd. If you’re in it, you can express yourself, there is a value in what you bring and you have to work within a team.” [READ MORE]