Michael Buffong
Michael Buffong is an English theatre director and the Artistic Director of Talawa Theatre Company. His work is characterised by reworking stage classics delivered to high degree of detail. Buffong has been described as "one of the most influential directors of classic plays over the last two decades", in addition to being named one of Creative Reviews 50 Creative Leaders. In Spring 2019, Buffong was one of the judges of the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize.
Career
Buffong was born in Islington, London, in 1964. He attended a director's course at Theatre Royal Stratford East and was later appointed an assistant director there. Buffong then went on to work in television and film and his credits include Holby City, EastEnders, Admin, Placebo, Calais Rules, Doctors, Casualty and Comedy Shuffle, Hollyoaks, Feeling It and Blazed. He has also written and directed the award-winning short film Simple!.He has also been particularly associated with the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester, where he has directed at least five plays. Buffong also directed Lenny Henry and Lashana Lynch in the Willy Russell play Educating Rita at the Minerva Theatre, Chichester, in 2015.
Buffong has been the artistic director Talawa Theatre Company since 2011. With Talawa, Buffong has most recently directed Guys and Dolls, King Lear, All My Sons, Moon on a Rainbow Shawl, God's Property, The Serpent's Tooth and Passing Wind. Buffong has directed Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti's A Kind of People at Royal Court Theatre and will also direct the Talawa co-production with Park Theatre (London) of Archie Maddocks's A Place for We in early summer 2020.