Letters: Alan Plater obituary
Paul Allen writes: Alan Plater was everything Michael Coveney described in his fine obituary (26 June) – and more. Notably, he was the most generous supporter of other writers, formally through the Writers' Guild, but also through direct contact.
He was, the dramatist John Godber said, when we heard of his death, "paramount in my decision to come to Hull Truck [Theatre Company]". He was a staunch supporter of Henry Livings, through thick and thin. When my adaptation of Mark Herman's screenplay Brassed Off transferred from Sheffield to the National Theatre, Alan came to a preview with his redoubtable Auntie Lil: "Well done, Paul – away win," he said, typically finding the simple phrase that said precisely what he wanted without drawing attention to itself.
His humanity was such that when Godber commissioned him to write about another of Hull's immigrant writers, at a time when the late poet Philip Larkin's personal stock was going down, he homed in at once on the characteristic which made Larkin likeable to him, and therefore to his audience – Larkin's passion for jazz. The play, Sweet Sorrow (1990), combined Alan's professional and human qualities perfectly.
Gita Conn writes: Four short playlets, inserted into a BBC1 programme, hardly figure in the illustrious list of Alan Plater's dramatic oeuvre. But, as the producer of a 90-minute programme, The Family Rules, in the 1980s, I was delighted and not a little overwhelmed when Alan agreed to write the dramas around which the studio discussion was to revolve.
At each meeting to discuss the scripts, he insisted that it was my job to criticise and demand changes. "You are the producer," he would remind me reassuringly. The programme sank into obscurity, but I will never forget his kindness and modesty.