BISHOP’S Sutton author and biographer to the stars John Miller has opened his considerable address book to create another fundraising evening for family support charity Home-Start Winchester, which aids struggling families in and around the Alresford area.

This January it is literary great Michael Frayn who will be in the hot seat in the Winchester Guildhall on Saturday, January 26, answering questions from John on the playwright and author’s remarkable career.

Best known as the author of the farce ‘Noises Off’ and the dramas ‘Copenhagen’ and ‘Democracy’, Michael Frayn’s novels, such as ‘Towards the end of the Morning’, ‘Headlong’ and ‘Spies’ have also been critical and commercial successes and his plays have won six Evening Standard and three Olivier Awards. ‘Copenhagen’ also won the Prix Moliere in Paris and a Tony for Best Play on Broadway.

Michael Frayn is unusual in being equally successful as novelist and playwright, a distinction he shares with Anton Chekhov, which may explain his third writing gift of translating the latter’s plays from Russian.

His novel ‘Skios’ was nominated on the long list for the Booker Prize, and his previous book ‘Stage Directions’ is a collection of his essays about his theatre work over half a lifetime, including the introduction to his last play ‘Afterlife’ at the National Theatre.

It is also a reflection on his path into theatre: his early, ill-fated attempts at Cambridge Footlights, his subsequent scorn in his newspaper columns and, surprisingly late in life, his reluctant conversion to the stage.

“Since I have spent my life writing novels as well as plays, one of the questions which people always ask is how I decide whether a new idea is one for a play or for a novel. The answer is that I don’t. The matter decides itself. The idea that takes shape inside one’s head has its form written upon it; that’s what makes it an idea and not just a piece of wishful thinking,” said Michael.

The evening, which follows previous highly successful In Conversation evenings with Dame Judi Dench and Claire Tomalin, starts at 7pm at Winchester Guildhall.

Tickets, priced £12, are available by calling 01962 851177, e-mailing [email protected], or online at michaelfraynwinchester.eventbrite.co.uk.