McDonagh: I will use will to stop changes to my plays

MARTIN McDONAGH, the filmmaker and playwright, has suggested he could use his will to block Roald Dahl-style posthumous edits to his work.

He warned that some theatre companies have refused to put on his plays in recent years because he refused to sanction changes to make the language more “palatable”.

But when asked about the potential for his work to be edited after his death, the 53-year-old indicated his will would prevent any changes.

It comes after publishers and sensitivity readers removed references to weight, height, mental health, gender and colour in Dahl’s classic children’s books to minimise offence.

“That’s why I’ve got to make sure in my will, the wording of that is very very specific too,” McDonagh told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

McDonagh’s classic play The Pillowman is set for a West End revival this summer starring Lily Allen and Steve Pemberton. The story revolves around a writer who is detained and interrogated by a totalitarian regime.

“A theatre has got every right not to put a play on,” McDonagh added. “The major problem is that they ask you or another writer to change it to make it more palatable to them or what they think their audience is.

“It is much more problematic, I think, now than it has been for many years.

“I think what one of your characters says shouldn’t be mistaken for what the author of the line says, and I think that’s something that’s being stupidly blurred by different groups with an axe to grind.”

New editions of Roald Dahl’s beloved stories saw Augustus Gloop as no longer fat, Mrs Twit no longer fearfully ugly, and the Oompa-Loompas having gone gender-neutral.

The Telegraph revealed in February how the publisher, Puffin, made hundreds of changes to the original text, removing many of Dahl’s classic, timeless and colourful descriptions of grotesque characters.

After a backlash led by the Queen Consort and Sir Salman Rushie, Puffin UK announced it would produce uncensored versions of Dahl’s stories too.

McDonagh’s latest film The Banshees of Inisherin was nominated for nine Oscars at this year’s Academy Awards.

Previously, his 2004 short film Shooter earned him an Oscar, and his other hit movies include and