Michael Billington is celebrating 60 years as a theatre critic this month. Starting his career as a critic on the Oxford University magazine Cherwell (first professional gig was on the Liverpool Daily Post & Echo) he still writes for Country Life, though he is probably still best known as theatre critic of The Guardian - a job he did for 48 years from 1971 - 2019.

He is the author of a number of books, most notably Affair of the Heart: British Theatre from 1992 to 2020, and State of the Nation: British Theatre since 1945, an authoritative overview of modern British theatre and its place in British society, and his seminal biography of the playwright and screenwriter Harold Pinter: Harold Pinter.

As a long-standing resident of Chiswick, Michael curated the Pinter on Screen season at Chiswick Cinema last year, presented in partnership with the Chiswick Book Festival. As pictured above, he interviewed actor Rupert Everett for the season.

There is so much to talk about and unpack in that long career, it's hard to know where to start, but Michael will be talking to the editor of The Chiswick Calendar Bridget Osborne on Wednesday 28 May for The Chiswick Calendar's Media Club about his 60-year career and what he has learned about British theatre along the way.

The Chiswick Calendar's Media Club on Wednesday 28 May at 7.30pm in the Boston Room of George IV pub in Chiswick.