James Allen was a socialist playwright from Miles Platting, Manchester, Lancashire, best known for his collaborations with Ken Loach. Allen began to write during his time as a miner. In 1958, he was involved in the launch and publication of The Miner. In 1964, he submitted a script to Granada TV, and was taken on as a scriptwriter for the soap opera Coronation Street (1965–67), a series for which he had little sympathy. His later play, The Talking Head (1969), recounts the experience of a talented writer driven to a nervous breakdown by the pressure of "episode delivery dates". Allen's first play, The Hard Word (1966), directed by Ridley Scott, was broadcast as part of the Thirty-Minute Theatre series on BBC 2. It was followed by The Lump (1967), the first fictional work directed by Jack Gold, who had begun his career on documentaries, a...read more