The late 1960s. Highly successful, celebrity playwright Oliver Lindall has assembled his team of players for the premiere of his new play When Winter Comes. As backdrop, and already secure in its influence, is a uniquely British working-class consciousness, one that has seen its full efflorescence on stage at the Royal Court. By then, ironically, we have arrived at an imperial nomenclature strangely not at odds with a vocal proletariat. For Oliver Lindall, first-night nerves won’t be the only troubling accompaniment his new play brings. Among his troupe is Simon Baird, chosen for his consummate acting skills, yet known for his reputation. Baird is an actor with brooding class resentments and as likely to wreak destruction as shine as outstanding star in any production he is involved with. When the play finally premieres, what’s it going to be? More plaudits for Oliver Lindall, or chaos at the hands of the hugely talented, mercurial Simon Baird? In the climax, the crescendo, of O’Connor’s The Terrorist, we are delivered not only a verdict, but a further question, one that continues to preoccupy stage and its management: who actually owns the finished production – the playwright, the players, or the audience played to? Simon Baird has his answer, and demonstrates it graphically.