Playwright Tom Stoppard dies

British playwright, director and screenwriter Tom Stoppard has died at the age of 88, The Guardian reports.

• Tom Stoppard is considered one of the most sought-after playwrights of the second half of the twentieth century. He wrote for film, radio, theater and television, and was a playwright for the Royal National Theater of Great Britain. Among Stoppard's most famous plays: Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, Travesties, Enter a Free Man, Arcadia, The Shore of Utopia, and Rock and Roll. He wrote scripts for the films Brazil by Terry Gilliam, The Russia House by Fred Schepisi, Shakespeare in Love by John Madden, and Anna Karenina by Joe Wright. In 1990, Stoppard filmed his own play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead.
• Stoppard was a three-time winner of the British theater Laurence Olivier Award and a five-time winner of the American theater Tony Award. For the screenplay of Shakespeare in Love, Stoppard was awarded an Oscar and a Golden Globe. In 1978, Queen Elizabeth II awarded him the title of Commander of the Order of the British Empire, and in 1997 he was knighted bachelor for his contribution to the performing arts.