When I ask him about a famous anecdote it takes him

When I ask him about a famous anecdote, it takes him a while to remember. “Oh yes, when I was 16 years old, he explained how to do Shakespeare in about 20 minutes,” he says. “I keep his ideas about the iambic pentameter as a touchstone.”What does he think about his father’s new book, Shakespeare’s Advice to the Players? “I haven’t read it – yet. Look, he’s been in Bath working very hard, and I’ve been here working very hard, so we haven’t seen much of each other. By choosing a career in directing, is he following in dad’s footsteps? Well, the older Hall doesn’t seem to loom much on the younger’s horizon.

“I’d love to work at the RSC, and I’m sure it will happen.”Has he ever fantasised about doing the top job there? “I was really flattered that people thought I could,” he says. “But I never imagined in a million years that I’d be running a building.” In fact, his hands are full with his touring company. I love that company, and I don’t believe in washing dirty laundry in public.” He is now equally complimentary about Noble and his successor, Michael Boyd. But, bearing in mind his previous RSC successes such as Julius Caesar, has he been invited back? “I’m quite busy at the moment,” he says, laughing like the freelancer he is. “But I was expected to start rehearsing without a full cast, and that was unacceptable.” He’s talked about the “confusion within the company”, which was demoralised by the artistic director Adrian Noble’s decision to jump ship after attempting to reorganise the RSC.”But I was upset,” says Hall, “that the event was turned into an example of why the RSC was falling to pieces, when actually it was just an incident.

Our problem is drug culture, which causes 90 per cent of crime.”With Hall, there are two awkward questions you can’t avoid. Awkward question number one is about why, in March 2002, he walked out of the Royal Shakespeare Company just two days before rehearsals for Edward III “It seems a long time ago now,” he says wearily. The college is home to an exceptional collection of manuscripts, along with Europe’s oldest keyboard instrument. It’s an emotional thing – there’s nothing political about it.

He’s quite a guy – he was sitting next to Kennedy when Marilyn Monroe sang ‘Happy Birthday, Mr President’.”Mamet’s Edmond is about a rich American’s descent into an urban nightmare, and Hall, who lives in south London, feels the play’s violence in his guts. When I mention street crime, he responds: “Oh, listen, our house in Streatham got broken into the other night while we were in And I’ve got a 14-month-old baby The guy got away, unfortunately Your liberal sentiments go out of the window. It’s fascinating and wonderful.”Husband and wife plan to collaborate on another production, a show called Dead Divas, written by Georgia Pritchett of 2DTV. “In it, Issy will play a deranged fan who keeps latching on to divas and role-playing their lives.” She will impersonate several divas, from Billie Holiday to Mama Cass, and the one-woman show may open early next year.