Howard Brenton, playwright – portrait of the artist

What first drew you to writing plays?

I wrote my first, based on a story I took from a comic, when I was 11. I was copying my father, who was a keen amateur-dramatic director and producer. But I'd always loved the theatre – I saw the comic Arthur Askey in panto when I was about six. I was mesmerised.

What was your big breakthrough?

When London's Royal Court put a one-act play of mine on for just one night. It was a disaster – I think I've destroyed all copies of the script. But Bill Gaskill, who was running the Court, gave me a job as a stagehand and said: "Write another play." So I did, and he put it on in 1969. It was called Revenge.

Has British theatre lost its political edge?

It comes and goes. The last great outburst was in the 1990s with Sarah Kane – all that punk aggression, in-yer-face theatre. Today, we don't know how to read the times we're in: whether we're living in a great crisis, or just a miserable one. So political theatre tends to be all over the place.

Which gives you more satisfaction, writing for stage or screen?

I loved writing for Spooks – I wrote 13 episodes. It was an adventure. When I wrote my first episode, I was just inventing something, splashing about. But now I've gone back to the theatre. It's where I belong.

What has been your biggest challenge?

Getting through the 1990s. I wrote a play Peter Hall was going to do, but it didn't happen and then no one else would do it. I was unable to get things on. I had to raid the savings account. It was Spooks that picked me back up – they'd seen something I'd written. Then suddenly I was back in the theatre.

What's the greatest myth about being a playwright?

That we have more fun and are wiser than anyone else. You speak for people, but it's usually by accident, because you've fastened on to a particular story. You're no wiser than anyone, but people start asking you about the state of the economy – or the soul.

What advice would you give a young writer?

Finish what you're writing. In the bad 1990s, I wrote a play that went on and on, but I finished it. Then I wrote another about something completely different – and I would never have got it done if I hadn't kept on with that impossibly tortured play.

What work of art would you most like to own?

One of those Picassos of heavy women running on the beach. I've always been a heavy man myself.

Is there an art form you don't relate to?

Musical theatre. I love opera – I've written a libretto – but I can't bear show music. Every song sounds the same.

What's the worst thing anyone ever said about you?

A critic once said, "He sloshes black on black," meaning that my work was dark, dirty and horrible. At first I thought it was a terrible thing to say. Then I thought, "Maybe that should be a family motto."

In short

Born: Portsmouth, 1942.

Career: His dozens of plays include Christie in Love, The Romans in Britain, In Extremis and #aiww: The Arrest of Ai Weiwei. Has also published a novel and written for TV, including Spooks. His play The Guffin will be performed in The Shed at the National Theatre, London, on Friday as part of the Connections Festival (nationaltheatre.org.uk).

High point: "Doing a small version of Moscow Gold, the play I wrote with Tariq Ali, in Moscow during the Gorbachev era. It was packed. Magical."

Low point: "Not getting anything on in the mid to late 1990s."