Tom Stoppard

Right, correct.

The first thing I liked about them is that they were two of them.

And the double act, you know, has a long and honorable comic tradition.

And I can see why, because they're fun to write.

And these two people, not Shakespeare's version of them, but mine...

I turn them into the kind of double act which everybody is familiar with.

There's usually one who's a little brighter and quite often angry with the other one who's a bit dim but sweet and so on.

A little like that, yes.

And the other thing about them was that in the story which they've been dropped into, they had this sort of very strange predicament.

When you look at Shakespeare's text, they're not really told what's happening in that play.

And furthermore, when they end up dead, they don't know why.

They don't know what they've done.

In fact, they haven't done anything.

So they're well-meaning, and they're often presented as villains, spies, on the side of the bad King Claudius.

But in point of fact, there's no reason to look at them like that now.

I found them rather endearing.

Oh, yes.

The idea is that it's two people who have to avoid answering questions.

They have to answer a question with a question.

And the first time somebody forgets or breaks one of the rules, then he loses a point.