He has successfully directed the Almeida company in the West End but he seems happier being involved in increasingly imaginative makeovers of often derelict buildings. The term 'location scout' used to be confined to cinema, one of those vaguely self-explanatory phrases that drifted past you during the credits unlike its more enigmatic compatriots 'Key Grip' or 'Best Boy'. Increasingly, however, 'location scout' is becoming part of Kent's job description. And he's not alone. Tastes have changed and much of this is bound up in a question of size.
Many directors are now more than a little uncomfortable working in large-scale theatres.
Tim Supple recently foundered directing Romeo and Juliet at the Olivier, but his small-scale Shakespeare at the RSC and the Young Vic had been strikingly atmospheric. Indeed, exceptions like Michael Grandage's powerful work on the vast open stage of the Sheffield Crucible notwithstanding, almost every great Shakespeare production of the last 25 years from Trevor Nunn's terrifying and justly legendary Macbeth to Stephen Pimlott's arrestingly analytical Richard II has taken place in a small space. Because audiences weaned on TV and film close-up want to get up close and personal. Utterly unlikely venues are being commandeered for one-off experiment. Two years earlier, director Deborah Warner took individuals along a shiveringly creepy journey through the abandoned St Pancras Hotel.