Wilkins was born in 1969,[3] and brought up in Edinburgh.[4] Before his professional debut as a playwright, he worked as an actor and taught English as a Foreign Language in Poland and Spain.[5]
Whilst in Spain, he wrote his first play, Childish Things. He sent it to the Traverse and it received a public reading.[4] Encouraged, he wrote his second play, Cafeteria/Restaurant, which received a reading at the Tron Theatre in Glasgow. The Traverse commissioned him to write The Nest, which became his first produced play.[4]
At the time of his debut, Wilkins was working as a drama teacher at Inverkeithing High School, Edinburgh.[6] His next play Carthage Must Be Destroyed, set in a 2nd-century Roman bathhouse,[7] opened at the Traverse in May 2007 and explored the themes of "power, politics, and decadence, set against the improbable background of the Third Punic War, in 149BC."[8] and won the Critics' Awards for Theatre in Scotland (CATS) Best New Play award for 2007–2008.[9] The citation said "'A mature, meaty, engrossing drama about power, politics and decadence, Alan Wilkins Carthage Must Be Destroyed was a gripping indictment of the corruptions of Empire."[10] It was also produced by the Theatre Royal in Bath.[11]
In 2008, Wilkins scripted Can We Live With You? for Lung Ha's theatre company, which works with people with learning disabilities. The play was performed at the Traverse in April 2008.[12] Offshore, produced by Birds of Paradise, was a play set against the background of the decline of the Scottish fishing industry and its effect on small communities. Wilkins used his own background, working as a barman in Wester Ross, as background material.[13] It played in Edinburgh and on tour in the autumn of 2008.[14]
Wilkins also taught on the Masters of Literature programme at the University of Glasgow and is a doctoral student at that institution.[10] In 2008, he led a play-writing course for inmates at Polmont young offenders' institution, the results of which were performed at the Traverse in December 2008.[15]
Wilkins also worked with Dundee Repertory Theatre, the Aldeburgh Festival[16] and was funded by the Scottish Arts Council to represent his country as a tutor / playwright at the 2006 Interplay Festival in Liechtenstein.[17]
Wilkins died on 7 September 2022, at the age of 52.[18]
