Six months ago playwright Alan Ayckbourn suffered a stroke. “After a summer of recuperation, Ayckbourn, on a sofa at his Scarborough townhouse with a view of sun-glittered sea, is recognisable as the friendly, energetic presence of interviews before his illness, although his enthusiastic, actorly voice occasionally snags, like a tape played on dodgy sprockets in his long-ago days as a studio-manager for BBC radio.”