@missbarton
ALL SET: Marling, photographed in November at the Almeida Theatre, London.
ANDREW TESTA/PANOS FOR NEWSWEEK
LAURA MARLING, one of Britain’s finest songwriters, is sitting in the window of the Almeida Theatre café in north London. Which in itself is a surprise: “I always felt theater was a bit above my head,” she says, her small, bright face looking somewhat amused. “I’ve sat through a lot of very boring plays in my time, and I thought theater can be a bit too…theater-y. It can just get a bit too far up its own theater bum.”