Mark Rylance resigns from RSC over BP sponsorship

Actor says Royal Shakespeare Company deal helps oil firm 'obscure reality of its activities'

• With its links to BP, I can't stay in the RSC | Mark Rylance

One of the UK's most respected actors is to resign from the Royal Shakespeare Company as a backlash against big oil's financing of the arts gathers momentum.

Mark Rylance, who has been an associate artist with the RSC for 30 years, said BP's sponsorship deal allowed the company to "obscure the destructive reality of its activities", which he said threatened the future of the planet.