Theatres Magazine Summer 2016 Protecting Theatres Showcase: Theatre Royal York From Street to Seat Theatres Trust: First 40 years Managing Matchams Protecting theatres for everyone Theatres Trust Trustees Tim Eyles (Chair) Nick Allott OBE In this Welcome Richard Baldwin Paddy Dillon Ruth Eastwood issue Welcome to the summer edition of Oliver Goodwin Prof Gavin Henderson CBE TM which traditionally accompanies Jerry Katzman Dame Penelope Keith DL our annual Conference. Conference 16: Judith Mellor OBE Protecting Theatres, looks back at the Dara Ó Briain Peter Roberts last 40 years since the Trust was founded Simon Ruddick – but more importantly, looks forward Ann Skippers Anna Stapleton to the next 40. Mark Shenton, our Special Adviser Conference Chair, highlights some of Peter J Wilson the content and themes in his article. Consultants As part of the celebration of our history, John Earl we have complied a timeline of major Jonathan Lane 5 events from the Trust’s history – which go Staff Mhora Samuel back well before the Theatres Trust Act Director (1976). We could only include highlights Ross Anthony Planning Adviser in the article, but we hope to get a fuller Claire Appleby 1—3 Architecture Adviser Conference 16 account on our website soon. Mary-Ann Avotri One of the questions we will ask at the Finance Officer Corinne Beaver 5—7 Conference is: What changes need to be General Manager made to existing theatres, so they can Kate Carmichael From Street to Seat Resources Adviser continue to serve the needs of audiences Rebecca Morland Theatres Adviser and producers alike? To examine this in Stephanie Rolt 8—12 more detail, we asked two operators of Records Officer Showcase: Theatre Royal York theatres designed by renowned theatre We believe that current and future generations should have architect, Frank Matcham, to write about access to good quality theatre the challenges and delights of their buildings, where they can 14—17 be inspired by, and enjoy, Theatres Trust: wonderful theatres – the Blackpool Grand live theatre. First 40 years and Kings Theatre, Portsmouth. We will Theatres Trust also hear from architect (and Theatres 22 Charing Cross Road London WC2H 0QL Trust Trustee) Paddy Dillon, with his T 020 7836 8591 19—24 thoughts on the important role foyers play F 020 7836 3302 Managing Matchams [email protected] in an audience’s experience of theatre- www.theatrestrust.org.uk @theatrestrust going, and how their design has changed over the centuries. Paddy will be chairing one of the sessions of Conference 16, and Theatres Magazine we are sure this will be discussed further Mhora Samuel Editor-in-chief on the day. Kate Carmichael Managing Editor One of the architects who will be Nicola Rowland joining us to talk at the Conference is Advertising sales Rebecca Morland Angus Morrogh-Ryan, Partner at De Matos Contributing Editor Ryan, who recently completed a major © 2016 The Theatres Trust Charitable Fund. All unsigned or otherwise uncredited articles are refurbishment project at the Grade II* the work of the Editors. The views expressed 27—29 editorially or by correspondents in this magazine In the news listed York Theatre Royal – a project that are not necessarily those of the Trust. Notes, queries and letters are always welcome. has significantly changed the way the front ISSN: 1759-7668 of house space and auditorium are used. 30—31 We are delighted to feature the York Design: Vincent Design Our work Print: John Good Theatre Royal as our Showcase. 33 Grants Front cover image: Theatre Royal York Photo: Hufton & Crow 1 Theatres Magazine Summer 2016 Conference 16 Protecting Theatres In Chekhov’s Conference Chair Mark Shenton The Seagull, the sets the scene for the Trust’s aspiring theatremaker 10th annual conference on 21 June Konstantin, and son of veteran actress Madame Arkadina, calls for a new kind of theatre: “We need new forms, and if we can’t have them, then we’re better off with no theatre at all!” Theatre has, since the time it was created by the ancient stage and Greeks, been in a constant state of evolution and revolution, audience. and is changing again inexorably even now, as our world As Tom Morris, its itself does. We have no special claims on the uniqueness of artistic director who presided this situation – change is a given in life – but could it be that over its latest refurbishment in 2013, the huge cultural shift that’s been occasioned by the rise pointed out in an interview with me for of our constantly plugged-in, online life of the last twenty- The Stage when it was completed that they five years has led, whether inadvertently or inexorably, tasked themselves with “finding out as much as we the biggest challenge yet to what theatre can mean? could about how it was designed originally – no drawing Digital distribution is already seeing off such former survives – and then to refurbish it in a way that was inspired certainties to our lives as newspapers and CDs, as the by that geometry. We know that this is the oldest working convenience of being able to download both to a laptop, theatre in the country, but the advice we had was that all of tablet or even a mobile phone mean that physical 3D the remains of the original footprint had been destroyed in copies no longer need to exist. But what about theatre, that 1970. But it hadn’t, and that enabled us to find out exactly depends on the “liveness” of its experience – the fact that where the original floor of the pit was and exactly where you are breathing the same air as the people creating it? the original stage came to, and therefore exactly what the Or is that really over-rated? Can theatre not be a bit like relationship between the actors and audience had been cinema – an experience created live by living people, in front when it was originally built. It was designed as a middle of living people, but then beamed digitally to audiences term between an Elizabethan thrust circular playhouse and from Aberdeen to Alaska and Australia, as the success of a 19th-century proscenium arch theatre, but instead of a NT Live has proved? Or do you need, in the words of the circle, it has an oval, horseshoe shape. But you still have the current Broadway smash hit Hamilton, to be “in the room stage coming right out into the middle of the horseshoe, where it happened?” and when you are onstage, you would have originally been And what is that room anyway? We’ve seen massive lit by a single light source over the audience, so the actor changes, of course, in the way theatres are organised and is absolutely in the same room as the audience and alive to constructed, from the large, open-air amphitheatres of every response he may get.” the ancient Greeks to the advent of gas and then electric The actor is the focal point – but is nowhere without light that enabled theatres to go indoors. This year Bristol an audience, so theatre buildings are always a negotiation Old Vic celebrates its 250th anniversary as Britain’s oldest between those interests. As Morris also put it to me, there’s continuously working theatre, which itself has undergone been a conversation between past, present and future several revolutions and rebuilds during that time, but at the as they’ve actively considered each of those eras and heart of it lies theatre’s essence: the interaction between interests as they planned and executed the refurbishment. 2 Theatres Magazine Summer 2016 “If you see theatre as an interactive negotiation with an As Mackintosh’s press release puts it, there has been, in audience, radical, forward-thinking theatremakers of the last the past 50 years, a “rapid rise of productions using thrust 20 years such as Simon McBurney, Emma Rice, and Felix and open stage formats”. The fact there has not been a Barrett of Punchdrunk have based their practice around theatre created in the West End that can accommodate that interaction in different ways. Film does the other thing these types of shows is, according to Mackintosh, a “major completely – if you want to have a glowing picture at the lost opportunity”. If and when these plans come to fruition, end of the room, that’s there. But only theatre can do that the theatre will – in the words of his company’s managing interactive thing. And what we’ve discovered by finding director Nick Allott – offer “something that the West End out about how the theatre was originally designed is a has never had before, which is a transfer house for non- unique opportunity for this organisation. If theatremakers proscenium work that originated in the subsidised sector,” are interested in that interactive relationship between the at places like the Donmar and Dorfman in London, or stage and the auditorium, they can come here and play Sheffield’s Crucible or Manchester’s Royal Exchange this instrument, and play it with the most up-to-date kit beyond it. we can provide.” Instead of being shoe-horned into pros arch houses, the It is similar to what the Globe provides, but indoors: new Sondheim Theatre could offer them a mid-scale home “There aren’t aeroplanes flying overhead, and it doesn’t where they can actually reach larger audiences, but without rain, but it has the same geometry and imaginative appeal, compromising their intimacy and integrity. of actors talking directly to the audience. Alongside the The simple fact, too, is that the West End is already other opportunities directors get to make work, this is a overcrowded (and overpriced), and with long-runners very exciting one.