Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1-19)
THE BRIDEWELL
THEATRE
14 OCTOBER 2003
Q1 Chairman: Thank you very much
indeed for coming. I ought to explain that people will be coming
in and out because, when we decided to hold this inquiry on this
date (which was the only day we had for it), we did not take due
account of the fact that this is the first day back from the recess;
that this is a day when the House meets at 2.30 and, therefore,
people are travelling down and, in addition to that, colleagues
have meetings. May I assure you that the Committee as a whole
takes this inquiry very seriously and we welcome the correspondence
we had which led to it. I believe Mr Cogo-Fawcett would like to
make an introductory statement and we would like to hear that.
Mr Cogo-Fawcett: Thank you very
much, and thank you for inviting us here. What makes the Bridewell
unique in London's theatrical index is the fact that it alone
is dedicated to the development of musical theatre and musical
artistes of all kinds: composers, directors, choreographers, dancers,
singers and actors. London has a number of theatres dedicated
to new drama—the Bush, Hampstead Theatre Club, the Soho
Theatre and so on. There are also a large number of subsidised
theatres around the country which, like the Royal National Theatre,
occasionally produce musicals. The motives for doing so, however,
are often pecuniary. Because the genre is generally considered
populist, subsidised production values can often produce substantial
box office income in times of need. Morever, the transfer rate
of musicals is good and they often provide an ongoing income stream
for the originating house; but new musicals are also comparatively
expensive to produce. Their development process can be long, highly
experimental and therefore costly; and the quality of risk involved
in their presentation incompatible with the potential rewards.
The subsidised playhouse may also not have readily available the
skills needed to develop musical work until it is stage-worthy.
These factors make new musicals a comparative rarity in the country's
subsidised theatrical environment. The Bridewell Theatre has been
in existence for ten years and in the last five has produced and
presented over 71 productions—27 of these have been new
musicals and six new operas. It has also presented 18 musical
and opera revivals, as well as 12 new dramas and eight drama revivals.
These productions have been a mixture of its own work and that
of other producers and presenters. It has developed a reputation
on both sides of the Atlantic as a nursery for the musical as
an art form. We have occupied the refurbished swimming pool on
the ground level of St Bride's Institute free of charge for the
last ten years; but the Corporation of London's annual revenue
support for the St Bride's Printing Library, housed within the
Institute, is to cease in March of next year. The rent paid by
the Corporation for the space the library occupies has allowed
the Institute to provide free premises and £40,000 subvention
to the Theatre annually. The cessation of the subsidy together
with the demands of the Disability Discrimination Act on an elderly
building have effectively caused the Institute to need to charge
us £72,000 rent and to stop the subsidy altogether. Our formal
tenure will therefore come to an end in March, although were we
to make good the shortfall of rent and subsidy the Institute could
continue to afford us temporary accommodation in the building
until their redevelopment of the premises takes place. There is
a long-term straw of comfort for us in that we have the opportunity
to become a beneficiary of the planning gain from the Mermaid
redevelopment. That money—and £2 million is the sum
which has been mentioned—could secure us new premises; but
the timing of the development of that site is subject to matters
beyond our control and it is possible we might not exist by the
time it comes to fruition. The Arts Council is sympathetic to
our plight yet despite past attempts we have never been accepted
as a regular annual revenue client with core funding. Despite
a number of recent project awards from the Arts Council our failure
to have an ongoing relationship has hugely weakened our case with
our stakeholders. Yet musical theatre has been a Cinderella of
our principal arts funding body throughout its history. Their
definition of music theatre being the theatrical presentation
of music with classical roots rarely encompasses the form we would
call musical theatre, and therefore we have been unable to benefit
from this highly focused funding. The very success of musicals,
the fact that their commercial success when it does occur is so
conspicuous, substantially weakens the case for the subvention
of its development. I am not suggesting for a moment that musicals
should be supported once they have arrived in a commercial context;
but I would argue that without the application of adequate financial
resources in the early stages of creative development one risks
stunting growth or denying it altogether. This cannot be right
for a section of the British theatre industry which is so vital
to tourism and has attracted a wealth of sub-industries around
it like a honeypot. If theatres such as the Bridewell do not exist
as key strategic components in the national development of musical
theatre to provide the artistic leadership and mentoring, as well
as the environments for challenge, training and learning, musical
form will continue to lag behind that of Broadway. Of 22 Broadway
theatres currently open ten are occupied by new musicals without
music and script created specifically for them. In the West End's
41 theatres there are two such musicals that are less than ten
years' old which began their life in the United Kingdom. I would
suggest that the writing is on the wall. The opportunities to
experiment both at the workshop and the presentational stage can
only sensibly exist in fringe theatres with small seating capacities
like our own, where the scale of risk is so diminished that the
financial consequences of failure are temporary and less meaningful.
It is its very scale which makes us useful but which hampers our
financial viability. In the meantime the Bridewell has a very
immediate crisis to face and £112,000 per year to find if
it is stay in its current premises albeit temporarily. I hope
the result of today's inquiry may give us grounds for hoping for
a future.
Chairman: Thank you very much indeed.
I will ask Mr Fabricant to start the questioning.
Q2 Michael Fabricant: First of all,
how many seats do you have?
Mr Cogo-Fawcett: 180 seats.
Q3 Michael Fabricant: Do you think
there is a future, short of subsidy, for any theatre with just
180 seats? Or do you think you are being a little purist in the
sort of programming you are doing and maybe, between the redevelopment
of the Mermaid and you not receiving subsidy, you should perhaps
adapt your programming to be more populist or at least attract
more support?
Mr Cogo-Fawcett: We are not short
of support, but I know of no other 180-seat theatre which exists
without subsidy. We attract sponsorship. We attract houses which
I do not think any subsidised theatre would be ashamed of. We
play to above 60% average per year. Musicals are populist, simply
because of the form. Musical theatre is popular theatre and attracts
a level of attendance that we would expect; but the fact that
we have to be experimental (because the very policy of the company
is to encourage new work) it is that which suggests—on 180
seats even were we to fill all of them every day of the week—we
would still not make money.
Q4 Michael Fabricant: Certainly I
would not wish to see the Bridewell Theatre close, but you have
painted rather a gloomy picture as to its future. I am just wondering
whether you are being flexible enough in the sort of performances
you put on not only to attract an audience but also to attract
additional funding from the Arts Council. You have pointed out
yourself the difficulty of attracting funding given the sort of
repertoire you have?
Mr Sawers: What you are saying
pulls in two directions. If one were to be more populist in our
programming then we would be less likely to attract support from
the Arts Council. I think the two things go in opposite directions.
Like all of these things, one has to try and achieve a balance.
We have always felt it is desperately important for musical theatre
writing in this country and the art form as a whole to present
the best of new writing that is around. Inevitably new writing
means more risk; means that you can struggle with audiences more
than you would do otherwise; but that is surely the process of
support structures that exist within the UK arts funding, a system
to support just that kind of endeavour.
Mr Cogo-Fawcett: We have seen
ourselves, and continue to see ourselves, very much as a training
ground, not just as a training ground for young artists but because
of the structure of the profession in which we live, and because
musical theatre is almost entirely commercially based, it is very
difficult for artists who have been in the business for 10 or
15 years to get the kind of practice they need to get, and to
get the refreshment they need. I wonder if Janie Dee would like
to talk a little bit about that for us.
Ms Dee: I met Carol about ten
years ago when she opened the Bridewell. By chance I came upon
her and saw the space in its pure form before she changed it into
a theatre, and it was already a beautiful space. In the last ten
years I have seen that develop into a theatre that has so much
versatility as a space and yet you are asking what the Bridewell
Theatre is. Its impression and image, for us as artistes particularly,
is that it is a place where you go to do new musical theatre work.
Also it has a huge audience following. It is very clear in their
minds, "We can go to the Bridewell to see something we won't
see anywhere else". It is not populist in that way; it is
not commercial theatre. I have been paid huge amounts of money
to do commercial theatre, and it is very, very nice to be paid
a lot, but every now and again I will do something for no money
because it is exciting to me as an artiste and I will get some
sort of inspiration out of this. It was true recently. I did something
last Christmas at the Bridewell and we had such a very artistic
time and a good time—it was full as well and everybody came
to see it. It was lovely to play to full houses, albeit only 180
seats. It was a fantastic atmosphere, of a type I have never experienced
in London. It is unique.
Q5 Michael Fabricant: Part of the
depressing aspect of it all is the point which Mr Cogo-Fawcett
made that no theatre with just 180 seats is viable without subsidy.
I note the Arts Council says that one of the requirements of core
funding is that there has got to be a payment of minimum union
rates. I just wonder whether you are being too purist in your
repertoire, and if only you could adapt your programme—albeit
temporarily until you find new premises or get this additional
funding through the sale of the Mermaid—you could at least
attract some funding from sources that you do not get at present.
Have you looked at these alternatives?
Mr Sawers: I think we look at
these alternatives all the time. To give you a clue, as Robert
mentioned earlier, regional theatres will often say, "We
need a bit of money, let's do a musical". We do not take
that approach by saying, "Okay, let's do a populist musical
because we know we'll make some money to subsidise our future".
Because of the economics of 180 seats, even if we sold every single
seat we would still lose—
Q6 Michael Fabricant: Even if you
attracted Arts Council funding?
Mr Sawers: I am talking about
without the subsidy. Even if we sold every single seat we would
still lose between £5,000-£10,000. It is not the right
route for a theatre of that size. What we exist to do is to provide
those experiences Janie was talking about, and to develop new
work itself and present that and show that work available and
look at the quality of it.
Ms Metcalfe: Obviously I completely
take your point about what appears to be a narrowness to what
we do. What I want to say is, yes, when I started that theatre
you had to get the thing off the ground and had to move the rock.
When we started we did all sorts of things. The reason why we
had this vision about wanting to develop music theatre was that
we looked around and it just was not happening. My inspiration
for doing this came from working with young people and seeing
the effect of the collision of drama and music on them and the
empowerment it gave them—children who would sit around going,
"Yeah, Miss", and suddenly you say, "Make some
music, make theatre and put it together". The whole dynamic
that happens—the National Youth Music Theatre, whom you
will hear from later, another great organisation inspired by the
same thing. Coming from a purely theatrical background doing lots
and lots of drama you think, "Here is this wonderful medium
which is so exciting and empowering to people". If you are
in the drama field, as I have been, there are so many opportunities
to develop new work to get those new ideas across. It is the newness
which is important to all of us. If you all think theatre exists
and is important it is because it is about explaining humanity
to itself. If that has any relevance it is explaining now
to us and not just the past. You always have to take any art form
forward, I would contend. When I came into theatre I was thinking
if I wanted to develop new drama there were so many opportunities,
so many small companies, writing companies and theatres where
I could do that, and suddenly I find this enthusiasm for musical
theatre through working with young people and I think, "Right,
let's take this forward because it is such a wonderful medium",
but where do you do it? There is nothing. Nothing is happening.
When I started the Bridewell I had this idea of developing theatre
and I was thinking, "Here is the space. My goodness, am I
going to be in competition with a whole lot of other people? No.
Nobody else is doing it". It had two prongs to it and one
of them was thinking about wanting to develop the art form, and
the other was thinking that nobody else was doing it. Yes, we
have tried lots of other ways. Yes, perhaps if we had just concentrated
on developing new drama, not populist drama but new drama, by
now the Arts Council would be funding us—that is indeed
possible. If those of us who feel passionately about it leave
the medium to founder and say, "Tough, we can't get money
and we won't do it" then it will die.
Chairman: I think it would be useful
to put this situation in its context. If you look at the National
Theatre, the National Theatre only operates on a subsidy; and
it operates on a level of subsidy which would have the Bridewell
swooning in delirium if it got it; but the National Theatre takes
far fewer risks than the Bridewell. If you want to go and see
musicals which practically any amateur operatic company is performing
at any given time, like Oklahoma and Carousel and
even Anything Goes, okay, you can go there and they make
money and they transfer them. In my view that is not what a national
theatre is about. When they do something like Democracy
which is, let us face it, not all that experimental because it
is by a famous and successful playwright, they stow it away in
the Cottesloe anyhow in case there is too much risk. My own view,
and I am a paying customer at the Bridewell, is that their value
is in not doing things that the amateur operatic companies do.
They put on the world premiere of Sondheim's first musical Saturday
Night, and I had the pleasure of seeing Janie Dee in it. They
put on Anyone Can Whistle and I thought it was worth staging
even though you could see why it closed very quickly.
Mr Bryant: Please do not take that personally!
Q7 Chairman: It is very important
people get opportunities to see things like that. What I would
put to Michael, as well as to our witnesses, is if you want the
extremely facile stuff then there are lots of places in London,
including the heavily subsidised National, where you can go and
see it. It seems to me what is important about the Bridewell,
and in a different way about the Donmar and the Almeida, is that
they do things you cannot get to see elsewhere but can turn out
to be wonderful experiences. Would you like to answer that?
Ms Dee: I would love to add to
that if I may. At the National Theatre Studio I have done a lot
of workshops there; the subsidy is substantial and they make good
use of their subsidy. They look into all sorts of wonderful projects.
Over the ten years I have been involved with the National Theatre
I have done two new musical projects. One was initiated by myself
and the other one was initiated by some friends of mine who write
music. It did get a professional production for a couple of days,
but that was it. It was not commercial enough evidently, or it
did not get the backing. That is just to add to the Chairman's
point about heavily subsidised theatres as opposed to completely
unsubsidised theatre. The amount of risk-taking is really minimal.
Also, I would like to tell you a story about a gig I got at the
Barbican last year which was funded by the Corporation of London.
It was a wonderful gig. It was to interest people in the huge
theatre being made into a cabaret venue where you could go and
have dinner and watch an artiste, in this case it was me, doing
a cabaret for you. The man who runs it (Gary England a friend
of mine) is absolutely brilliant and said, "I think we'll
start with acrobats falling from the ceiling; we'll have this
amazing music; then the curtain will go up slowly; then the chandeliers
will come down; the dinner will be brought to them; and then we
will say, "Ladies and gentlemen, come up". They did
this and it was fantastic. When I got back to my dressing room
I had a huge bottle of champagne, glasses, roses and everything.
I thought, "This is how you dream of it being". At the
Bridewell somebody had given some lights which had gone wrong
somewhere else and they had said, "You can use them at the
Bridewell", but actually they were brilliant and they worked,
for no money. We got back to our dressing rooms and we all had
a little flower each to say "Good Luck". This moves
me because there is no money but the achievement is just as magical.
I know these people have been struggling for ten years with nothing
and no subsidy.
Mr Fabricant: I am on your side but I
have to ask these questions. One thing Robert Cogo-Fawcett said,
you talked about the comparison between development of musical
theatre in the United Kingdom and that in New York city and it
is particularly tough at the moment. I have got very strong connections
in the US and it is particularly tough at the moment with this
Republican administration—although I am very pro the Republicans
in every other aspect, especially as I am off to Lichfield, Connecticut
on Thursday, but that is another story.
Chairman: It most certainly is!
Q8 Mr Fabricant: Why does it work
in New York city but it does not work here? I cannot imagine there
is a lot of subsidy there either. What should we be doing here?
Mr Cogo-Fawcett: There is subsidy.
Q9 Mr Fabricant: From whom?
Mr Cogo-Fawcett: From the National
Endowment for the Arts. It does in fact have a bursary fund. I
cannot put a figure on it, but it does offer substantial sums
towards the development of musical theatre. Also the commercial
infrastructure is different. We are dependent upon a handful of
producers in this country for the existence of our commercial
musical theatre. I do not need to name them, they are well known
names and you know who they are as well as I do, I am sure. Indeed,
some of those producers do spend some money on the development
of musical theatre—we have benefited from it at the Bridewell—but
there are only a handful of them. In New York I could spend a
month going round spending two hours with every musical producer
and there would still be more to go to. They spend a long time
and a lot of money developing things, because the whole structure
there is very different. The size of the vehicle they create on
each occasion is an enormous vehicle—a vehicle costing $10-15
million. Here, yes, there are occasional vehicles that cost that
sum, but generally we try to put musicals on for £1-1.2 million.
In the commercial economy of theatre that represents for us a
tidy amount, which is the reason why so much old work is revived.
The new work, the work that costs $10-15 million which is done
over there, will have a substantial development period behind
it, almost certainly; because people recognise the need to grow
artistes and to grow the work. It takes a long time with musicals
because it is such a collaborative process, in the way that all
theatre is collaborative, drama is collaborative but it is not
nearly as collaborative as musical theatre which involves so many
different ingredients that need bringing together; some unfortunately
get dropped along the way and others get brought in, and all of
that takes a long time and a lot of development. It is recognised
in the States. Perhaps it is to do with the tradition there; they
have a longer musical tradition than we do. Here it is also because
there are not the people to turn to. We have turned to most of
them and had help from most of the five or six over the years.
Finally, despite the fact that they create foundations, those
foundations are not that wealthy and they spread it around, and
often the foundations are there to help themselves for wholly
legitimate reasons. For example, Cameron Mackintosh's Foundation
has helped work to go on at the National Theatre, which has then
been brought back into the West End. It is wholly proper that
it should be used in that way, but actually it has not been used
for the development of new work, by and large.
Mr Bryant: I am going to play Devil's
advocate. Having played the Duke of Austria in Blondel
at university I think my commitment to alternative musicals is
quite high! Chairman, I should point out that Sunday in the
Park was also done at the National which would not have found
a commercial house anywhere.
Chairman: I saw it there.
Q10 Mr Bryant: Indeed, I saw Promises
Promises at the Bridewell which I enjoyed enormously; although
why Burt Bacharach needs a non-commercial avenue for getting his
work into musical theatre, I do not quite understand. The ordinary
person looking at the London theatres at the moment would see
Mama Mia!, We Will Rock You, The Rod Stewart Musical, Blood
Brothers, Anything Goes, The Lion King, Les Miserables, The Phantom
of the Opera, Chicago, Sunset Boulevard and Bombay Dreams.
In all of that there is quite a lot of musical going on. The Chairman
refers to these kinds of musicals as "facile", but the
truth is that they are extremely popular, good value and highly
entertaining. Many of my constituents will do the journey from
South Wales up to London for two musicals spread over two evenings.
Why on earth should any of this be subsidised?
Mr Sawers: The best way to see
it is to make a comparison with how new drama writing appears
to us to develop in the West End. If you consider that in the
West End each year there are perhaps 10 new plays that appear
on the West End stage, you need to think of a pyramid of development,
if you like. For those 10 plays to arrive in the West End (or
those 10 musicals, but we will come to that comparison later)
there are a number of subsidised houses in London and elsewhere
in the UK that are developing work, the best of which will go
into the West End. There are 10 or 12 theatres doing this kind
of thing, all subsidised, and they are producing 30, 40 or 50
new plays a year for those 10 to arrive in the West End. For those
10 or 12 theatres to produce 50 or 60 plays a year they are receiving
writing of 300, 400 or 500—a significant number—because
that is a development process of the work, that is a development
process of the skills involved, and it is the inevitable, almost
statistical process of writing. Some will be great, and for each
great play a playwright will write three or four average plays,
that is the way things are.
Ms Dee: You are talking about
subsidising that part of the pyramid. You are not talking about
the end product, which is Chicago. Chicago started
as a concert performance with Ann Reinking saying, "Can we
just try this, it might be good". It was subsidised at that
moment, and then it became very commercial because it worked.
The Bridewell is trying to produce new stuff all the time which
is brand new and has not been thought of before and will end up
one day, hopefully, being produced as those other commercial ventures.
Mr Sawers: That is the point I
am getting to. There is a pyramidal structure of development within
drama work and that does not exist for musical theatre in any
way, shape or form.
Q11 Mr Bryant: I understand the economics
are different for musicals because it is much more expensive to
put on the first night, especially to do it in such a way that
you all get a big enough audience to last you six or nine months,
which is the only way you can make it stack up. I understand that.
The market seems pretty good at chucking out Which Witch
and all the other rubbish musicals we forget about five minutes
after we first saw them.
Mr Sawers: I would turn the argument
around and say, do you want the musical theatre that is populist
in the West End to be these (somebody else's quote) facile things
that currently exist? Why is it that over the last 10 years there
has not been in the UK (apart from Bombay Dreams, and it
is yet to be seen whether that will be seen as successful in the
longer term) a new British musical theatre piece arriving on the
West End that has done the likes of Phantom, Les Mis and
Miss Saigon of 20 years ago.
Mr Cogo-Fawcett: It is a very
difficult argument to counteract when all the musicals you quote
are extremely popular. I did say at the beginning, only one of
these which you have quoted has got music specially written for
it. Only one of those Bombay Dreams is a new musical. The
rest of them are entirely compilation musicals or they have music
taken from previous eras.
Q12 Mr Bryant: I suppose you are
including Les Mis as having started in France originally?
Mr Cogo-Fawcett: No, I did say
of over 10 years old.
Q13 Mr Bryant: Is that not one of
the other problems, which is that we now have a lot of West End
theatres clogged up with musicals that have been so successful,
and successful at keeping people coming three or four times over
the course of 20 years, that there is no great appetite for people
to find new great big musicals. Is that fair or unfair?
Mr Cogo-Fawcett: I think there
is no great appetite for producers to take the risk to put new
musicals on. It is easier to keep a commercial vehicle going;
to keep pumping more money into the advertising and the marketing
on this fixed cost, which invariably goes down over time. Musicals
are very interesting, because when you start them they cost so
much, and they actually go up in cost when you get towards the
first re-cast; but beyond the first re-cast they generally come
down in cost as the musical goes on in time because you get cheaper
and cheaper personnel in them, as we know, over a period of years.
It is very comforting to have that kind of musical at the back
of you, rather than to think, "I'm going to develop something
new".
Q14 Mr Bryant: That is one part of
the question, which is about why have subsidy. The other question
is: why you; why not another theatre; why not the Lyric, Hammersmith;
why not Hobson Hall?
Ms Dee: We have the reputation
already. We have already established a reputation.
Ms Metcalfe: Of course, they do
occasionally do something that is musical theatre or has a musical
content. Indeed, we really are the only place where the prime
aim of our programming is to develop new work. I think it is this
whole thing about new work. In a sense, you do make yourself honourable
and `twas ever thus with art in any form; the minute you start
up with something new at first it is just not populist. People
think, "That's a bit peculiar. Why are we doing that?"
When Cezanne painted his first picture I am sure people said,
"What was all that about? I wouldn't want that hanging on
my wall, would I". That is what it is about, but that is
what keeps the art vibrant.
Mr Cogo-Fawcett: There is also
an infrastructural issue. There are places that have people like
Tim and Carol who are musical managers/artistes, whereas the Lyric
Hammersmith does not have those kind of people in it. When they
do musicals they generally need to bring people in specifically
to supervise the process.
Chairman: The only musical I can remember
seeing at the Lyric Hammersmith was a musical version of Ruth
Rendall's A Judgment in Stone.
Q15 Mr Bryant: I am not particularly
arguing for the Lyric Hammersmith, I am just saying why should
the Almeida not or wherever—
Ms Dee: Because they do not have
the reputation the Bridewell has. If you want to go somewhere
to see something which is brand new which you would not be able
to see anywhere else that is musical theatre you would go to the
Bridewell, without question, if you know about it. If you do not
know about it and you ask somebody they will say, "Go to
the Bridewell".
Q16 Mr Bryant: My memory from some
ten years ago was that the old fire station in Oxford had a relationship
with Cameron McIntosh and with Stephen Sondheim to do with the
Professorship of Musical Theatre at Oxford, is that right?
Ms Dee: Yes.
Q17 Mr Bryant: Is that still part
of the equation?
Ms Dee: It closed.
Mr Cogo-Fawcett: It has fallen
by the wayside. It opens occasionally when it is rented out by
people.
Ms Dee: I was a performer in that
Oxford deal; the writers who were part of that are still going
strong, albeit going strong against all odds.
Mr Bryant: I think there was a musical
called Galileo Galileo. I saw that. The scars are on my
back!
Q18 Mr Doran: One of the problems
of coming last is that most of the questions you want to ask have
already been asked. I am not an expert on musicals like my colleagues
here but I would like to pick up some of the threads of what has
been raised. From the outside it strikes me that you have got
a serious structural problem. At the top you have got these apparently
very successful and very rich musicals running in the West End
with very successful producers, with two or three millionaires
at the head of it obviously doing very, very well, I will not
say at the bottom there is a Bridewell, but somewhere underneath
there is a Bridewell and organisations like the Bridewell. When
my colleague, Michael Fabricant, asked about the situation in
America you explained very well why that was different. Why have
we got the structural problem you have outlined? What efforts
can be made to plug the gaps? It strikes me that the work you
are doing is extremely valuable but, at the same time, is unrecognised?
Ms Metcalfe: I can give you a
personal answer which is, when we started and said we were going
to do musical theatre, it was said to me, "Is there any?
What are you going to do if you are going to do new musical theatre?"
As your colleague has alluded to, we started off by doing revivals
of shows which had been somewhat neglected and looking at the
classics. Part of what I was trying to say to people was that
you can do musicals on a small scale. One of the things people
felt was that musical theatre could only happen in a huge theatre.
Of course, if that is the case then it is very difficult to develop
it. One of our starting points was, let us show people that you
can do musical theatre in a small space. Going back to your question,
certainly there was the question, "What are you going to
do?" Then there was that sense of people feeling, as has
been clear here, "If you are doing musicals that must be
commercial, you cannot possibly need any assistance with it".
I have to say, it has taken ten years, but because we produced
work that was very clearly new, that was dealing with real issues
and the emotions and the tribulations of the characters communicating,
that was enhanced by the use of music (and most of these shows
have been American), because we actually produced these shows
and people were able to come and see them I think people's perception
has shifted. Some of the people were saying, "Music theatre—that's
just big, jolly shows in the West End", but they have now
seen there is a much richer vein there which can be tapped. With
people's attitude and thinking, the Arts Council are a very good
example of that. Recently they have been very supportive of us,
because they have seen that what we have been doing has got a
value—the kind of value to which they subscribe—about
accessibility, about developing multiculturalism and diversity
in the community. I think that is happening and is beginning to
change.
Q19 Mr Doran: But not supportive
enough?
Ms Metcalfe: You must ask them.
At the moment they would possibly say their funds have been very
prescribed and that has made it difficult for them.
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