Examination of Witnesses (Questions 260-279)
THE OLD
VIC, ROYAL
COURT THEATRE
8 FEBRUARY 2005
Q260 Chris Bryant: Talking of box office,
one issue which has arisen recently, because of the OFT doing
its report on the selling of theatre tickets, is the question
of when you buy a ticket, when you ring up, which for the vast
majority of people is going to be the only means of buying a theatre
ticket, they end up not just buying a ticket for £40 but
then having an additional charge slapped on top of it, of maybe
£1, £5, maybe £12 or £20, or whatever. Where
do you sit on that?
Ms Moynihan: Without trying to
avoid answering it, our box office is operated by Ambassador Theatre
Group, so we contract that operation and effectively we are stuck
with their booking fees. We have a very good relationship with
them so I am not knocking that relationship, but probably it is
better that you ask them, and I think they are coming later. Effectively,
we have to take the booking fee and from time to time we have
sought to negotiate that down where we thought it was inappropriate.
Q261 Chris Bryant: How much is it, do
you know?
Ms Moynihan: It is £2.50
per booking.
Q262 Chris Bryant: As you know, many
people when buying their ticket are perplexed as to why it is
not included in the price of the ticket; that is either how much
the ticket is or it is not?
Ms Greene: It is extraordinary
how much it costs to put on a show, it is quite scary. Only 10%
of shows actually make a profit. The sorts of shows that we are
doing, we have done a new play, Cloaca, which Kevin directed,
in September, which did not receive fabulous reviews but actually
got a decent audience. Then we did pantomime with Ian McKellen,
which did extraordinarily well, and we are opening a new play
on Thursday, in which Kevin is starring, which has also taken
a very good advance, but they do cost a lot of money to put on.
Q263 Chris Bryant: My issue is not with
the £40, it is with the £2.50, and even it were advertised
as £42.50 I would be happy. It is the sudden injustice, is
what it feels like?
Ms Moynihan: As I say, I am afraid
that probably you need to ask the box office operators. They would
say that is a fair cost of providing their service. You will have
to ask them to elaborate further, but I think they will say that
is the cost of providing the service to the customer.
Q264 Chairman: You are both institutions
but you are institutions of a different kind, are you not? Although
I realise that under your new regime the Old Vic is seeking to
create new material, both you and the Young Vic, at both of which
I have spent very many marvellous evenings, to a very considerable
degree have been receiving theatres. I have seen the RSC at both,
for example, etc. Whereas the Royal Court probably has got the
greatest record for originating new material, and indeed right
back to Granville Barker, John Osborne, etc, etc, right through
to the present day, that wonderful exposure of the tabloid press
to which you kindly invited me. At the Royal Court, do you believe
that the role you play in originating new material, probably more
than any other theatre, certainly, I would say, more than any
other theatre in London and maybe in the country, I will put it
another way because the first way is a bit too easy, to what extent
do you think that is recognised by the Arts Council, whether it
regards you as a very special case, which you ought to be?
Ms Borger: I do not want just
to say yes. I would like to think we originate the most new material
in the world, but perhaps that is a bit ambitious. I think they
do consider us a special case and that is not to set us against
our other new writing colleagues, like the Bush or Hampstead,
but we do 18 to 20 shows every year and we will be 50 next year.
We do only new plays, very occasionally revive a classic, I think
we might do that actually in our birthday year, but I think that
is why we are subsidised. While the Michaels both said that they
can manage to do about six or seven plays a year, I think we do
receive greater subsidy than the Almeida and the Donmar, but we
are the only other theatre which does as many productions in a
year as the National and they receive quite a bit more than we
do.
Q265 Chairman: Again, The Old Vic, in
a sense, is a perfect building. No doubt internally you have different
views, but it would be very difficult indeed to find a way of
improving on The Old Vic, both in terms of the public areas, the
large spaces and so on. The Royal Court, like the Almeida, has
had, on the other hand, extensive remodelling. I did not want
to say to our guests from the Donmar, who are so delightful, how
inadequate their remodelling had been, in terms of being able
actually to see the play. Again, as I say, The Old Vic, in my
view, is so perfect that it would be wrong to interfere with it,
but does the kind of remodelling that you have had help in attracting
theatre-goers as distinct from creating a more attractive environment?
Ms Borger: I thought it was interesting
when you raised the question about, or Michael did, if it is a
nicer space will more people go, or will it be more comfortable,
and I thought, certainly the Royal Court is much more comfortable
but does it attract a larger audience only for that reason? I
would have to agree with the previous speakers that it is about
what you put on the stage. That said, I am very sympathetic to
the Old Vic's problems because it is the position that the Royal
Court was in. It was going to be condemned, it would fall down,
it was no longer licensable so it had to be fixed. When you are
going to spend that much public money, I think it is important
to make it a more comfortable space and I think that you can animate
your building in the day far more if you have what we have, the
new restaurant space which did not exist before, so now there
are places that people can be in. A lot of the money goes to things
which are invisible, like technology or more heating or more aid-conditioning
and things like that. We were lucky to be in that position when
we received that grant.
Q266 Mr Doran: Just following through
the comments you have just made, I was trying to press the Donmar
and Almeida people just to see what the public benefit was for
this investment and I was interested that they related it to ticket
price and viability. Is that how you see the situation?
Ms Borger: No. I would not have
put it that way. I was interested that was what they said. I am
hugely proud of our ticket prices because they are very low and
I feel that is obviously an appropriate use of public subsidy.
I think that we have subsidy to make something happen which could
not happen otherwise, so for me that is the public benefit. If
we believe that it is good to have National Health, at least I
am American so these are all the things that I love most about
England, if you think it is important to support to theatre, if
you think it is important to have what a civilised society should
have, subsidy makes those things happen. One of the knock-ons,
of course, is that ticket prices are more affordable, but the
other is, especially in our theatre, because we are a writers'
theatre and we seek the voice of the outsider and all those good
things, I think that without subsidy probably that work would
not be done.
Q267 Mr Doran: You would not exist?
Ms Borger: We would not, no. Even
our commercial stories, something like "Look Back in Anger",
which is now part of the syllabus, there is a very successful
production in Edinburgh coming down to Bath, 22 commercial managements
turned down that play in 1956 and then it was done in the subsidised
theatre and has made a lot of money. That pattern still continues
because, even a writer like Martin McDonagh, his work is on now
at the National, it has been on Broadway, he has been done in
39 countries, that was an unsolicited script which came to the
Royal Court. You just do not know if that work would have been
done without subsidy.
Q268 Mr Doran: You have got a strong
case for saying that investment in the Royal Court is benefiting
theatre nationally?
Ms Borger: I think I have.
Q269 Mr Doran: I fed that one to you.
That is all you are going to get, I promise you. Returning to
The Old Vic, I read through your submission and there is a lot
of frustration in there, I could feel that. Just so I am clear,
there is not a costing in here that I could see for the repairs
to the fabric which need to be done, have you got a figure?
Ms Greene: We have got a figure,
yes.
Ms Moynihan: We said in the submission
that we will not make it public because literally we are in the
middle of a project planning grant to work on those figures.
Q270 Mr Doran: If you do not want to
commit yourself now, stop before you do, but is your cost part
of the £250 million estimate of repairs to theatres generally?
Ms Moynihan: Not currently.
Q271 Mr Doran: That figure will increase.
Do you aim to be part of that scheme?
Ms Moynihan: Yes, and we are in
discussions about it. Can I add something in terms of our costing,
and it is relevant to what the Chairman was saying. All of the
repairs we would look to do at The Old Vic would be about substantial
repairs and making The Old Vic a working production house. There
is no element of it which is what one might call a vanity project
or a destination restaurant, it is all about fabric and essential
repairs and access and provision for producing.
Q272 Mr Doran: I understand that. Because
of the frustration I picked up in your submission, it seems to
me as though you are getting a little bit desperate?
Ms Greene: We are in a desperate
situation because we have a big hole in the roof. I cannot remember
exactly which year it was, I think it was in 1941, the Germans
bombed London and one of the bombs happened to go through the
roof of The Old Vic and it has never been repaired properly. It
is really serious now.
Q273 Mr Doran: Is it actually leaking?
Ms Greene: It is leaking, yes,
when it rains.
Ms Moynihan: We are not alone
in that, it happens in the best of theatres. It is part of the
experience.
Ms Greene: We are very proud of
the Old Vic; we have good toilet facilities and the seats are
relatively comfortable and there is air-cooling. We spend what
little money we make through management and put it back into the
fabric of the building, and I think you would have a comfortable
evening if you came.
Q274 Mr Doran: You are using the legal
vehicle of a trust. That separates you out a little from the rest
of the West End theatres. Is that something you think is going
to be helpful?
Ms Moynihan: We are aware of the
issues. I think the issue with the request from the commercial
theatre is "why should commercial owners receive funding
and how will that be protected?", and obviously, to some
extent, we are one more step towards that by not being in private
ownership, so it is a charity.
Q275 Mr Doran: Has it helped you so far?
Ms Moynihan: Yes.
Q276 Mr Doran: A question still on the
roof, I am sorry. I am fixated by roofs.
Ms Greene: Come and have a look.
Q277 Mr Doran: No. I am no good as a
handyman, I am sorry. Is it likely that you will have to wait
until this whole £250 million package, £125 million
from the commercial sector plus the cost of your roof, is put
together?
Ms Greene: We are trying to raise
the money privately as well, of course, all the time, and we are
starting a big fund-raising campaign for the fabric of the building.
Q278 Mr Doran: I saw that from your submission.
Ms Greene: If we raised any money,
if we raised a substantial amount of money between now and next
year, we would have to start on the roof.
Q279 Mr Doran: It may be that you will
manage to resolve this problem yourselves?
Ms Greene: I would like to think
that you might help us, for once.
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