![Jenna Russell stars in Piaf at Nottingham Playhouse](/https/www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/theatre/2021/04/01/piafwhatson2_Main_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqM37qcIWR9CtrqmiMdQVx7D1MHoqlfw1MnAlQoEF2aag.jpg?imwidth=680)
Will a trip to the theatre ever be the same again?
Theatres should reopen on May 17. But bosses in Leeds, Birmingham, Bristol and Cornwall still aren't sure how the show will go on
![Jenna Russell stars in Piaf at Nottingham Playhouse](/https/www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/theatre/2021/04/01/piafwhatson2_Main_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqM37qcIWR9CtrqmiMdQVx7D1MHoqlfw1MnAlQoEF2aag.jpg?imwidth=680)
Uncertainty was the watchword last year for British theatre. Flexibility – born of ongoing uncertainty – will be the modus operandi of regional theatres as they gear up for reopening in May, with the nominal prospect of ‘back to normal’ from midsummer.
The variables this year are as much to do with what audiences will need in order to feel comfortable about returning to playhouses as they are to do with the vicissitudes of the virus. Stand by for the continuation of socially distanced audiences on certain days of the week even after the official lifting of restrictions. And the possibility, too, should vaccine passports be made, or become, a staple means of unlocking society, that theatre doors will be alternately thrown open to those with and those without them.
This week sees the announcement of the second tranche of grants from the Culture Recovery Fund, aimed at tiding organisations over to June. The swelling torrent of announcements about impending work should grow to a flood after Easter.
James Brining, artistic director of the Leeds Playhouse, speaks for many in describing the coming month as critical in theatre’s resurrection: “For me, it’s all about how the next few weeks, and how those stages in the roadmap, work out: what will be the effect of April 12, and then May 17? It’s a make-or-break period.”
Something major will surface soon in Leeds in the shape of the postponed production – co-presented with Opera North – of Sondheim’s A Little Night Music, which Brining reveals has been reconceived for social distancing. “When I listened to it again I started to reimagine it. The piece is about not wasting your life, seizing the moment, not being separated from the person you could be with. After the year we’ve lived through it should have huge weight.”
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The reopening programme of work will be announced soon. One certainty is that there won’t be shows running simultaneously in the two main auditoria; additionally, the new studio is being given over to different local artists to develop work for four months. There will be tighter timeframes in terms of looking (and booking) ahead: “We’ve broken the programme down – April to August, September to Christmas – so we can adjust things as we need to. If there’s no distancing at Christmas that’s a bonus. It’s not something we’re going to rely on.”
The Birmingham Rep’s 50th anniversary season, beginning in September, will be announced towards the end of the month, but dance will animate the main-house stage from May 19 with a triple bill by Birmingham choreographer Rosie Kay, followed by a play about black working-class lives (Constructed), again in the main house. Sean Foley, its artistic director, is proceeding with caution. “I haven’t spoken to anyone who thinks theatres are going to fully reopen around June 21, but it’s clear that Boris really wants to stick to that timetable, so maybe it will be possible. What we’ve done is go: we can only produce shows that work financially at 50 per cent capacity.”
Exactly the same rationale underpins the thinking of Iwan Lewis, at the Barn Cirencester, which aims to hit the ground running after May 17 and keep going come what may, programming ambitious work – such as a new play about Russian online disinformation (A Russian Doll by Cat Goscovitch) – right until Christmas. “It’s all based on the assumption of 50 per cent houses and social distancing, and then everything else is a bonus. I just need to get 110 people in per performance.” Live-streaming, a forte here, will be continued as a valued add-on option and back-up plan.
Just how complex the puzzle is for those who will be looking to do work at scale in the autumn is laid bare by Douglas Rintoul, artistic director of the Queen’s Hornchurch, Essex.
The main house will reopen in May with Tim Firth’s comedy about blokes on an outdoor bonding exercise, Neville’s Island. “We really wanted to do something set outside,” Rintoul jokes. “The last thing we wanted to do was a comedy set in a sitting room when we’ve all been sat indoors endlessly.” From June, they have two programming models, one corresponding to social distancing, one without. “The big problem is large-scale musicals, and the panto. Normally we’d start to build the panto set in May. We can’t take that risk. We’re looking to wait until September to start.”
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Assuming social distancing is lifted from mid-summer, is it conceivable there will be a “mixed economy” of audience capacities, in order to reassure returning patrons? Chichester Festival Theatre has announced that its production of South Pacific, running from July 5, will have a performance a week for socially distanced audiences.
At Nottingham, after its online Spring Loaded season – featuring in its Still Life series a new ‘vignette’ by Alan Bennett, offering a revealing personal glimpse into the rigours of lockdown life – there’ll be a main-stage revival of Pam Gems’ Piaf (from July 2).
Artistic director Adam Penford says: “That will have two performances a week socially distanced, even though in theory we’re opening after [the capacity cap] has lifted. That’s one approach. How long they will need to be in place I don’t know. A Christmas Carol will be an expensive show to mount, so we need to be selling pretty near capacity to make that stack up. What’s interesting is that as we’ve moved existing ticket-bookers over to new dates, a few are opting to go to those socially distanced performances.”
“It’s a clever idea,” reckons artistic director of the Bristol Old Vic Tom Morris, who’s examining that option and weighing up what to do about mooted vaccine passports. “You’ve got a classic conflict of rights. You’ve got some people who quite reasonably regard it as their right to go into an auditorium where everyone has been vaccinated or tested, and other people who quite reasonably regard it as their right to attend without having to be tested or vaccinated, for all sorts of reasons. There’s a lot of thinking going into this, not only in the theatre sector but in retail, pubs and restaurants – there are different versions of the same problem everywhere.”
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Does he have any interest in the possibility of some performances being targeted to those with Covid-status proof and some without? “I quite like the idea, but we need to work out whether it’s practical and whether people would welcome it. My instinct is that the solution which offers people a choice is going to be the best solution. If you have competing rights, you can’t have one solution that works ideally for everyone.”
What about the interval, which some have feared might be an endangered species after the Globe announced some interval-free Shakespeare productions last month? The rule of thumb during the last rounds of attempts to reopen theatres was to minimise running times and keep bar areas closed. The expectation is that the protocols for reopening in May will accord with previous guidelines, but clearly ‘back to normal’ suggests thronging foyers.
“Everything need to be retested,” Morris replies. “In Bristol we’re aiming to try some experimental intervals in the early summer with a socially distanced audience, in which people actually move about. Radical! In the past, our audience has enjoyed intervals. They can be a showbusiness event in their own right.”
James Dacre, artistic director of Royal & Derngate, Northampton, which boasts Ralph Fiennes in Four Quartets as part of its reopening offer, mounts the case for the defence too. “The magic of live performance can be better served by not having an interval, but there are many writers who use the interval as an opportunity to allow the audience to reflect, and move the story on. I think it’s actually going to be a creative decision. Yes, it will be informed by health and safety considerations, but looking further into the future really the decision is one of how best to tell the story.”
![Ralph Fiennes will star in Four Quartets at the Royal & Derngate, Northampton](/https/www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/theatre/2021/04/01/TELEMMGLPICT000253502460_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqeuF_hvB7WUpAv2AswMugJLRWBq1ta5xxdEdOsvb3LW8.jpeg?imwidth=350)
In Sheffield, participating via the imminent World Snooker Championship at the Crucible in the DCMS’s Event Research Programme (aimed at looking at audience behaviour, to help plan for reopening), artistic director Rob Hastie makes the point for many.
“When it comes to intervals, I think it will be case by case – deciding what the individual [project] needs and what our audience tells us it wants. Regardless of the official guidelines, we’re going to have to be listening hard to our audiences about what they feel comfortable and safe with. We’re going to be listening for months.” The Sheffield comeback season will be revealed shortly, but we do know what will be absent: “I think you’re unlikely to see a play about Covid – [that’s] one thing that people won’t want.”
Last but not least, a slight gnashing of teeth is heard down the line from Porthcurno, near Penzance. Zoe Curnow, artistic director of the coastal open-air Minack, is able to reopen the venue as an outdoor museum from April 12, but most hold off until mid-May to resume performances (the venue is classified with large outdoor venues rather than other theatres). A few shows have been announced, more will follow.
She says: “What’s ludicrous is that from April 12, village communities can be staging fetes and community events run by people who probably haven’t staged a Covid-safe event yet, but I can’t stage a show despite having a good track record.” High caution, again, governs her approach. “I’ve programmed 2021 to be performable and financially viable at our socially distanced capacity.”
Last year, the Minack lost £300,000 – a result of being closed through three prime trading months. But Curnow is looking on the bright side now: “So long as nothing slips on the roadmap, it won’t be anything like that bad this year. It’s just still very challenging for those us trying to sort out a season.” Indeed.