The “Value” of Theatre and Some Other Thoughts

I am trying to put something into words and I'm not sure how to. I don’t know if what I’m saying is right, or if I’m the right person to say it. But here goes.

I have been thinking about this blog by RashDash all week.

At the same time I've been watching the Big Press Push for government support for theatres unfold.

And at the same time, reading lots of things in texts and on Twitter along the lines of:

Commercial theatre should get in the bin

Subsidised theatre should get in the bin

The West End should get in the bin

The fringe should get in the bin

*Insert type of theatre here* is exploitative and shouldn't exist.

Which feels a bit like theatre eugenics, though that’s probably the wrong terminology to use. Whatever we call it, I don’t think that it’s okay?

First, a confession. There have been times, both long ago and much more recently, that I have questioned whether the world might be a better place if *all* art was co-created or community-centred in some way. I’m sure I will probably wonder it again in the future. It comes in waves.

"What's the point in theatre if it's not serving the community?" I would sigh, probably in the venue's bar, after the show I'm producing with young people was postponed or had to move spaces for the fifth or sixth time in order to accommodate something “of greater value".

“What is the point in art for art’s sake?”

I started my career in participation, and it is at the heart of everything I do. In my early career I cried in the toilets over decisions from managers and producers and artistic directors that I felt powerless to fight, where participatory or community projects had so clearly been seen as lower (or last) priority. Years later, more confident and assured in my practice and my values, I have fought the fight hard - there have been strongly worded emails and raised voices and jobs left or not taken, but also progress and compromise and celebration. It's been mostly positive.

In recent times, there's also been a wonderful and refreshing shift in the sector towards participation, co-created and community-centred work becoming more recognised for the vital, game-changing, transformative, wildly creative and artistic and innovative and WORTHY stuff that it is. It can be joyful and celebratory. It can be gritty and difficult. It can be everything "professional" theatre can be. Including professional.

But anyway. Yes I have sometimes wondered why the opposite stuff exists. Borne out of frustration and anger and sadness, I have said things about the commercial sector or The Big Institutions in the pub that I'd rather not repeat. I've also worked on commercial projects, for the brief time that I thought to be a 'proper' producer I had to somehow 'graduate' from participatory work. It didn't last long. Commercial theatre is, for the most part, not my cup of tea, and that's okay.

BUT.

I think I was wrong to say and think those things.

Commercial theatre is, for the most part, not my cup of tea, and that's okay. But that doesn’t mean it doesn't have value. By saying and thinking those things about The Big Institutions I have been doing the exact same thing that we feel "they" have been doing to "us" for all these years. Devaluing. Placing perceived value of one thing over perceived value of another. The truth is, and coronavirus has put all of this into very harsh perspective, we need all of it.

Do I still think some of the big venues could and probably should have a bit less cash? That it could and should be more evenly distributed? That just because you have a development team doesn't mean you deserve all the money? Yes.

Do I think there is altogether too much middle management? Too many administrators and not enough artists and facilitators? Too much bureaucracy soaking up the funding and not enough just getting shit done? Yes.

Do I, perhaps hypocritically, also rely on some of these institutions to invest in and platform my work, and more importantly to invest in and platform work for and by communities in the cities they’re in? Yes.

Do I think many of them, including ones I've disagreed with about other things, do use some of their resources to do phenomenal work with communities, artists, young people, older people? Unequivocally yes.

Is participatory, co-created and community-centred culture *more important* than any other cultural offer? No. But it is JUST AS important.

The reason the (brilliant) RashDash blog has been circling my brain is because it was devastating. I think the 'Let's Create' strategy is a big win for the sector, for obvious reasons. But I had not stopped to think that the Big Shift might make exciting, radical, fiercely independent companies feel redundant. For the record, I didn’t see their application, but I expect RashDash were wholly deserving of the ACE emergency money and probably only lost out due to the sheer number of applicants. But I can understand why they might feel otherwise. (You can support them to exist, here) 

Their blog made me reassess my stance on all of this stuff, again. Because of COURSE we need RashDash. Without RashDash, without Another Someone, I probably wouldn't be the theatre-maker I am today. I took sixth formers to see Two Man Show and it changed their lives. We talked about it for hours afterwards. I still could. Of COURSE we need RashDash. And of COURSE we need all those other brilliant, exciting, radical, fiercely independent companies. Relevance does not mean you're redundant if you can't be "useful" in the traditional sense. Powerful, radical, activist theatre is useful, and vital, even if it exists solely as art. Please do not go and become other things. It matters that you exist.

(Although I do want to take a moment to say, to all artists who worry they don't belong in a Let's Create world, that you are not ‘moving in on our funding’ by making community-centred work, if you want to have a go at making it. There is *so much* value in artists who don't see themselves as facilitators stepping into that space sometimes too. You are welcome here.)

I do personally think arts buildings should have a civic role as well as a cultural one. I think that’s why it’s harder for me, and for many of us in the subsidised and participation worlds, to admit that there is value - and not just monetary - in the big shiny commercial sector too. But there is, undeniably. It's vital in the ecology. We can be uncomfortable about its role – about how it often only makes profit for one person or a small group of people. And we can be uncomfortable with how those people choose to spend or not spend that profit. But I think we can be uncomfortable about those things without devaluing the art or the people that love it, or work hard to make it happen. I totally get that it's a particularly hard pill to swallow right now, as freelancers are struggling to keep food on the table. But I also think it is a complicated, messy, knotty thing and maybe we are being too simplistic when we (absolutely me included) outright bash it.

Commercial theatre might not, for the most part, be our cup of tea, and some of us might never want to work in that world, and that's okay. Many people do, and that's okay too. A producer, actor, technician is not somehow worse or ethically compromised because they choose to work in, or love working in, that world. I am guilty of having made this assumption in the past. The very recent past, too. It was wrong. It is also wrong to exploit your actors and staff, paying very little or not honouring contracts, so you can make more money. Both can be true.

(Edit: as it has been pointed out on Twitter since I wrote this, by people able to articulate this much better than I, the reality for most artists and freelancers involves balancing both, no matter your preference. This is important, too.)

So this is where the ‘get in the bin’ discourse makes me uncomfortable.

There is exploitation on ALL levels in our sector. It's rife, and awful and urgently needs addressing.

There's a chasm of diversity issues (for want of better words) that urgently need addressing.

Everything is far too London-centric and don't get me started on that because we'll be here for another 10 paragraphs.

Change IS needed, wholly and absolutely.

But theatre should stay.

Shouldn’t it?

Experimental studio theatre and big shiny musicals and children’s theatre and graduate shows above pubs and epic community shows and youth theatre and cultural crossovers and sharings that never make it out of the rehearsal room and gig theatre and immersive zombies and teenagers making something up on the bus home from college and projects in care homes and shows brought over from Europe and Africa and Asia and school plays and outdoor shows and touring work and, dare I say it, Harold Fucking Pinter. The whole messy lot.
(Okay, maybe not the zombies)

It needs a significant shake-up and redistribution of resource and commitment to fair pay and proper representation.

It needs to be more democratic - artists and communities and freelancers need to have an equal voice to buildings.

It needs to be about 1000% more environmentally sustainable.

It needs fewer dead white blokes on the books.

But it also needs to exist.

Doesn’t it?

There are fights within the sector that absolutely need to be fought. But maybe right now, during this crisis, when everyone and everything seems to be against us, maybe the best thing we can do is work together to fight FOR the sector before fighting amongst ourselves. I wonder if splitting ourselves up by what we offer and playing ourselves off against each other might just play into to the capitalist ideals we think we're fighting against by saying the things in the first place?

Like I said at the start, I don’t really know if what I’m saying is right, or if I’m the right person to say it. Part of me feels like I’m somehow letting the side down by writing any of this. Bowing down to the man, and all that. Maybe I am. Or maybe I’m only writing this because I’ve been on Zoom for 8 hours today and my brain is goo. I guess I’ve just been wrestling with some of this stuff in my head for a few days, and if you have too, I’d love to hear from you.