‘We’ve always kept going – even during the war’
A crucial part of our culture (and economy) is being overlooked, says am-dram fanatic Jenny Landreth
‘In the amateur theatre, love is all you need,” the actor Simon Callow said in a speech to the Amateur Theatre Fest in 2018. And love is, of course, at the heart of the word “amateur”.
But Covid-19 has stripped away any romantic notions and revealed a more complex picture. Amateur actors may, unlike their professional counterparts, not be paid, but their sector is hugely valuable to the economy – in 2008, the government estimated its worth at well over £500 million – and while they wait, like the rest of us, for a vaccine, love can only take them some of the way.
In a normal year, panto season would be almost upon us; it’s financially crucial for amateurs and professionals alike. “Panto is literally the golden goose that pays the bills for the rest of the year,” says Colin Hide of Leicester’s Little Theatre. “It’s a sell-out, every performance,” and it makes Hide and co more than £100,000 in ticket sales.
‘It gives purpose to my life. I feel part of a group where no one judges you’
With panto gone, how is the mood? “Pretty good,” Hide insists. “The most amazing thing is the love people have for the place. People are phoning up, making donations – it’s incredible.”
When he asked members of the company’s youth theatre why they liked taking part, their responses gave him a window into why amateur theatre is important to so many. “It gives purpose to my life,” one said. “I feel part of a group where no one judges you and you can be who you want to be,” said another, adding: “Coming here doesn’t just help me act – it helps me to create entire worlds, become a new person. And to be part of a show, a family.”
But alongside the loss to people’s cultural and creative lives, going dark has brought myriad economic consequences. For instance, local communities benefit financially from the presence of amateur theatres. “It all ties back in,” Veronika Wilson, the general manager of Putney Arts Centre, explains.
“If you have a theatre on a local high street, the night-time economy on that high street benefits from those live audiences.”
Some amateur companies, such as the Little Theatre, run their own substantial buildings and have paid staff, who are now furloughed or out of work. Some hire professional directors, choreographers and designers, and the loss of that employment hits a freelance workforce already excluded from the Government’s financial support packages.
Tamsin Reinsch is especially aware that amateur theatre is an integral part of the showbusiness industry. She is the third generation to run Border Studios, in Selkirk, which provides a full scenery service to amateurs. Started in 1961 by her grandfather Les, its books would normally, by November, be chock-full of panto orders from across Britain.
“We may not be providing for the highest echelons of the theatre world,” Reinsch says, “but we are supporting grassroots theatre. We have been able to employ a team of people, support local suppliers, create work for freelancers and give back through work experience.”
This normally thriving professional company is just one of the hidden assets that contribute to the UK’S theatre industry – even, she adds, “if amateur theatre is often overlooked”.
Likewise, Tina Swain of St Albans’ Abbey Theatre is passionate about all theatre – hers just happens to be amateur. The chop-and-change of the last few months has required the Abbey to have a flexible, adaptable response, and now, she says, they can “turn on a sixpence”. The implications in the Government’s current guidelines are that “we can’t let non-professional theatres open because they might not be responsible towards the people coming into the building” – and, Swain emphasises, “that’s nonsense”.
“If anything,” she says, “we’re more responsible. Those people are our lifeblood… We are not going to give up the fight to be recognised for the value of what we offer for the local community.”
In Leicester, the Little Theatre will celebrate its centenary in 2022, and Hide is similarly motivated. “This is the first time we’ve shut. Even in the war, they kept going. There was an incredible reluctance to shut, but we were instructed to. Terrible.”
If you can’t put a price on the love, joy and community of amateur theatre, maybe the very real financial losses will make people sit up and take notice. A vaccine might help avoid some of the “potentially ruinous consequences” cited by Veronika Wilson – but Covid has shown us that it’s time amateur theatre had more public champions. Break a Leg: a Memoir, Manifesto and Celebration of Amateur Theatre by Jenny Landreth (Chatto & Windus, £16.99) is out now