We should salute Hall, champion of inclusive theatre
To moan or not to moan – that is the question. There’s just one week left to catch Tom Hiddleston in Hamlet at RADA, or rather not to catch him. Tickets for the threeweek run at the 160-seat theatre were allocated in an online ballot in the summer. Those unlucky enough not to get the nod have had to hear how fab it is, the “world” divided into HiddleHam haves and have-nots.
Elsewhere, the past month has thrown up two other prospects that have had many a theatre-lover gnashing their teeth in frustration. Billie Piper returned to reprise her acclaimed performance in Lorca’s
Yerma at the Young Vic; another sell-out. And those pioneers of the immersive theatre experience, Punchdrunk, announced a new piece, Kabeiroi, that only involves two punters at a time; again, this entailed an online ballot.
The email from them informing me I’d failed in my bid this week felt like a slap in the face. These shows have brought home how tough it can be to feel excluded from the “party”, making you desperate to see what’s afoot. They’ve also raised ed the thought that perhaps theatre tre is mutating before our eyes – as producers and artists push the he envelope to create special events,ents, and the most up-to-speed d theatregoers chasese the adrenalin rush of getting in, and feeling like VIPs. Of course, there have always been “hot tickets”, queues round the block, but is there a shift going on towards exclusivity, for all the mantras about inclusivity?
One man who championed inclusivity was Peter Hall, the theatrical colossus who died on Monday. I can’t have been the only one who felt that this was the end of an era. Hall didn’t just bestride the theatre world like a colossus for over half a century, he was there for the little guy.
Though, for some, he represented the Cambridge-educated whiteprivileged male, he was, his autobiography reminds us, the grammar-school boy from Suffolk who discovered his love of theatre when visiting the West End during the war. “I could stand at the back or perch in the gallery for next to nothing,” he wrote. “If funds were not too short, I could buy a seat in the pit – known grandly today as the back stalls – having reserved my place with a camp stool, placed in a queue of stools outside the theatre in the early morning. Thus I was able to sees Richardson’s Vanya… Olivier’sOlivier’ Richard III… John Gielgud as Hamlet for the second time.” Yes, he adhered to the firstcome, first-served principle, enjoyed the scrum to grab the ticket. But in founding the RSC,RS he embodied an idealism about making the best culture available for all. That idealism went backba decades. Those early proponents of a national theatre, William Archer and Harley-Granville Barker, argued in 1904 for a “visibly and unmistakably popular institution, making a large appeal to the whole community”.
Though the scale of the National Theatre’s Olivier auditorium daunted Hall he thrilled at its design, modelled on the ancient Greek amphitheatre at Epidaurus. When he staged The
Oresteia in it, complete with masks, in 1981, he was making a statement about theatre’s connections with the origins of Western culture, with democracy. Has the mission now dwindled to theatre being connected to the right social media circles?
There’s no doubt that we need to be on our guard against our theatre culture turning into a closed boutique, a digital love-in – or at least the perception that it is. The “masses” – though that phrase still barely pertains – must be looked to. All must feel welcome. And yet, the more you look at Hall’s legacy, and the more you look at what’s going on right across the board, the more you see that, actually, we’ve never had it so good, and much of that is down to Hall.
When he programmed at the National – whether it be Peter Shaffer’s
Amadeus on the main stage or Tony Harrison’s Mysteries cycle in the Cottesloe – he did so with flair; he was, you might say, the “godfather” of theatre. Nowadays the commercial sector works more closely with the subsidised sector than ever, and few raise a murmur of protest. Not when theatreland gains so palpably – witness Jez Butterworth’s crowd-pleasing The
Ferryman, West End-bound before it opened at the Royal Court.
Being British we must indulge in a good old gripe for time to time. But, while a handful of theatre’s experimental offshoots may prove irritatingly out of reach to all but a few, the many are still being well catered for – and if there’s a bumper crop this autumn, we should salute Hall. As he tilled, so have we harvested. No moaning necessary.
The most up-to-speed theatregoers chase the adrenalin rush of getting in, and feeling like VIPs