Tabloid money… a Covid-19 crisis for theatres
● Covid-19 is playing havoc with
Theatreland, says Jane Fryer in the Daily Mail. Last week, Andrew Lloyd Webber had to cancel a performance of Cinderella,
starring Carrie Hope Fletcher (pictured) in the titular role, after five of the cast tested positive. A cancelled Cinderella costs £80,000 a night. The Lion King and Cabaret –the new up-to-£310-a-ticket extravaganza – have both closed for several performances, as did the Life Of Pi at Wyndham’s Theatre.
Christmas salesare usually the “fat” that carries many theatres through the next months, but the “government’s
endless mixed messages” will make this a lean year. Lloyd Webber had been feeling optimistic enough to plough £1m a month of his own money
into hiss even London theatre stoke ep them afloat. “Not any more.”
The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) has just blown £9m trying to eradicate rodents on
Gough Islan dint he South Atlantic, says Richard Littlejohn, in the Daily Mail. The islan disanim portant nesting site for seabirds, so when mice started eating the eggs and chicks of a rare albatross, the RSPB scrambled a crack team for the biggest operation in the South Atlantic since the Falklands Wa rin 1982, droppi ngp oisoned bait from helicopters. Yet at least one surviving mouse has been seen after the bombardment. It would have been cheaper to get ex-Navy pilot Prince Andrew ( aka“Air Miles Andy”) to relive his Falklands tour. “Gough Island’s answer to Danger Mous e would have been no match for a helicopter gunship.”
● It’s the same old story every time football’s twice-yearly transfer window rolls around, says Brian Reade in the Daily Mirror. Fans claim to have intimate knowledge of how much their clubs have in their war chests, based on net spend at the last window. If only the club bought so-and-so, they say, that player would “pay back the fee in shirt sales alone”. Last summer, that player was Spain’s Saul Niguez. On deadline day, Chelsea paid Atlético Madrid a €4m loan fee, with the option to buy. Saul was a flop. Yet fans will keep pressuring clubs to “splash the cash”, based on the consistently-disproven myth that a club that doesn’t buy sexy names for the sake of it is “moving backwards”. These “YouTube scouts” should be careful what they wish for.