A belief that Arts Council England has abandoned the arms length principle, adopted an authoritarian stance and is now fixated by its own strategic priorities has led national touring theatre company Red Shift to take the unusual step of surrendering its subsidy from the Arts Council. Jonathan Holloway explains.
Red Shifts Theatre Companys current tour of Much Ado About Nothing, set during the Bosnian war, will finish Easter 2008, after which the company will no longer be in receipt of regular funding and so will not be able to tour on the small scale.
Founded in 1982, Red Shift evolved a hallmark style in which visual theatre has collided with text to produce over fifty accessible and demanding productions. The company is popular with small- and middle-scale venues: each show visits around fifty theatres and the work often attracts significant media interest. It took us eight years to achieve Regularly Funded Organisation (RFO) status and until four years ago we had a productive relationship with our principal funder, Arts Council England. Following devolution to Arts Council England, London (ACE, London), the situation changed dramatically.
We are obviously a national company, but ACE, London was instantly stricken with concern at our marginal contribution to the London theatre landscape. Devolution by postcode plunged us into twilight, where we lost currency overnight. We questioned assessment criteria and the inferences of an officer who was new to the Arts Council, new to us and new to touring. This was probably a mistake. All but one of the ACE, London show reports since filed by officers have emphasised our failure to satisfy Arts Council policy objectives. Despite acres of glowing statistics regarding venue and audience satisfaction, and all the good reviews, this positive testimony hardly features in ACE, Londons paper record.
Our production of Get Carter (2006) was a real coup for Red Shift and for the touring sector. The show was huge by comparison with most small-scale productions, garnered brilliant reviews and, following an extensive UK tour, visited the Edinburgh Festival where it played to large houses in a prestige venue and was listed in the broadsheet critics choices day after day. ACE, London filed five officer reports virtually identical in their criticism of the production, and lamentable in their simplistic dismissal of it for portraying unreconstructed 1970s attitudes to women. A sustained drone note of wearying personal criticism has also been playing in the background. I was told that I didnt have a convincing artistic dialogue at a time when I was directing award-winning designers and composers, on commission to Nottingham Playhouse and the BBC.
Changing attitudes to art
The Arts Council has undergone a profound re-orientation of its attitude towards artists and audiences. Artist peer panels no longer monitor the activities of officers, the favoured few are being gathered into networks of non-artist cultural leaders, and some say the Oxbridge hegemony is undimmed. It has been clear for a long time that ACE, London didnt like having us around. In light of all the talk of cuts that has been circulating, our Board concluded we might soon lose our grant. We started making a noise more widely and went to the Independent Theatre Council for support. The response was sympathetic but the remark, youve had subsidy for a long time, maybe now its someone elses turn, made us feel very unloved.
Two years ago, John Fox wrote a crucial article in The Guardian about the winding up of the Welfare State, in which he cited the Arts Councils attitude to their work as a principal reason for packing up. The artistic community hardly noticed it.
It has yet to emerge what effect the Olympics and ACE priorities will have on arts subsidy. I suspect the axe will fall, and as many pundits are predicting, it may fall most heavily on touring. Diminished funding to receiving venues already signals that national touring is under threat and its enormous skills base may be allowed to wither. Intensive touring needs a whole different approach than that required for resident shows. This extends from the robust nature of the performances to the intricacy of designing and building substantial sets clever enough to get-out in 45 minutes. You can be absolutely sure there are very few people at the DCMS or the Arts Council who understand that.
One of the things that has really struck me recently is the way artists are no longer regarded with the respect given to theatre workers 20 years ago. Arts Council officers have excellent conditions of service with good pensions, maternity and paternity leave, sabbaticals and generous holidays, while artists are expected to survive on pay and conditions equivalent to those of unskilled workers. My practical understanding of small-scale touring was hard won, and partly at a cost to those closest to me.
Life after ACE
So, what next for Red Shift? We have lined up a series of surprising titles on which we have managed to buy stage rights that will last for some time. This is our piggy bank. Once we start producing them, well be on the clock and the bankability of those productions will have to be replaced by something new. We have flirted with big theatres and commercial producers regarding co-productions and further exploitation of our back catalogue. These relationships have almost always stalled, sometimes at a very late stage. We know the term small-scale has a lot to do with it because it is assumed the work cant fill a main stage. We always visit larger theatres on any tour, and weve learnt they often feel uncomfortable being on a date sheet alongside small black-box studios. Well, that wont any longer be the case.
The company will continue trading, will maintain a server, will monitor emails and do the groundwork for future productions. We will either move to home working or sublet two-thirds of our office to cover the overheads of keeping the facility. I have found a job in academe, which understands that work outside the institution is to be encouraged. The Board remains engaged, while our General Manager continues maintaining the current tour over the short term.
Like the generals daughter, we decided to jump off the cliff rather than suffer violation. Whatever happens in the end, I feel sad but empowered by a decision to take my companys destiny and my own back into my hands. n
Jonathan Holloway is Artistic Director of Red Shift Theatre Company. Much Ado About Nothing tours until Easter 2008.
w: http://www.redshifttheatreco.co.uk