Amateur dramatics. Amdram. The very mention can trigger a supercilious sneer or a fit of condescending giggles among professional practitioners. But use the term ?voluntary? or ?participative? or ?community? theatre and the reaction is likely to be very different. Mark Pemberton investigates.
Up and down the country, hundreds of thousands of people are involved in amateur theatre on a daily basis. They may be volunteers but they are every bit as committed as their professional counterparts. (And, in many cases, as talented: witness the number of professionals who began their careers with their local amateur theatre group, and the success of the contestants in the recent Channel 4 series Musicality.) And they ?participate? in theatre in the true sense of the word, not as passive consumers but as active participants in a genuine community activity. And everyone ? from the leading performers to the front-of-house staff, the administrators to the technicians ? is doing it unpaid, in celebration of the original meaning of the word amateur, from the Latin ?amo? ? for the love of it.
Business and pleasure
Amateur theatre is much bigger business than it is given credit for. The National Operatic and Dramatic Association (NODA), the major representative body for amateur theatre, has more than 2,400 affiliated theatre groups, representing an active constituency of over 430,000 people, performing to audiences of 7.5m. Twenty-nine percent of its participants are under 21, and many of them will go on to drama school and pursue a professional career. In many cases amateur groups give young people their first taste of theatre, which is as important in creating audiences as it is in creating artists.
More importantly, the combined turnover of NODA?s members is in excess of £34m per annum. Much of that sum is paid directly into the professional sector, in the form of hire fees for venues or payments to theatrical suppliers, rights holders and publishers. Nick Lloyd, Chief Executive of Malvern Festival Theatre, also believes they are an essential part of programming: ?They can do work that I couldn?t afford to bring in professionally. We?re a very popular drama house, but we can?t afford to put on big musicals. But they attract audiences we might not otherwise reach.?
And yet amateur theatre is the one area of community arts infrastructure that receives no funding from Arts Council England (ACE). The situation is very different in Scotland and Wales, where the respective Arts Councils fund community drama associations.
NODA was founded in 1899 and, although UK-wide, serves very much as the association for amateur theatre in England ? albeit entirely self-financing. Its members stage musicals, operas, plays, concerts and pantomimes in a wide variety of performing venues throughout the country, ranging from leading professional theatres to village halls ? in many parts of the country providing the only live theatre for miles. One theatre group in Shetland, for example, gets audiences of up to a quarter of the local population. There is a broad spectrum of ages involved with amateur theatre nation-wide, from a burgeoning number of youth groups to adult companies that offer opportunities for people to participate ? as performers (whether dramatic or musical), backstage, front of house or in administration. And, by extension, amateur theatre embraces youth theatre, drama schools, university drama clubs, the annual office pantomime and any number of small community events that, in total, add up to a lot of people and a lot of theatre.
This huge body of people is testimony to the valuable spirit of volunteering that exists in this country, which we forget at our peril. The government wants to encourage more people to volunteer (though whether anyone in government has ever quantified the numbers already volunteering in the arts is a moot point) through initiatives such as The Experience Corps, which aimed to persuade more over-50s to offer their skills and time. That said, it is common in amateur theatre to bemoan the fact that older people carry most of the burden of keeping the societies alive. Amateur theatre competes with the other distractions available to the young, and any help in encouraging young people to develop and retain an interest in theatre would be valuable to the sector.
Keep talking
Amateur societies also fight a constant battle to get bums on seats. There is anecdotal evidence that audience numbers are declining, and NODA is encouraging its members to take seriously the need for a better understanding of marketing. But the problem is accessing training from experts locally. A greater dialogue with the theatres hired by the amateur groups about more effective marketing of their productions would be productive on both sides. Although there have been some initiatives in recent years in this area ? such as a series of workshops offered by the former Eastern Arts Board on marketing and fundraising for voluntary groups ? these have fallen by the wayside following re-structuring of regional arts offices. A developing dialogue between the amateur sector and ACE gives hope that perhaps greater opportunities for training in marketing and administrative skills will emerge as a result of the structural changes.
NODA has welcomed this change. Under the old system, the response from the Regional Arts Associations to the amateur sector was variable. Some showed a welcome interest, but many appeared to dismiss it as an irrelevance to their core objective of supporting funded clients. ACE has promised a more coherent and positive approach, which NODA hopes will lead to a genuine spirit of partnership between the voluntary and the funded sectors.
The amateur and professional sectors have much to gain from each other. The amateur sector relies on the professionals to generate new work, and benefits from the skills of professional directors, musical directors and choreographers as well as the support of box office and technical staff. In turn, those venues that understand that ?participation? is not just about developing audiences but also about letting the local community actually tread their boards can prove to their funding bodies that they are not just taking the need for access seriously, but are also making it happen.
Mark Pemberton is Chief Executive of NODA. t: 0870 770 2480; e: everyone@noda.org.uk