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Thirty five years ago the Watermill opened its doors to the public for the very first time, writes Jill Fraser.
The season lasted only a few weeks. Today the Watermill is open year round. The company, a registered charity, performs to over 60,000 people a year in the main 220 seat auditorium, tours nationally and internationally, has an active youth theatre of over 100 members, an education programme and has developed a rural touring circuit taking new writing to village and community halls.

In 2001 ?The Gondoliers?, extolling a new genre of actor musicianship, transferred to Shaftesbury Avenue and in the summer of 2002,?Rose Rage?, an adaptation of Shakespeare?s Henry VIs by Edward Hall and Roger Warren, transfers to the Theatre Royal Haymarket for a limited season. In the last two years the Watermill has received five nominations in the Barclays Theatre Awards and has won two. The Watermill also won the Empty Space?Peter Brook Award 2001. Audience figures have been the highest since 1992. Over the last five years the Watermill?s profile has enjoyed a meteoric growth ? a real success story for regional producing theatre.

So what? Other theatres have similar successes. What makes the Watermill so special?

Funding insult

What makes it so special is that it has all happened with minimal public funding. In the last ten years, the Watermill has received a total of £234,600 in core funding from its regional arts board; in 1992 £3,000 rising to £64,100 in 2001.

We are told that we can now look forward to a substantial increase in funding, thanks to the extra £25m received from the Treasury last year. By 2003 the Watermill will have had its grant increased by £30,000 this year and £30,000 next year to a massive £124,100. Forgive my cynicism. I know what producing theatres doing a similar volume of work are receiving, I know what level of funding is needed to produce theatre and, together with Croydon Warehouse and the Swan at Worcester, we come in a unique band of under-funding. £124,100 for a producing theatre employing an average of 54 people each week and producing the range of work already described, is insultingly low. We have survived because of an extraordinarily loyal and hard working and under-paid staff; because of fantastic support from the public, giving to fundraising campaigns; because of support through sponsorship by the business community; because of one-off grants, deficit funding from Arts Council of England (ACE) and the Regional Arts Lottery Programme money; but most importantly, because of the quality of the work created by our extended ensemble of artists.

Prejudice?

However, the question must be asked. Is the Watermill valuable to the artistic and wider community? Is the fact that the Watermill is not financially supported in its work to the same degree as other theatres an indication of the funding bodies? true opinion ? i.e. that it is not worth funding? We are told no, the theatre is greatly valued. If so why does our funding situation not reflect this? Is there some hidden agenda? Is it because we have a nice location beside a river in Berkshire and are not made of concrete? Is it because the funders consider everyone in West Berks to be wealthy and to be able to pay for theatre for themselves? Is it because we have always found ways of raising funds to get ourselves out of trouble and the funders think that will always happen? Have we played our cards badly and let them off the hook too often?

A small thing can tip you over the edge. For me it was receiving two copies of ACE?s new ArtsNow newsletter. Four colour, four sided A4, thick paper, designed we are told to ?keep you in touch with what we are doing?. The information could have been word processed onto a single sheet of A4 ? money saved. ACE?s job is to support performing companies and their creativity, it should not be to spend hard fought for treasury funds on bureaucratic image enhancing marketing. It is an insult to those of us who work for extremely low wages and struggle for every penny to put good work on our stages. Particularly when you are told that there is no money available in any pot to provide more core funding, now that the great division of the £25m is done.

A plea for parity

If the Watermill has a creative future, if it is of value to the artistic community; if the arts enhance the quality of life; if the arts provide inspiration in every field of commerce; if creative artists need space and a supportive working environment in which to develop, then the arts bureaucracy should be looking at the asset sitting here and save it from oblivion. Look at the facts, look at the annual accounts, budgets and business plans and acknowledge that the Watermill is a miracle in survival and acknowledge that it can continue to give a superb return on treasury investment, but only if it receives proper funding to do the work. The Watermill is a success story for the Southern Region ? in spite of, not because of the funding system. We are treated like disobedient children who will not be quiet. All we are looking for is parity with our peers. We should not be berated for asking to be invited to the funding party. We want to be treated like colleagues, like equals who have the same vision for the arts ? and deliver.

We have fought the funding system here for twenty years. We have made some headway, but there is a limit to how long we can keep fighting. It is exhausting and uses the energy that should be used to make the work happen in a secure environment. There is money in the system and what we are asking for is petty cash in the grand scheme of things. We feel insulted by having to go with a begging bowl for deficit funding, for one off grants. Will someone recognise that unless the Watermill is brought in line with everyone else, the amount of work we can produce will continue to reduce with the inevitable result.


Jill Fraser is Artistic and Executive Director of the Watermill Theatre e: jill@watermill.org.uk