'We've kept our lights on': How coronavirus closures will affect the landscape of London's theatre

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It costs about £30,000 a week to keep a 1,000-seat, historic, commercial London theatre closed. That accounts for utilities, overheads, maintenance and the wages of permanent staff. There are around 40 such theatres — some larger, some smaller — in central London. Producer Nica Burns, who co-owns six vintage West End playhouses with Max Weitzenhoffer through their company Nimax, says: “If my theatres are closed for three months, it will cost me £2.5m, with no money coming in.”

The London theatre world is a resilient and mutually supportive one, and is confronting the closure of all its venues with pragmatism and a clear-headed refusal to panic. But before any of us start to think about what this vibrant, world-beating sector of the capital’s culture will look like when it gets back on its feet, it’s worth thinking about what the shutdown – and worse, the uncertainty over how long it will last – could cost.

Payment or support for the freelance actors, musicians and other creatives who worked on the shows shut down across London on Monday night is still being negotiated by government, producers and unions. The Arts Council acted swiftly to guarantee funding to those theatres they support, such as the National Theatre, Barbican, Donmar, Almeida, Lyric Hammersmith and others, but as Michael Longhurst of the Donmar points out, that counts for just seven per cent of his theatre’s income.

Burns’s fellow producer-owners, Cameron Mackintosh and Andrew Lloyd Webber, and London’s biggest theatre owner ATG, will be digging deep into their reserves. The Society of London Theatre calculates that the sector generated gross revenue of£798,994,920 in the last financial year, earning VAT of £133,165,820 for the Treasury. Those revenue streams were shut off completely on Monday. Independent producer John Brant went from having five productions of his hit musical Come From Away running around the world, to none, in the space of four days.

The tiny Finborough pub theatre in Earl’s Court, celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, cancelled two productions and shut down even before Boris Johnson’s botched announcement that people should “stay away” from theatres, restaurants and pubs. “We will make a straightforward loss of £25,000,” says artistic director Neil McPherson, “which, spookily enough, is the same amount that [producer] Bill Kenwright donated to us this year. But that was already filling our deficit of £20,000.”

David Babani’s voice breaks as he talks about the existential threat facing the Menier Chocolate Factory, which he has run for 17 years and which also closed, cancelling its production of Paula Vogel’s Indecent, ahead of the government announcement. Like Mehmet Ergen of Dalston’s Arcola Theatre – who speaks to me from Istanbul, where he was visiting family for “a few days” and is now stranded – he is asking those who have bought tickets to cancelled shows to ask for credit or write off the purchase as a donation. Refunds could sink such venues. Paul Taylor-Mills of the Turbine Theatre in Battersea fears smaller, newer organisations like his, without major reserves, may be forced to close, but that even big West End musicals may collapse if shut down and starved of tourist income for any length of time.

“Theatre companies around the country have been up against the wall for quite some time with arts and local government cuts and without support they will go under,” says the National Theatre’s artistic director Rufus Norris. “It needs a sector-wide gesture of support immediately.” The National employs around 900 full time staff and 1,200 part-timers, including actors and musicians, at any one time: about 4,000 people work there over the course of a year. He recognises, too, that the same scenario is playing out across all businesses in the creative, hospitality and tourism sectors, and beyond. Like Burns, Babani and just about everyone I speak to, he stresses that a time frame from the medical authorities via the government is essential for everyone to plan.

Meanwhile, contracts for new productions are not being signed, leaving writers facing an uncertain future with resilient humour. “I’m OK at the moment, barely surviving, but if this lasts three to six months, that’s going to be a concern,” says Roy Williams, whose play Sing Yer Heart Out for the Lads is due to be revived at the National in the Autumn. He adds: “But in a weird way this has focused writers’ energy and stopped us procrastinating: the days of slinking out for a coffee or a walk are gone.” Beth Steel, whose play The House of Shades took three years to write and has been delayed at the Almeida until later in the year, says she is “gutted”, though stresses that the theatre’s director Rupert Goold and his staff have been “brilliant”.

James Graham, who grimly jokes that he “self isolates for a living” and whose TV adaptation of his own play Quiz is soon to air, worries about his peers in the theatre but also foresees a knock-on effect in broadcast media. Graham also wonders what the lack of live, shared theatre experiences in London “for weeks if not many months will do for us mentally, emotionally and – dare I say it – spiritually.”

From this bleak landscape small shoots of ingenious recovery are already sprouting. Companies including new writing promoters Papatango, the King’s Head in Islington and the Theatre Café are experimenting with streaming monologues, backstage Q&As and concerts online. Actor and director Robert Myles is mounting YouTube readings of every single Shakespeare play, in order (under the admittedly cringey title The Show Must Go Online). Norris hopes to make the “considerable catalogue” of shows recorded for NT Live available, subject to rights issues. Longhurst plans to call on “artists who have been major players at the Donmar to shed some love and talent that we can share widely online”.

But really, as Ergen puts it, “we’re all waiting until it’s live again”. Julian Bird of the Society of London Theatres says: “We have more theatres than any other city in the world, we sell more tickets than any other theatre including New York, and we want to be ready and raring to come back as soon as we possibly can.” As Norris says: “We are in a dire situation, but we will survive it.”

Perhaps the last word belongs to Burns. Nimax owns the Apollo and Lyric, which with the Gielgud and Sondheim owned by Mackintosh, make up the iconic parade of four theatres on Shaftesbury Avenue. “The lights on those theatres are symbolic, saying ‘come in here and have a good time’,” she says. “I thought about the electricity bill, but we’ve kept our lights on, Cameron’s kept his lights on, to say that the show may not be on right now, but we will be back very shortly.”

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