The National Theatre of Scotland’s acclaimed production of Black Watch came to Wales on Thursday night and played… Ebbw Vale’s leisure centre… trailing rave reviews and breathless recommendations that it is one of the greatest shows you will ever see. It’s a definitive piece of theatre and I completely agree that it’s something not to be missed.
However, without wanting to sound like a curmudgeon, I came away with some mixed feelings – not about the production itself, which was inspiring, but about the event and the circumstances of its presentation.
Contrary to one opinion, I didn’t think the production played well in the space, despite the herculean efforts the NTS had taken to make the unhelpful acoustics, red plastic chairs and breeze block walls more bearable. Happily, the warm welcome of the centre’s attendants, who seemed genuinely pleased to be greeting people to their venue, just about managed to offset the bleak, Soviet-style queuing on entry and the lack of any bar or refreshments, despite the presence of a large sign above the door indicating “cafeteria” and (with characteristic bilingual utility) “caffeteria.”
However, coming into the auditorium, the audience was greeted with large blocks of the best seating, plastered with “reserved” notices for the large party of VIP’s that were at the reception upstairs and, it seems, heartily enjoying the free drink and food.
Personally, there is something incongruous and unsettling to me about wanting to provide access to great theatre in an area of acknowledged economic and social deprivation, using £40,000 from the government’s regeneration budget in order to make it happen, and then slapping yourself on the back for doing so with such a display of privilege and exclusivity.
With all the politicians, local government officials and arts grandees that were present, at least Neil Murray, the Newport-born Executive Producer of the NTS, had the good grace to sit among the paying punters. As did, I should say, Leighton Andrews AM, the government minister in attendance.
I can’t be sure that the performance was not sold out (indeed, I was given the impression that it had done), but there did seem to be quite a few empty seats, which begs some questions about whether the production had managed to reach its intended audience in Ebbw Vale. I sincerely hope the data will be able to prove that it did, but on the evidence of my own eyes I could not be so sure.
Given the lack of a strong central media in Wales, it is sometimes difficult for promoters to communicate to audiences. However, I can’t say I noticed much of a marketing campaign for the production. Aside from the invited guests, a good proportion of the audience consisted of the theatre community, many of whom, myself included, had driven up from Cardiff or Swansea. Perhaps some of the VIP’s did not turn up, but, if one were to add together the empty seats, the invited guests and the theatre professionals, I would estimate that it amounted to at least a third of the audience.
The profile of the remainder seemed to be predominantly middle-aged. Perhaps drawn to the military and historical aspect of the show, there was a stronger showing from middle-aged men than might have been expected. I had heard talk of buses being laid on to facilitate people who might find transport an obstacle, including young people, but I only noticed one mini-bus arriving and young people were in a minority in the audience.
Now much of this evidence is anecdotal and empirical, but it is widely acknowledged that ACW has been as proactive as it has in bringing Black Watch to Wales in anticipation of the new national theatre and as an example of the impact it can make. As many were sitting directly opposite me, I couldn’t help but speculate about what was going through the minds of the board members of the new company, as they followed the performance. In some ways, it was easy to be sympathetic towards them, not least, because a landmark piece of Scottish theatre, which has achieved world-wide success, was being laid out before them. At the very least, the artistic challenge must have seemed daunting.
Moreover, I had the sense that some in attendance were a little perplexed by Black Watch’s innovation and its honesty. In my experience, new work from Wales that features strong language and a degree of unfamiliarity is treated by some venue managers with a level of distrust and a non-negotiable certainty that it will not play to their audiences. Indeed, I noticed some yawning and staring at the ceiling from those very people at certain points in Black Watch.
But what I am really trying to get at is that if a hugely praised, world-class piece of theatre comes to Wales and fails to reach its intended audience, what message does that imply for the new national company?
By comparison with the NTS, the new national theatre will have to face a number of demanding challenges. A quick inspection of the back of the Black Watch programme speaks to the heart of one of them. The NTS employs thirty four full or part-time members of staff and a further seven freelance administrative staff on a regular basis. In 2008/09, the NTS will receive £4.3 million in annual revenue from the Scottish government. Whereas I understand that the new national company in Wales will receive £1.3 million in its first year of full operation and intends to employ no more than nine or ten permanent staff.
However, one of the most telling aspects of the whole evening for me was the outstanding contribution to its success from its Movement Director, Steven Hoggett. There was water-like fluidity, impressive daring and rigorous precision to the movement that Steven had developed with the actors that was absolutely spine-tingling and made for some of the production’s stand-out moments. For example, the signing sequence that accompanied the soldiers’ response to receiving letters from home was heartrendingly beautiful. But it was also to be found in the small detail of the ensemble work when, for example, a contentious question from the writer (played by Michael Nardone) met with a collective setting back in the chair or a small, but simultaneous adjustment in position.
Aside from recognising the work, the reason for emphasising this is that Steven is Artistic Director of the hugely successful Frantic Assembly, a company that was formed in Swansea in the early Nineties and left Wales after four years, because, as Steven once said to me, “it felt like we were banging our heads against a brick wall in order to get any support or funding.”
If that doesn’t express the inversion of short-term fix over artist development that has been palpable for so long in Wales, I don’t know what does.
Go and see Black Watch, it’s great.
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