| “The common space where citizens gathered to meet and to share" |
Theatre in Wales: Comment |
| Playwrights, Directors, Critics , Arts and Culture of Wales , September 8, 2021 |
This sequence follows no path other than to respond to events as they occur. The beginning of the closure of the public arts, February 2020, makes an obvious dividing point. September 2018 is also a clear dividing month. The selection covers contemporary events but also looks back two decades to the perspective of David Adams. Adams was a theatre critic in a time when the theatre of Wales had a professional theatre critic. While much has changed some evidently has not. 11 February 2020: Theatr Clwyd Reporting on Itself "True self-confidence also comes with a measure of humility. The company has a good story to tell. 700,000 people saw a Theatr Clwyd production in 2019. Revenue has grown 40% in the last four years. It has a multiplier effect above one, its presence estimated as generating £9,400,000 for the local economy. An Olivier award helps." 10 February 2020 Sherman Lays Out its Intentions "A thumbs-up then for: Joe Murphy will lead on Sherman Theatre’s desire to embed a literary department at the Sherman to further enrich the canon of Welsh plays and to ensure a more diverse range of voices are heard in Welsh theatre." 25 October 2019: The Cybersphere's Loss of Common Place for Public Meeting "The Agora was the common space where citizens gathered to meet and to share. Two millennia on and humans have the greatest communication mechanism ever. Its fate has become very human, division into an infinity of private fragmentations. In place of the Agora the citizens of Cyberia gather in limited clusterings of the like-minded." 20 May 2019: A Cheer for Chippy Lane & a Writing Apprentice Wanted “Rebecca is pioneering opportunities for women writers from Wales to champion their abilities and break through the boundaries and stereotypes of writing they have previously been confined to.” 07 May 2019: Ffion Jones & Not Enough Laughter in Welsh theatre "I applaud Ffion Jones. I applaud the candour, the vitality, the emotional openness, the self-belief, the brio, the lack of jargon, the unabashedness of the Welshness, the relish for theatre. I applaud too the promotion of her show, the hunger to communicate, the will for an audience." 15 April 2019: David Adams on the View from 2003 ”And I haven't even started on the subject of playwrights - the people who would ideally be producing the work to be seen on the stages of the new national theatre. The principal new-writing company, Sgript Cymru, and the smaller Theatr y Byd are both starved of funds...Little support for new writers. No encouragement for emerging new work.” 12 April 2019 David Adams in 2000 “What do we have today in Wales ? A Mess.” “The problem is the general cultural one of Wales being more or less invisible or remains only dimly perceived, if not invisible...Any theatre practice, especially non-literary performance, and especially that of a subdominant culture such as Wales's in relation to England, does becomes invisible if it is not recorded.” 09 April 2019: David Adams and Past Theatre Criticism in Wales “But what’s different is that the Assembly’s cultural policy is meant to drive the Arts Council. It's a policy based on a philistine emphasis on so-called accessibility, where uncomfortable matters like critical judgement, the value of the arts and the needs of creative individuals and groups are alien concepts.” 22 December 2018 Gary Owen, Chippy Lane and a Call for More Ambition “Too often we have been shy of making work that will pull in big audiences. It is entirely normal for writers in Ireland and Scotland to write big plays that open on main stages that connect with a much wider audience. Because we have not connected to audiences on that scale we don't aspire to, we don't see that as theatre's job...continue to do work that will only appeal to a small number of people.” 07 December 2018: Wales Arts Review Look-back on the Year “Hijinx ploughed new depths of cheekiness and irreverence with “the Flop.” The audience I was in was near collapse with laughter. The chorus line on its main song is unrepeatable on a site that is open to all eyes.” |
Reviewed by: Adam Somerset |
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