Elizabeth Freestone on developing the co-existence of live and on screen theatre: why shouldn’t a big theatre screen a small show?
In her recent blog about digital theatre Lyn Gardner wrote that screenings of plays and opera do not put people off going to see the real thing. I agree: experience leads to appetite which leads to more experience which leads to greater appetite. The greater the variety of ways to experience theatre, the better things are for all of us, makers and audience members alike.
I run Pentabus, a small-scale touring company. We tour rural area – village halls, fields, colleges and pubs – taking our work into the heart of a community. We do this because people living in geographically isolated places struggle to have the same access to live arts their urban counterparts enjoy. Transport, pricing, time – all conspire to deny opportunity. So I'm thrilled live screenings give our audiences more opportunities to experience theatre near them. And I'm delighted the income venues get from live screenings (including bar sales) helps them afford to programme more live theatre in turn. But some of the infrastructure surrounding screenings can't help but pitch one against the other. And if put into competition with each other, venues will always choose live screenings because they are much cheaper to buy than live theatre. The good news is, the problems are solvable.
In her recent blog about digital theatre Lyn Gardner wrote that screenings of plays and opera do not put people off going to see the real thing. I agree: experience leads to appetite which leads to more experience which leads to greater appetite. The greater the variety of ways to experience theatre, the better things are for all of us, makers and audience members alike.
I run Pentabus, a small-scale touring company. We tour rural area – village halls, fields, colleges and pubs – taking our work into the heart of a community. We do this because people living in geographically isolated places struggle to have the same access to live arts their urban counterparts enjoy. Transport, pricing, time – all conspire to deny opportunity. So I'm thrilled live screenings give our audiences more opportunities to experience theatre near them. And I'm delighted the income venues get from live screenings (including bar sales) helps them afford to programme more live theatre in turn. But some of the infrastructure surrounding screenings can't help but pitch one against the other. And if put into competition with each other, venues will always choose live screenings because they are much cheaper to buy than live theatre. The good news is, the problems are solvable.