BP protest targets the RSC

A group of actors, directors and playwrights have voiced their opposition to BPs sponsorship the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC). In a letter to the Guardian, co-ordinated by the UK Tar Sands Network and timed to coincide with the launch of the World Shakespeare Festival on 23 April, the group criticises the RSC for “allowing itself to be used by BP to obscure the destructive reality of its activities with a veneer of respectability”. Led by Mark Rylance, former Creative Director of the RSC, the signatories to the letter call for an end to oil sponsorship of the arts and a commitment to “finding more responsible ways to finance this country’s cultural life”. They argue that BP should not be allowed to associate itself with “cherished cultural institutions” in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon drilling disaster and its decision to start extracting tar sands in Canada.

The company’s support for the World Shakespeare Festival, which runs until November, includes sponsorship of three of the twelve new productions being presented as part of the Festival. But its support for culture goes wider: as Premier Partner of the Cultural Olympiad and the London 2012 Festival, it is also working with the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games, the Royal Opera House and the British Museum. Last year Tate came under fire for its ongoing sponsorship relationship with BP (see AP246).