Author: James Haddrell

With the vast majority of theatres, cinemas, galleries and restaurants all having reopened months ago, and audiences and visitors coming back, it would be easy to think that the impact of the pandemic was over, that whilst companies are certainly having to work hard to recoup losses, operations are back to what they were before Covid hit.

At Greenwich Theatre we are continuing what has become a popular tradition of staging classic family tales for the summer holidays, with a riotous comedy version of Treasure Island.

Last weekend at Greenwich Theatre we held a gala evening, a special line-up of talks and performances celebrating 50 years of the theatre’s modern era – though thanks to the pandemic the event took place in our 53rd year.

Directing a new show can be consuming with rehearsals running all day. However, a few times a year there’s a moment when I can step out of that and announce a new season of shows.

David Haller, Elliott Bornemann, Lauren Drennan and Helen Ramsay are set to bring 30 or more characters to life this summer when the theatre’s madcap comedy version of Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic adventure story takes to the stage.

At Greenwich Theatre there is already a clear winner – family shows are outselling everything else several times over.

Mike Bartlett, who will be best known to many for the smash hit TV drama Doctor Foster, must surely be the toast of theatreland right now.

One of this country’s notable drama schools, ALRA’s alumni issued a statement on April 4th confirming that the organisation is no longer financially viable.

Over the course of the pandemic, one of the things that upset me most as we closed the doors at Greenwich Theatre was the loss of our family programme.

This week I came across two very different but equally innovative new visual arts initiatives that raise questions about the nature of art, what it can do and who it’s for.

Whether you like your politics with a capital P or prefer a lower case view of the way our society works (or doesn’t work), theatre has the power to challenge, to reinforce, to celebrate or to confront that – and that power has never been more important.

Theatres across London and beyond rapidly opened their doors and filled gaps in their programmes with the newly homeless productions.

This week at Greenwich Theatre has been given over to technical rehearsals for Alarms and Excursions, the collection of short plays by Michael Frayn.

In 1726, an Irish writer and clergyman published a satirical novel written in the style of the “travellers’ tales” that were popular in the day.

If we ever needed a clear picture of the damage wrought by the pandemic to venues, even a passing glance at the recently released annual accounts of the National Theatre make it all too clear.

As a consequence of the challenges presented by the Omicron variant of Covid-19 and its rapid spread across the capital, the festival organisers have been forced to take the hardest decision for any of us in the arts and close the doors.

The last thing we have wanted to do at any point in this challenging time is reduce our ambition and short change our audiences, and that spirit will continue into 2022

In May 2020, not long after the pandemic had really begun to take hold in this country, a piece of street art appeared on an outer wall of the University Hospital in Southampton.

Last Friday at Greenwich Theatre we finally opened The Queen Of Hearts, the pantomime that was due to run last Christmas, and then Easter, and finally this winter.