Never mind that the polar ice-caps are shrinking: here’s conclusive proof that the world is indeed warming up faster than ever. It’s barely mid-March, the clocks haven’t even turned back here yet (though, weirdly, they did a couple of weeks ago in New York), and already we’ve been summonsed to our first opening of the Chichester Festival Theatre’s summer season, which took place last night in the Minerva studio with the premiere of a new stage version of Simon Gray’s The Last Cigarette.
Strangely, the weather even turned sunny for the occasion, so we could almost fool ourselves into believing that summer has actually arrived.
But two things disproved it: first that it was only the Minerva that was open last night (the main house Festival Theatre doesn’t kick into action till three nights before The Last Cigarette ends, when previews for Hay Fever begin on April 9), so things felt strangely subdued; and secondly, the usual press drinks on the terrace outside the Minerva had been relocated inside the restaurant.
Still, there was a sharp turn-out of national critics, including three who were filing overnight reviews (Charles Spencer, Quentin Letts and Paul Callan) - Michael Billington’s review has also appeared today, but he must have snuck in early as I didn’t see him there last night, and I’m awaiting Nicholas de Jongh’s verdict in the Standard (the first time he has reviewed Jasper Britton onstage since he appeared in the original production of his play Plague over England at the Finborough last year, so it could be interesting reading, especially after Jasper’s recent comments on working with him in a Guardian blog about that play that I’ve previously discussed here).
Both the early start to this season, and the critical showing, are testament to the increased standing of this theatre under artistic director Jonathan Church: last year’s season had played to over 86% capacity - over 174,000 people - against 106,000 in 2005, before Church’s arrival.
At least we still have the critics - and the papers - to make the trip at the moment. But newspapers, or at least the arts journalists they employ, are an increasingly endangered species. A report from America this week has shown that, while it was estimated that in 2005 there were approximately 5,000 staff positions on American newspapers that involved writing about the arts - including critics, feature writers and reporters who covered cultural news - today that number is down to 2,500, “due to layoffs, cutbacks and the closure of several prominent papers”.
We’re seeing some of that shrinkage here already - Time Out’s theatre section, for instance, now just has one person running it, whereas it always used to be a two-person operation; while at The Independent, I’m told, the role of theatre critic is no longer a staff position, but purely a role being filled by freelancers. And both freelance and contract rates are being slashed everywhere, from the Telegraph and the Times to the Daily Mail.
How will arts journalists continue to be able to eat at this rate? But an interesting side-effect to all this, at least in America, is that we although we may not be able to eat, some of us are still intent on providing food for thought. According to the story on Miller-McCune.com, “Reviews and analysis are rapidly migrating to niche Web sites, such as Lawrence A. Johnson’s South Florida Classical Review. ‘I’m doing this because I think newspapers are on their way out, and something has to take their place,’ Johnson explains. “The music deserves a certain sounding board. In cities where they don’t have a regular critic, mediocrity tends to be the rule. A former music critic for the Miami Herald, Johnson launched the site last June, ‘during that awkward period between the announcement of layoffs and the day I got the official word I was getting the heave-ho.’ On his site, he does pretty much everything he used to do for the Herald, only with no restrictions on length. He then sells some of his reviews back to the Herald and other area papers at a freelance rate. ‘I think that’s the future,’ he says. ‘I think you’re going to see more sites like this that serve as the origination point of the coverage’.”
The only trouble is: it doesn’t pay. Johnson’s site, according to the story, “also includes contributions from a couple of colleagues around the state; he doesn’t pay them at the moment, but plans to do so eventually. ‘My overhead is relatively low,’ he notes. ‘I don’t have levels and levels of editors. I just need a little slice of advertising to keep it going. I live pretty frugally.’”
One of my favourite sites devoted to New York theatre information is also a modest operation: according to the story, www.nytheatre.com is “a tiny operation: Denton runs it out of his home and his mother oversees the business side”. And once again, the “reviews are written by theatre professionals who do not get paid for their work.”
There are already plenty of sites over in Britain structured to a similar ethos; but if these are worrying times for those of us who make our living (at least for now!) from arts journalism, maybe a new kind of journalism is going to emerge. “I think there is as much need for arts journalists as there ever has been — probably more,” artjournal.com’s Doug McLennan is quoted as saying. But as he story goes on, he “sees this transformation as an opportunity to reinvent arts journalism by making it more innovative and more inclusive. ‘Who says that the epitome of the best possible expression of arts journalism is the 20-inch, text-only review?’ he asks. ‘Every time you translate dance into words, there’s a compromise going on. If you’re referring to a texture in music, why not illustrate the point with a little sound clip? The possibilities are just amazing. But do you see anybody seriously experimenting with that? It’s an incredibly exciting time to be an arts journalist. We’re in a sort of Wild West of invention. I think what comes out eventually will be far superior to what we have had’.”
Let’s hope so. Meanwhile, this blog remains my own frontline of attack as I explore that bold new frontier….
