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Welcome to the TheatreDateline: 20th February, 2005Recently I went to see a "family show" at a small theatre. I would say that at least half of the audience was made up of children, ranging from about seven to fourteen years of age. Towards the end of the interval I saw a member of the theatre's staff run down one of the aisles after a boy of about nine or ten. He had committed a terrible crime: he had brought a small plastic bottle of lemonade, which he had bought in the foyer, into the auditorium. He - and his mother, who had very quickly joined him - were told in no uncertain terms that this was not allowed and that he should either (a) take it back out to the foyer and drink it there (even though the second half was just about to start), or (b) give it to his mother to be kept until after the show. How many times have you waited in a long, long queue at the theatre bar and finally been served, only for the warning bell to go so that you either have to knock it back quickly or just leave it on a table or the bar in the hope that it will still be there when the show finishes? It's just a small thing, but it's important. If we are going to increase audiences and attract, in particular, young people into our theatres, we have to make them more welcoming, and this is one small way of doing it. And please don't counter with the argument that drinks might be spilled. What is worse: wine or beer spilled on the carpet or melted ice-cream? And I don't know of a single theatre which refuses to allow ice-cream in the auditorium. We should follow the lead of many of the multi-screen cinema complexes which are springing up all over the country. Many of them have glass/bottle holders built into the arm-rests of their seats. Now I realise that it would be prohibitively expensive to replace our theatre seating, but what is wrong with allowing drinks in plastic glasses into the auditorium? There's no chance of breakage and no more chance of spillage than there is with ice-cream. Many theatres are going along this route - I know of a number, of all sizes. In fact, at Live Theatre in Newcastle the bar is in the auditorium, although, of course, it does close during the performance. I sometimes think we go out of our way to make theatres unwelcoming. I know of one theatre which recently replaced the informal but smart uniforms of their male front-of-house staff with dinner jackets. They also wear intercoms with in-ear speakers. When you go through the doors from the street, you are confronted by what looks like a couple of bouncers! It's not what you would call welcoming. And we have to make our theatres more welcoming. I know that some people like to dress up for the theatre. Fair enough: for those who like that sort of thing, that is the sort of thing they like. But we will only build up new audiences if going to the theatre is not a special occasion where we are hedged about by rules about what we can do and wear, but rather a part of our everyday life. People need to feel at home in the theatre, and I'm not just talking about those who like a suit-and-tie element of formality when they go out but the (generally) yonger people who want to dress informally and comfortably, who want to be able to relax with a drink (soft or alcoholic) as they watch the show - just as they do when they're watching the TV at home or the latest blockbuster at the cinema. Of course there have to be some rules - unwrapping noisy sweet papers, crunching crisps, allowing mobile phones to ring and talking are just bad manners and disturb other people's enjoyment - but why should we put other obstacles in the way? And it works! The audiences at South Shields' Customs House are growing all the time because, I have been told by numerous people, "they make you feel so welcome there". That's one bandwagon that every theatre in the country should get on!
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