|
|
|
|
Articles
|
|
|
Articles |
Theatre in Northern Ireland: Theatres and CompaniesAs Northern Ireland is the smallest country within the United Kingdom, you would imagine that it would have the smallest number of theatres and producing companies. And you would be right - but you would also probably be very surprised at how few there actually are. Belfast In fact, there is just one professional producing theatre in all of the six counties, the Lyric in Belfast, which opened in 1968. It could be called a medium-scale theatre, although, with only 304 seats, that might be stretching the definition a wee bit. It certainly has a good reputation and its productions have toured internationally. The resident company is the Lyric Associates Company: actors, playwrights, directors and designers who are ‘associates’ of the theatre. Charter members are Stella McCusker, John Hewitt and Conleth Hill & Seán Campion, the original stars of Stones in His Pockets in the West End. The first associate playwright is acclaimed local writer Gary Mitchell. The theatre's patron is Liam Neeson. Belfast has two other theatres. The Grand Opera House seats 1001 and is a grade II listed building which was designed by the renowned theatre architect Frank Matcham. It is a no. 1 touring house, which means that it gets all the major touring productions - as you would expect in the largest theatre in a capital city. The other theatre is the Group Theatre: with 222 seats, it is mainly hired out to amateur groups. Then, of course, there is the Watefront Hall, a major concert hall, and a number of art centres which do have some drama programming. The rest of the country The largest theatre anywhere in Northern Ireland outside of Belfast is the Derry Theatre in Derry itself. It has a main house seating 1019 and a studio seating 100 (making it the biggest theatre in the province). It does originate some productions, but functions primarily as a receiving house, taking shows right across the performing arts spectrum. After that there is a massive drop in size to the Riverside in Coleraine with 358 seats, and that is larger than any other in the country by a fair margin. Companies It is always difficult to keep track of small-scale companies, but the most authoritative sources suggest that there are only seven producing companies in Northern Ireland, apart from the Lyric: Big Telly, Field Day, Kabosh, Prime Cut, Replay Productions, Tinderbox and Ridiculusmus. The latter is the best known on the mainland, being a regular at the Edinburgh Fringe and touring fairly extensively. Big Telly is very much a group which makes great use of spectacle, using drama, music, circus, puppets and film in their productions, whilst Prime Cut works a lot at the Lyric. Articles Indices: |
|
|