It is emerging that the coming financial year will see an average 3% rise for companies funded by the Regional Arts Boards, with many providing additional funds for companies working in the community or with ethnic groups. In the London Arts Board area the general rise is 4% or over, with dance companies and those working with black and Asian communities likely to receive a little more.
Ipswich's Wolsey Theatre will not have a rep company when it re-opens at the end of the year, the Eastern Arts Board has stated. Instead an artistic director will be appointed who will commission work and then collect together the right cast and crew to present it. The Board has earmarked over £300,000 for the theatre (which representes standstill funding) and it will continue to be co-funded by Suffolk County Council and Ipswich Borough.
The theatre closed last March after major financial problems.
Assembly Rooms may not be open for this year's Fringe
The Assembly Rooms, one of the Edinburgh Fringe's three top venues, may not be open this year after Edinburgh City Council suspended the tendering process. William Burdett Coutts, who has run the venue for many years, reminded the council of an agreement they entered into in 1997 which gives his company the first option to manage the venue for ten years. Up till then it appeared that Scottish International (run by former Famous Grouse House artistic director Hugh Loughlan) was the front-runner to win the tender.
It seems increasingly unlikely that whoever wins the contract will be unable to put together a programme in time to meet the deadline for the press date of the Fringe programme, especially since the council will not meet again on the matter until 24th January, leaving only 13 weeks to the deadline.
Insiders believe that the loss of the Assembly could cost the Fringe Society as mch as £100,000 in lost income.