Producing Houses
The two main producing houses in the region are Northern Stage and Live Theatre, both in Newcastle, and while both have maintained the quality of their productions, the quantity has declined. It's the same for every theatre in the region and the reason is simple—funding.
Most theatres have, as always, produced a panto or special Christmas show because, apart from anything else, these tend to be big money-earners. Some, such as the Gala in Durham and the Customs House in South Shields, produce their own whilst others use panto production companies, including Qdos at Newcastle Theatre Royal and Darlington Civic, Blue Genie Entertainment at the Playhouse Whitley Bay, UK Productions at Sunderland Empire and the Newcastle Pantomime Company at the Mill Volvo Tyne Theatre.
Some even produce two Christmas shows: Northern Stage had its show for the under-6s, Tallest Tales from the Tallest Forest, and the "family" show, Dark Woods, Deep Snow, whilst the Customs House had the traditional panto Cinderella and, for the under-6s, its co-production with Made4Stage, Santa's Naughty Elf.
With at least one panto/Christmas show in every town or city (not forgetting, of course, the numerous amateur pantos), theatre-goers in the region were well served over Christmas, but throughout the year it was a different matter.
Live Theatre presented the most: White Rabbit, Red Rabbit in February, Captain Amazing in April, its promenade celebration of its 40th anniversary, Live Witness, and co-production Brilliant Adventures in May, two new plays, Michael Chaplin's Tyne in July (part of the Festival of the North East 2013) and Paddy Campbell's Wet House, in September, and finally a revival of Lee Hall's Cooking with Elvis in October.
The theatre also presented a number of readings of works in progress by local writers and a fine collection of short plays by 3/14 year olds, performed by professional actors, Between the Lines, in December.
Northern Stage was between directors for much of the year, after Erica Whyman departed for a new post at the RSC and before Lorne Campbell arrived. There was only one major production before the Christmas season, an excellent revival of Dennis Potter's Blue Remembered Hills which went on a national tour.
A Wondrous Place (June) was a co-production with the Royal Exchange in Manchester, Sheffield Theatres and Liverpool's Unity Theatre of short plays with a sense of place and northern-ness and The Man Who Thought the Moon Would Fall Out of the Sky (March) was an unusual piece by North, a company set up by the theatre and made up of recent acting graduates to give them an opportunity to experience taking part in (and helping to devise) a full-scale theatre piece. In the last few days the theatre has announced the members of the 2014 company.
Another co-production was The Noise by Clare Duffy, Jon Spooner and Chris Thorpe, presented by Unlimited Theatre with Northern Stage and Warwick Arts Centre. Co-productions, once unusual, are now very common and a regrettable sign of our straitened theatrical times.
For the second year running Northern Stage ran its own venue at the Edinburgh Fringe, St Stephen's, showcasing companies from all over the north, and ran its regular scratch night, First in Three, throughout the year. For part of the time it also acted as a receiving house (as in fact did Live), bringing in interesting productions from elsewhere and, in part, filling the contemporary dance gap left by the Theatre Royal.
The only other theatres to produce their own work were ARC Stockton and the Customs House in South Shields. ARC tends to specialise in spoken word performances, many developed through the Bridging the Gap scheme, and the Customs House produced one community (professional creative team and amateur actors) production, I {Heart} ST, which I wrote and directed and so shall say no more about, one co-production, By the Pricking of My Thumbs, a compilation of extracts showing evil and the supernatural in Shakespeare, and one new play by local writer and Customs House favourite Tom Kelly, I Love Kent Walton, a one-man show based on the life of a former professional wrestler from the town.
There were, however, a lot of small-scale productions right across the region, but particularly on Tyneside, and that is the subject of the next page of this review.