Academic research backed up the real-life experience of Irish theatremakers. In general, the more funding an organisation received, the lower the female presence in the work. Significant gender pay disparities were revealed.
Focussing on ten of the top (Irish) Arts Council-funded organisations that produced or presented theatre in Ireland, research found that between 2006 and 2015 women who make up a little over 50% of the Irish population were less visible in
- 42% of cast/actors
- 40% of set designers
- 37% of directors
- 34% of lighting designers
- 28% of authors/playwrights
- 9% of sound designers.
In contrast, 79% of costume designers were women.
There’s evidence that some progress was made in addressing the imbalances in the years that followed. The act of measuring or observing sometime can often changes behaviour: the Hawthorne effect.
In the five years that followed, there was more than a doubling of female representation of directors (20% to 46%) and writers (17% to 34%) at the Abbey Theatre. However, male actors continued to outnumber female actors cast in productions despite 57% of students at the Lir Academy being female (2016-2020).
The situation in Northern Ireland largely mirrors what was, and is still, happening south of the border. The inaugural Front & Centre symposium ran in Belfast in May 2025, hosted in QUB’s Brian Friel Theatre, shining a spotlight on new ways of collaborating and creating space for female and non-binary playwriting in Northern Ireland.
A series of panels and workshops explored statistics, drivers, barriers and opportunities, with rehearsed readings bringing work to life in different stages of development.
Statistics from Thrive (NI’s research and evaluate organisation for arts and heritage) pointed out big differences in how north-west communities consume their arts. In short: less often, but spending more when they do, and often as a whole family experience rather than solo or couple attendance.
Patterns of last-minute bookings (a practice that can lead to touring shows cancelling shows due to low sales) were said to be reflective of the precarity of people’s employment (uncertain rotas, needing to keep available for work, lower regional wages) that then cause precarity in the cultural sector.
Gemma reiterated that audiences were all around and the work – not necessarily labelled as ‘theatre’ – can find people where they live. Less traditional spaces can support all kinds of work. Soso pointed to the loyalty of disability audiences and the foolishness of relying on mainstreaming to adequately capture the need and demand for work in their sectors.
Going out needed to be guaranteed to be fun. Theatre might need to see itself as the pre-drinks for a long evening of entertainment. For many, being asked to sit in the dark and face one direction (towards a stage) for two or three hours cab be both ableist and alienating.
A fascinating discussion emerged about what a matriarchal model would look like in the cultural space. Answers included that it would be built for community, and be reciprocal in terms of how audiences, creatives and venues all benefitted. There was also mention of subscription models and the need to bundle multiple activities together: theatre could come with yoga classes and vice versa.
Friday’s programme finished with two rehearsed readings.
Unintentionally – unless Verlaque was being devilish! – some of the dialogue screams into the Front & Centre narrative as much as into the sporting story where obstacles need to be tackled despite little money and a lack of media interest.
“It’s hard to put up a fight when no one knows you’re there.”
“Limited resources mean hard choices”
The rehearsed reading finished with a Orla Mullan bursting into song, throwing a whole new light on Verlaque’s ambition for Dangerous Play that feels like it can comfortably sit as a contemporary companion that doesn’t compete with Tara Lynne O’Neill’s 2021 Rough Girls.
Poached by Alice Malseed and Catherine Rees was a read through of what felt like a pretty finished script. A prime ministerial figure steps up to announce plans to control conception as part of a new Population Limitation policy. A ‘child consideration’ process will vet mothers. Maud (read by Rees) doesn’t score well when the state inquisitors (read by Shannen McNeice and Malseed) pose their pointed questions. Other coworkers (including those read by Orla Graham and Vicky Allen) suggest ways of gaming the system.
The satire is rich yet beautifully understated. Women alone are judged for their suitability to conceive and bring up a child. Children have become a value-laden commodity in The Great Egg Race (without Heinz Wolff and his mad 1980’s contraptions). The state stretches its hands into career paths while holding eggs as ransom. Despite being a rehearsed reading, Vicky Allen’s eyes lit up as she morphed into a new evil cyber genius who might have a way to beat the system without scrambling the conception opportunities for the women of Northern Ireland.
Thanks to Karis Kelly for the opportunity to attend Friday’s Front & Centre. If my work schedule had been different this weekend, I’d have stayed in Derry to see Carley Magee’s Growing Pains on Saturday evening (20:30), and take in the always mind-blowing scratch performances (Sunday 14:30) and the extract reading of the hotly anticipated Hello Charlie by Caoimhe Farren (Sunday 19:30). Tickets available for the workshops and performances on The Playhouse website.
Some quick reflections …
With funding levels that are so far below England, Scotland, Wales and Republic of Ireland, every area of the sector has been living under sustained pressure for more than a decade. Producers can only take so many risks. Venues need bums on seats (and drinks bought in bars) to keep the lights on. Creative decisions are clearly compromised. The familiar is rehashed. The reliable is dusted off and needs to be a blazing success in order to cover any loss-leading work that is commissioned. No matter your gender, (dis)ability or sexuality, it’s hard to get new work developed and staged. That it took five years for the award-winning script Consumed by Lyric writer-in-residence Karis Kelly (and one of the driving forces behind Front & Centre) to make it onto a Belfast stage is staggering. And her experience is just one of many.
A drive up to Derry is always worthwhile. There’s a directness that imparts local wisdom in a way that lands and doesn’t skirt around sensibilities. The nuances of audiences in the north west also speak into my stomping ground around greater Belfast.
Taking theatre into unconventional venues is already quite common in west Belfast. I’ve learned the way up to The Roddy’s on the Glen Road, most recently to see Julie (which brings to life a piece of local history in a way that connects with so many in the local audience). But to hear this weekend that Gina Donnelly’s play Anthem for Dissatisfaction – which premiered up in The Roddy’s – is being the funded (on the back of being scouted at Edinburgh Fringe Festival) to tour internationally is amazing news. Vibrant work telling stories that are both universal but also deeply rooted in this place. Pray for the subtitler!
Staging The People’s Panto in the acoustically harsh and wingless-staged St Comgall’s community space is a technical challenge for the team at Brassneck. But the quality of Neil Keery’s scripts, the committed performances, direction that neatly works around the venue’s limitations, and the rock bottom £10 ticket price means it deserves to be packed out with every seat sold.
Talk of a subscription model for theatre isn’t totally without precedent. The Grand Opera House (Bronze/Silver/Gold/Platinum) and the Lyric Theatre (Ensemble/Players/Principals/Directors Circle) membership tiers swap up-front payment for 2-for-1 tickets, discounts and advance booking (GOH only). The stream of familiar faces I recognise when reviewing shows on opening nights suggests that the schemes are well supported.
Away from theatre, Queen’s Film Theatre’s membership scheme offers a number of free tickets, discounts and loyalty points). Omniplex Cinemas’ MyOmniPass a free ticket for every movie being screened in exchange for a monthly membership fee. Though due to the seemingly inevitable creeping process of enshittification – my interview with the term’s creator Cory Doctorow at last year’s Imagine! Festival can still be viewed online – a monthly price rise was soon followed by seats being restricted to the rows where you’d prefer not to sit.
The bundling of different leisure activities would work better if existing arts organisations didn’t already have distinct physical footprints. There’s a parallel universe in which the Lyric’s theatre and rehearsal spaces together with MAC’s gallery, social and event spaces were collocated with the Crescent Arts’ thriving programme of courses and workshops. Though there’s nothing to stop a golden ticket scheme being run across multiple commercial venues or multiple producers.
Outside of Belfast, councils own and operate the majority of the main traditional regional theatre spaces. (There are some significant exceptions.) This has merits (closeness to the funder) and demerits (risk-averse and can become very inflexible). Amateur dramatic societies continue to thrive in some areas. There are almost too many youth theatre programmes to count, each creating a niche for itself with passionate freelancers delivering training and encouragement week after week for little financial reward.
The opportunities for getting new work in front of an audience are very limited. Belfast Playwrights’ 10-Minute Play festival fills a gap left by the old Pick’n’Mix festival. The new writing rehearsed readings have vanished from recent Belfast International Arts Festival programmes. Dramaturgs and literary managers no longer seem to be employed by theatres. Accidental Theatre’s 24-hour scratch play events haven’t run for a while. Though check out Amadan Ensemble’s evening of Quickfire Plays on Saturday 28 March as part of Imagine! Festival.
Other than stand-up comedy, only a minority of small-to-medium sized work staged in Belfast seems to tour around the rest of Northern Ireland. The big productions about Derry don’t tour to Belfast. The exchange of work between Belfast, Derry and Dublin is shockingly small. (The poor public transport links between the cities also prevent popping up or down to another city to see a show and get home the same day despite the relatatively short distances involved.)
There’s no single silver bullet. And the sector’s structural challenges quickly distract (me) from Front & Centre desire to see an even playing field that makes space for a range of voices in front of and behind the scenes … no matter the traditional/untraditional venue or whether the artistic event is sold as theatre or a jolly good time.
But it does seem that trying to make work that is more accessible, more transportable, and faster to restage when opportunities arise will benefit some theatremakers and expand audiences.
Writing new work that reflects the existential issues of today/tomorrow (and situations from the past) can appeal to audiences. Seeing yourself or your ancestors on stage is powerful. Holding truth to power on a stage can be as effective as writing a consultation response to an Assembly committee or an Executive department. There should always be room for great entertainment. But what is funny and gripping can also contain a sense of questioning and challenge.
Structurally, Northern Ireland needs
- a mix of differently sized (and differently heated) rehearsal spaces;
- small-medium-large performance spaces, some based in bars and old churches, and some without the word theatre anywhere to be seen;
- pathways to try out work in smaller venues and allow successful productions to switch to larger stages (while other shows may go back to the drawing board);
- ways of finding accommodation to support touring productions;
- organisations willing to commission new work with a financial cushion to live with the occasional failure;
- a lot more opportunities for new work to be read, developed and rehearsed.xxxz
Front & Centre will hopefully return. It needs to. The structural challenges are not going to disappear without a sustained push. Other arts/cultuzal campaigns over the next year may be able to pick up on F&C’s statistics that can show low funding levels in NI are disadvantaging vital voices.
Improving opportunities for the groups targeted by Front & Centre will benefit the whole sector. Counting the number of people in categories will change the sector. Listening to different regional voices also challenges easy thinking. I want to find out what happens in the football match after Amanda Verlaque’s cliff hanger.
I want to see how the satirical look at government poached eggs can be refined and sharpen further its great concepts. But I’d also love to see Vittoria Caffola’s Bloodlines (who could forget the tale of a vegetarian butcher needing an injection of high quality sperm into her ovaries and her lesbian sister studying genetics set against the 1911 Belfast Eugenics Society!) get a full production along with so many more rehearsed readings and excepts that have stuck in my mind over the years. And pray that someone puts Abbie Spallen on stage performing her play Strandline in a Northern Ireland theatre.
No comments:
Post a Comment