Quashing rumours at the Abbey: The Abbey Theatre has announced that Ben Barnes will complete his term as artistic director at the end of next year to take up "international offers in North America and elsewhere", writes Belinda McKeon.
And, according to Barnes, who is currently directing a production of Brian Friel's Translations in Toronto, there's no connection between the timing of the announcement and the rumours of his resignation which have been whipping around arts circles in past weeks. "That's completely unfounded," Barnes insists. "No secret has been made of the fact that there have been financial difficulties in the theatre over the last few years, and that always gives rise to tension, but I have always had a very good working relationship with the board of the theatre."
As to the recent tension surrounding the theatre's postponement of two shows in its centenary programme - Paul Mercier's Smokescreen and Drama at Inish by Lennox Robinson, to be directed by Jim Nolan - Barnes admits it was "unfortunate" that the wording of a statement which he had intended to issue was not agreed with the board before the story went public. Given the contradictory comment on the matter which emerged from Abbey sources contacted last month by Artscape, would it not have been better for Barnes to make a statement before departing for Canada? "We hadn't made a decision to postpone those shows before I left," he responds.
The reasons for the postponement are both logistical and financial, he says; the international touring of The Gigli Concert to Australia and America has taken "quite a lot of the time and resources of the theatre", and adding additional venues to that tour has proven costly. And while the fundraising sub-committee chaired by John McColgan has done "fantastic" work, says Barnes, the fundraising "hasn't moved on as quickly as we would have liked". There is, he says, "a price tag" on an ambitious programme such as abbeyonehundred "and we haven't reached it, but [the shortfall] is not anything in the region of €800,000", a figure which has been mentioned. Is it more than €500,000? "I really would hesitate to put a figure on it." Money is "still coming in", he says, adding that he is "very confident that we will close that gap between now and the year's end".
Intimidation up North
"Arts Council staff have been threatened, screamed at, intimidated and, on rare occasions, physically attacked - often by those who pose as champions of the downtrodden. The arts world has its share of thugs and bullies like everywhere else, but, naïvely, I expected better."
We may think that things are tough in the Republic, but at the Arts Council of Northern Ireland (ACNI), the background of violence and intimidation hasn't gone away, you know, even in terms of certain groups' attitude to acquiring funding. The quote is from Robbie Meredith, former literature and language officer at ACNI, writing in the current issue of Fortnight, the Northern politics, arts and culture magazine, an article headlined "Why I'm Glad I Left The Arts Council".
The piece is a refreshingly frank perspective on working in an Arts Council environment - the pressures of spreading the declining funding too thinly, the constant criticism, the poor pay and the intimidation which led to playing safe in funding decisions in order to avoid "conflict and vitriolic abuse". After a year and a half he left because it "did my head in".
He writes that the council is "too considerate of failure. In my first meeting I listened, open-mouthed, to details of a theatre company which had not paid its actors or stage staff for a production, could provide no clear financial information and had broken every administrative rule in the book." It was given the same grant as in the previous year. "People complain that the Arts Council is too ruthless, but sometimes it isn't half ruthless enough. Some arts organisations piss money up against the wall, achieving absolutely nothing, and yet there is a reluctance to call time."
Dylan's expedition
Dylan Moran may be taking another step towards that great novel we all think is in him. The Black Books co-writer and star opens Inner Voices, a series of character monologues by top comedians on BBC Radio 4, next week with the extraordinary adventures of an Arctic explorer, as recounted in letters home. During the course of the letters, the explorer becomes fixated by a fox that might not exist and decides to cut off his own hand (Wednesday, 11.15 p.m.). Meanwhile, in Comedy Connections on BBC1 television on Tuesday at 11.05 p.m., Graham Linehan, Arthur Mathews, Pauline McLynn, Ardal O'Hanlon and Frank Kelly talk about the creation of Father Ted.
Festivals in flight
We're in high festival season. Earagail is in full flight all over Donegal (www.earagailartsfestival.ie). Galway Arts Festival (www.galwayartsfestival.ie) opens on Monday night with the ambitious festival co-production of Open Source, a dance/performance piece and a particularly strong theatrical line-up, including another festival production of Mark Doherty's first stage play, Trad, and the welcome return of the Macnas parade.
The Kilkenny Festival starts on August 6th, with a programme including a new Performance Corporation show (an interactive detective story wandering the medieval streets of Kilkenny); site-specific work from Cois Céim; an outdoor weekend of Irish popular and classical music in Woodstock Gardens; the première of Daniel Figgis's sound installation, Motor, and a focus on sculpture, including a retrospective of American sculptor Pat Keck, Jim Collins's life-size silhouettes through the city, and interactive events such as Lughaidh O Braonain inscribing graffitti on to acrylic sheets and Barcelona street theatre group OSADIA building "hair sculptures" on volunteers (www.kilkennyarts.ie).
Further down the line the Belfast Festival at Queens (October 22nd to November 7th) is taking shape, and the world première of a work by composer John Tavener is one of its highlights. Tavener's music is inspired by spirituality and mysticism and Hymn of Dawn is "an attempt to bring about a transcendent unity of all religion by the form of a mystical love song". The joint commission between the Ulster Orchestra (UO), Radio France and the St Paul's Chamber Orchestra from the US will be performed by the UO.
The festival theme is "Journeys and Migrations", and includes theatre from Hungary and Canada, dance from Argentina and music from the Sahara Desert. A photographic project, the Northern Bank Family Album, will chart the journeys taken by citizens of Belfast during their lives. There's also a production of South African writer Alan Paton's Cry, The Beloved Country (www.belfastfestival.com).
Opera for virgins
Opera Virgins is a new scheme launched by Opera Theatre Company (OTC) which offers cut-prices to people between 18 and 30 who don't do opera. OTC's artistic director, Annilese Miskimmon, speculated about what they should call their opera virgins after their 18-month membership is up, and invited suggestions. She was speaking at OTC's impressive preview this week of their programme for the rest of the year and early 2005.
First up is a live performance of Pergolesi's Stabat Mater in the spectacular setting of the slate quarry grotto on Valentia Island, Co Kerry (August 19th to 21st), directed by artist Dorothy Cross, who made a film about the preparatory work. In November, OTC tours Vera of Las Vegas, a new jazz-based American opera, a contemporary black comedy described as a "nightmare cabaret-opera", composed by Daron Hagen and with a libretto by Paul Muldoon. Miskimmon directs Vera, which she described as having "more plot twists than Usual Suspects meets The Crying Game". She also directs OTC's particular take on one of the icons of the operatic canon, La Bohème (February to March 2005), from which Emer McNally sang an aria to round off the preview (www.opera.ie).
It's all change at Irish Theatre Magazine. Following the departure of founding managing editor Maura O'Keeffe, the magazine is looking for a general manager to work with editor-in-chief Karen Fricker. Fricker, meanwhile has just begun a six-month sabbatical; the next two issues will be guest edited by Ophelia Byrne. For job details, e-mail info@irishtheatremagazine.ie.
Is it true that the Fringe (celebrating its 10th anniversary) is planning to put the Spiegeltent on a pontoon in the Liffey? www.fringefest.com.