Pride

The theatre in Britain has always been a matter of pride. We’ve always been proud of the quality and diversity of the theatre, we won’t quite admit it’s nothing compared to the Germans, but we sort of feel like we invented it, and despite the Greeks and all that stuff, since we have Shakespeare, we sort of feel like we do.

In Australia, going to the theatre in a city like Sydney is expensive. Even on a student ticket, you’ll be paying quite a lot of money. It’s the same with London, and New York too. But I slightly despair at the ticketing of events outside the capitals. I was recently invited to a theatre event in Glasgow, I was told the ticket was £3.

Now while on the one hand, it’s wonderful that the ticket is so cheap, on the other hand, the cheap ticket does nothing at all for me, it makes me consider the value of something that is sold for just £3. Don’t we have any pride? Going to the mainstream theatre is still reasonably expensive here, but generally only for touring productions. Local work tends to be a couple of quid, and that intrinsically reflects how we feel about the quality.

Does any other business sell itself so cheaply? £3/£5, you can’t get into the cinema for less than £9 these days. What are we saying about the value of live performance and how we value it?

Where’s our pride? On one hand, if you live in Derry, you’re going to pay £19 to see an amateur musical at the local main theatre, here in Glasgow, you can get away with paying a pittance. I’m not saying that art shouldn’t be accessible, but I am saying it should be value itself differently.