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Christmas may seem a long way away, but August is when plans are put in place for the UK's pantomime season - and they are being thrown into chaos by COVID-19.
There is nothing more British than pantomimes, the traditional festive family productions where fairy tales are told with plenty of audience participation.
Now, with concerns about social distancing for the actors and the audience, plus the financial risk of investing in a huge production, this Christmas could be make or break for some theater futures.
“Now is judgement day for pantomimes as we know it this year,” said Steve Bowden, managing director at Imagine Theatre, one of the UK’s main pantomime production houses.
“Scenery, costumes, props are being prepared all year round, but we haven't been able to do that. We could probably still realise a pantomime season if we worked seven days a week, 24 hours a day and had these facilities turning around the work they would normally do over the year in five months.
"But what we really need as commercial producers, and subsidised sectors and venues is to know that there is funding there that will help us through. Not so we can just use our reserves, but so that we can invest in the future."
The Imagine Theatre warehouse in Coventry, is an Aladdin’s cave of theater paraphernalia, crammed with everything you have ever wanted to put on a pantomime.
Except this year, pandemic uncertainty means no-one can be sure the show can go on.
“You need full auditoriums and with social distancing and the measures we are currently being asked to consider it makes it very difficult for the economics to stack up… it seems almost impossible to deliver pantomime as we would want to this year,” said Bowden.
That is why stage sets for fairy tales like Cinderella and Snow White and adventure titles like Aladdin and Jack and the Beanstalk have not been shipped out across the land.
The drawers stuffed with stick on moustaches, crates of sequined slippers, around 200 wacky wigs, 30,000 outlandish costumes and buckets of glitter are instead gathering fairy dust.
The normally buzzing warehouse, full of people from carpenters to prop makers to actors coming in for costume fittings, is quiet and empty. All the staff have been furloughed.
“They are not working, they are all at home. We are updating them as to what is happening and myself and Sarah, my wife and business partner work day-to-day on unravelling this conundrum. I can't think of another way to put it,” Bowden said.
“Unfortunately the harsh reality is that we have to look at savings because we do not know when we will next earn, and our entire income, which runs into millions, is not going to take place this year… we need help so we can keep our creatives in the building, in employment.”
Pantomimes are a traditional part of the British Christmas and new year season, where fairy tales are acted out with mass audience participation. CGTN
A study by Oxford Economics warned that the entire shutdown of arts venues and live events during the COVID-19 crisis could mean 400,000 job losses and $95 billion of lost annual revenue across the sector. They call it a “cultural catastrophe.”
The UK government has set aside $2billion to help the arts, but even the culture secretary admits that won't be enough to save every job.
Plus it still not clear how that pot will be shared between venues, competing art forms or regions.
And it is regional theaters in particular that need pantomime season to survive. The run might only be a few weeks over the festive period, but pantomime and most Christmas shows provide the backbone of theater activity.
25 per cent of our income, our profit, comes from panto
- David Cooper, of Elgiva Theatre
“Twenty five percent of our income, our profit, comes from panto,” said David Cooper, theater director at Elgiva Theatre, in Chesham.
“It is a cornerstone of most theaters' financial planning - ticket sales or secondary spend, bars, merchandise - but more importantly it is the focal point for our audiences. It is the only genre, the only type of production I know, that the whole family comes and gets involved."
That is why producers are looking at alternatives, including outdoor and virtual performances, determined to play to the crowds.
“At the moment we don't know what type of production we are going to be able to put on, because social distancing affected finances. We were doing Snow White, but now we are doing Sleeping Beauty, mainly to get rid of the seven dwarves - social distancing in dressing rooms is a critical factor,” said Cooper.
“We are in continual discussion with our producer with the contingencies, plans within plans within plans, but we will have a panto here. Oh yes we will.”
Oh no, perhaps they won't. And the sad reality is that without the lucrative panto drawing in the crowds, the curtain might fall on some regional theaters for good.
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