Oscar contenders protest threatened cuts to theatre funding

Published Thursday 15 February 2007 at 15:15 by Alistair Smith

Four of Britain’s Oscar hopefuls have spoken out against feared cuts to theatre funding, warning the UK film industry would not be where it is without a healthy subsidised theatre sector.

Actresses Judi Dench and Helen Mirren, director Stephen Frears and writer Patrick Marber have stressed that the current success enjoyed by UK films and performers in Hollywood would not be possible without a healthy theatre scene, which is currently faced with the threat of reduced funding at the next Comprehensive Spending Review.

As revealed in this week’s Stage, Arts Council England has been told to prepare scenarios for cuts to funding from government, sparking fears that the arts will suffer at the next spending round, which is to be announced later this year.

Mirren, who is tipped as a favourite for the Best Actress Oscar for her role in The Queen, said: “The huge success of recent British films like The Queen would not have been possible without the many wonderful actors who have become as good as they are through long experience in the theatre… The British subsidised theatre is admired and envied throughout the world and our film industry needs it.”

Meanwhile Frears questioned how the government could consider cutting cash when previous support for the arts had “paid off so handsomely”, grooming performers such as Mirren and Dench and writers such as Marber.

Dench commented: “Our theatre is envied and respected by almost every country worldwide and we are only in this position because of the subsidy we receive. Our theatre is responsible for so much of the high quality of British film acting, which has been recognised by all the award nominations our actors have received this year and which is part of the enormous success of the British film industry. Being trained in the theatre is a necessity. The health of our film industry depends on the health of our theatre.”

Marber added that without an opportunity to develop his own writing at the National Theatre Studio it would have been unlikely that he would now be writing films. He warned that it would be a “huge blow” if lowered subsidy meant that young writers could not develop and take risks. “Receiving an Academy nomination for screenwriting is an honour and I’m thrilled to be part of this year’s British success story,” he said. “But I owe it all to the years I spent learning and developing as a writer in the subsidised theatre.”