TMA pushes for official role as ACE’s touring policy adviser

Published Thursday 13 December 2007 at 11:00 by Alistair Smith

Theatre producers are calling on Arts Council England to appoint their trade body, the Theatrical Management Association, as an official policy adviser, following the scrapping of ACE’s touring department.

ACE’s recent restructure has led to both the disbanding of its touring department and the exit of head of touring Elizabeth Adlington. Since then, there has been “anxiety” among producers, who feel that the arts council’s current touring strategy is not working, according to TMA president Derek Nicholls.

Nicholls explained: “The reorganisation squeezed out the touring department and now all the project funding for large and mid-scale work comes from Grants for the Arts and is administered by the regional arts council offices. There is no one central to administer it. This means that touring work is bidding against everything that isn’t a regularly funded organisation and the small, tight team of touring officers has not been replicated in each of the regional offices across the country.”

The TMA has already taken over part of ACE’s role in coordinating the various large and mid-scale touring shows and holds regular committee meetings, to which producers, managers and the arts council are invited.

However, the organisation is now calling for it to be appointed to an official key advisory role, to help ACE direct touring funds to where they are most needed.

“There is an increasing concern that we need more product on the large scale - especially drama product. More funded touring product is needed and the theatres need more shows of quality,” Nicholls added. “We’d also like more flexibility around the funding and we’d like a central coordinating role recreated or created in another way.

“What the TMA can’t do is be instrumental in funding decisions, but we think there is a significant advisory role for us. The TMA council has recognised that in this context an advisory role would be beneficial for the industry at this point in time and that is what we are pushing for.”

Edward Snape, producer of tours of shows such as Me and My Girl and the Fimbles, said he supported the TMA’s bid to become more involved with ACE touring policy.

He told The Stage: “My own experience of ACE has been that it tends to be remarkably divorced from and inexperienced in the day to day realities of both subsidised and commercial theatre.

“I think, in particular, in the area of middle to large-scale touring, which works by its very nature in a mixed economy of both commercial and subsidised, ACE has shown a remarkable lack of vision and understanding.

“The British touring circuit has been built from a commercial heritage - the actor-manager who understands that the art of the show matters as much as the business. I think if ACE and TMA could find a way of working more closely together, then our small but vibrant theatre industry could achieve all the more.”

However, ACE director of theatre strategy Barbara Matthews - also a former president of the TMA - said that she believed appointing the TMA as an official adviser would be inappropriate.

She added: “We agree with the TMA that we need to work with touring companies and theatre organisations to build and develop strategies for touring. We continue to meet and have dialogue with all sectors of theatre and these discussions inform future developments.

“It is not appropriate for one organisation to hold the position of adviser, but we value the advice and information that the TMA is able to provide and the readiness that many of their members show to share their expertise.”