The Stage

Arts troubleshooter to examine Abbey Theatre cash crisis

Published Tuesday 2 November 2004 at 11:25 by Anthony Garvey

A prominent Scottish arts consultant has been appointed to review funding structures at Ireland’s crisis-torn Abbey Theatre, which is facing a deficit of over two million euro this year and threatened job cuts.

Anne Bonnar, a founding director of the National Theatre for Scotland, has been recruited for the task by the Irish Arts Council, which is responsible for funding the Abbey, providing a grant of 4.5m euro for the current year. She has been asked to deliver her recommendations by November 12, an indication of the urgency with which the Council views the situation.

Bonnar has moved to Dublin for meetings with key Abbey staff, including board chairwoman Eithne Healy and artistic director Ben Barnes. She was chosen for the job from a panel of seven Irish and British consultants, mainly because of her experience and track record.

A former general manager of Edinburgh’s Traverse Theatre, she is currently director of Bonnar Keenlyside, the arts management consultancy she co-founded more than a decade ago and which offers advice and expertise to theatre groups and festivals in the UK and Ireland. She has also worked at the Citizens’ Theatre, Riverside Studios, Almeida and the Young Vic.

The long simmering crisis at the Abbey, fuelled by inadequate state funding, could hardly have reached boiling point at a worse time, in the middle of the theatre’s centenary celebrations. Ironically, the centenary celebration programme added to the financial strains, with some shows having to be cancelled and a third of the 90 strong Abbey staff told they were being made redundant.

One of Bonnar’s tasks will be to review a report on the crisis prepared by an 11-member working group set up last month after an emergency meeting of the Abbey board. It has made some 20 recommendations, including a management shake-up, the establishment of a new consultative forum involving all interests at the theatre and talks with the arts council and government on long-term funding.

It acknowledges that the Abbey’s financial situation is “very serious” and says management and staff must recognise the need to reduce costs. But it recommends that “the threat of widespread job losses” be removed, with the number of core theatre staff reverting to last year’s level of 77. That would mean a loss of 14 temporary staff when their contracts expire.

The report also notes that artistic director Barnes is due to leave at the end of next year, following a five year term and recommends that the search for his successor should start now.

Meanwhile, the Arts Council has applied for state funding of 68 million euro for next year. Council director Mark Cloake said: “With that figure, we feel we will be able to respond to the Abbey and to the needs of other organisations.”