Making a living: how should theatre artists be paid?

JD Broussé, known as JD, is a circus-maker who has lived in the UK and worked with companies including Barely Methodical Troupe and Superfan, and made his own solo work including the much-praised (le) Pain. But he’s now moved back to his native France, and so has perspective on how both systems operate.

Under the French system, JD needs to work 43 days a year as an artist to qualify for a scheme that then pays artists who are not working at a daily rate – dependent on how much they have earned during the year. Artists never get less than minimum pay and in JD’s case, he is currently on 69 euros a day; not a fortune but enough to live on and provide stability. Mortgage lenders even recognise it in their calculations when deciding what they might lend you, and the scheme also includes holiday pay and pension contributions.

‘In France, I think of myself as an artist – when I was in London I didn’t, as I couldn’t afford to’ – JD Broussé, circus-maker

“It has changed my mindset around work,” says JD. “When I lived in London and I wasn’t making circus, I’d get shifts working in a pub so I could pay my rent and eat. But here in France, because I know I will be getting that money every day, it makes me more creative. If I have no paid circus work, instead of taking on bar jobs, I am making work with other artists in the same position, putting on cabaret nights and trying out stuff.” He can take the creative risk because the 69 euros means he doesn’t have to scrabble around for work just to live. “It has really changed how I feel about myself. I think of myself as an artist. That’s my job. But when I was in London I didn’t, because I couldn’t afford to. In France I can use that time to make sure I keep developing as an artist.”

JD’s experience chimes with research that suggests that if you support people either through schemes such as the one that operates in France or UBI, contrary to dissenters’ expectations, the recipients don’t spend all day sitting on the sofa in their pyjamas eating crisps and watching Netflix; instead the stability and peace of mind and often improved mental health is a spur that makes people more creative and more productive.

Most theatremakers are driven by the desire to make theatre, but many never achieve their potential because they are struggling to make ends meet. They are too burned out to make the projects they want to make, projects that might make a crucial difference in their local community or become an international hit like The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. Somewhere in the UK, the next potential Simon McBurney or Katie Mitchell is putting in seven shifts a week in a bar rather than making theatre.

JD says that in France, artists are valued and with that value comes status, “but in the UK, not so much. It is much easier to be an artist in France”. But he’s not starry-eyed about the French system, saying that it is hugely bureaucratic, can be complicated to negotiate and on occasion encourages doubtful employment practices.

“Because employers know that provided you are being paid for the 43 days you will be able to access the government support, it means that artists are often asked how many days work they need for that to kick in,” JD says. “So often they end up working for days on projects but are not paid for all those days.”

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Potential pitfalls

Equity’s Fleming thinks that is a potential pitfall around UBI, too, if employers start thinking that because an artist – or indeed anyone – is getting support from the state, then they as employers can pay them less.

“At Equity, over the past 15 years we have had real success in cracking down on the worst of those exploitative practices that artists face,” says Fleming. “And it worries me that the reason some big employers are in favour of UBI is because it allows them to pay their staff badly.” He thinks there is a place for schemes like UBI and the one in France and other parts of Europe, but argues that employers will still need to be held to account and challenged if they think such initiatives absolve them from paying people properly.

So could there be other and maybe more immediate ways in which those who make theatre can have more 

Strike a Light’s LABA scheme demonstrates, knowing you are going to have a stable income for a fixed period can be career transforming. But while the artists involved in LABA are paid at the same rate as those on staff, their employment is for a fixed period, not until they make the decision to leave.

But what might happen if more theatre buildings and companies had more artists and actors on their payroll for longer periods or permanently? How might that stability affect not just those employed, but also the organisation itself? In 1999, Hamish Glen, then artistic director of Dundee Rep, did something radical – he decided to employ a full-time ensemble of 11 actors, initially on three-year contracts – to make all the work of the company. Twenty-five years on, three of those original actors are still at Dundee Rep.

“Of course, back in 1999 there was a level of funding that we can only dream of now,” says the current artistic director and joint chief executive Andrew Panton, who has inherited these three core members. He values having them at the heart of the organisation and totally gets the argument of having more artists on payrolls, and not just actors: “Why not associate directors and designers, too?” But would he want an 11-strong ensemble like there was back in 1999?

‘We need to be able to breathe and evolve in our working practices’ – Andrew Panton, artistic director and joint chief executive, Dundee Rep

“It’s about what is right for the times. Back in 1999 there was less conversation than there is now about serving the sector, giving freelance performers and creatives opportunities and spreading the work around in a way we couldn’t do if we had a large full-time ensemble. What we have is a blended way of working with a small core ensemble who are paid every week of the year and have all the benefits that go with that, and we have associates coming in and out on a more conventional project-by-project basis. We need to be able to breathe and evolve in our working practices a bit more than when the ensemble model was first conceived in 1999. But I’d also like to be able to push the blended model further so it’s not either a permanent ensemble or associates who are employed on a freelance basis but something in between, with people with us for longer contracts. But to do that, our funding would have to significantly increase.”

Obviously, for the three original ensemble actors who remain – all women – there is the stability of long-term employment, but what are the benefits to Dundee Rep?

“A lot,” says Panton. “They have all the benefits that freelance artists don’t always have access to, and they have access to knowledge that places them at the heart of the organisation.” The knowledge is a two-way street: the ensemble actors are privy to all the information that the theatre shares with its other employees, but they also bring a knowledge that has been accrued over 25 years about the organisation, about programming and, perhaps most crucially, about the Rep’s local audience. “People stop them in the street and want to talk to them because they recognise them. That direct line between the theatre and its community is invaluable,” says Panton.

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Creativity and community

Helen Eastman, artistic director and chief executive of Oxford’s Creation Theatre, agrees. When she took over the running of the company, her predecessor Lucy Askew had already done some research with universities around how to make things better for artists working in theatre, resulting in the creation of a permanent ensemble, initially consisting of six people but now four after two moved on to take up other opportunities.

“People don’t think of actors as being the creative engine of a theatre organisation, but for us they are,” says Eastman, who argues that there is “a kindness around this model, because it is a model in which theatre looks after people and treats them like family”. She adds: “Theatre spent so much time talking about building back better during the pandemic but maybe what we should have been talking about was how we could do things differently.”

‘People don’t think of actors as being the creative engine of a theatre organisation, but for us they are’ – Helen Eastman, artistic director and chief executive, Creation Theatre

She points to the fact that many mid-career actors and artists leave the profession, taking all their expertise with them, when they want to get a mortgage or have a child. “This makes those things possible for them. In the current climate when it is so very tough to be a freelancer, going back to some kind of rep system shouldn’t be seen as retro but as a different way of working that fits the times.” But isn’t having actors on the payroll more expensive?

“Our payroll is high,” admits Eastman, “but after 30 years in Oxford, Creation, which doesn’t have any subsidy, has audience loyalty and that means we know that each show will sell a certain number of tickets, and that helps. But there are so many benefits for the company and for the actors. It makes them better actors because they are using and developing their skills every day, because they are rehearsing and acting almost every day. Most actors only work a few weeks of the year with long gaps in between.”

Like Panton, Eastman would like to extend the idea of full-time employment to other theatre freelancers. “In an ideal world, in two years’ time, we will also have a stage manager on the payroll and an associate director, too.” She reckons that if Creation can do what it is doing without subsidy, then far bigger funded organisations could also do it. “I am not saying it is easy. You need the board on side, and higher payrolls make boards nervous. But Creation is showing it can be done, so why not others? Theatre can be very fixed in its ideas of what its models should look like. This is a different model.”

Equity’s Fleming would like to see more theatres adopting the idea, too, arguing that it’s time that theatre curbs its desire “to treat the actor as a pure commodity within the process because stability and better art go together. I don’t understand why ACE is not talking to key institutions about this. I genuinely believe that more stability in the industry and a more stable workforce could transform the economic prospects for the whole country.”