Clash of professional and amateur – 75 years ago in The Stage

This week, 75 years ago, The Stage reflected on a clash between professional and amateur theatre companies.

“This question of status – professional and amateur – is eternally cropping up,” we reported. “We are reminded each time that the theatre is at once an art and an industry, but entirely different from other arts and industries. As an art, it demands labour untold, passionate devotion and, sometimes, the absorption of priceless genius. As an industry, in this country it involves some 60,000 men and women. A large proportion of these can claim a living wage as being engaged in uncreative but necessary work. The minority, being trained and talented artists, are naturally entitled to their share of the proceeds, though the professional quality goes far deeper than a salary list.

“It is for the good of the theatre and quite apart from financial considerations that emphasis upon the professional status is specially called for just now. Our stage is attracting a huge new public. Meanwhile, the amateur – in the sense of a less efficient and unpaid part-timer – is encroaching upon the small number of theatres available. This is particularly so in the new civic theatres.

“One of these, as we recently recorded, is let for the entire season to local amateur societies, thus keeping out professional companies. The playgoer, we read, is misled in paying for admission to an entertainment that he thought was to be given by professional players.”

For more from The Stage Archive, visit thestage.co.uk/archive-virtual