Fame Academy would put King’s centre stage

Published on Friday 7 March 2008 08:15

Landmark theatre needs a long-term survival plan, says Rami Okasha

SINCE we launched the Save The King’s campaign late last year, I haven’t met a single person who wants the theatre to close. Stanley Baxter, backing the campaign, has told the Evening News about his happy memories of delighting city audiences.

The King’s needs two things: immediate safety work, and a long-term vision. Any plans to sell off the theatre would be incredibly short-sighted. The city bought the King’s in 1965 to save it for its citizens and I am pretty sure that wasn’t meant to be a temporary measure.

In the past ten weeks, more than 4000 people have signed the Save the King’s petition. Councillors have been lobbied, motions have been raised in parliament and MSPs begged ministers to intervene over the threatened closure. But the campaigning paid off when all the political parties in the council voted to invest an extra 6 million in the theatre over the next three years.

That money – which just weeks earlier was said to be impossible to find – will fund safety work. We know that the ventilation system needs work and the council has known about it for months. Sanitation and fire escapes need attention, and the decor is below scratch.

But the second issue – the long-term redevelopment of the theatre – is the most exciting. The theatre wants to join forces with city schools, colleges, universities and community groups to provide hands-on training backstage and onstage.

It will take somewhere in the region of double the money pledged to completely renovate the building. The Scottish Arts Council and lottery funds are obvious partners to save this most historic of Edinburgh’s theatres.

Selling off the theatre would shatter the plan to turn the King’s into Scotland’s own Fame Academy. Imagine pupils from city schools being in the King’s, learning about lighting, music, sound, production, directing, marketing, art and design and other performing technologies.

There is growing support for a training academy where people gain skills in performing arts and technologies. The success of London’s Brit School, sponsored by the music industry, shows how serious publicly-owned performing arts colleges produce serious young talent. Nobody should say Edinburgh cannot do it too. Because the King’s only hosts shows for six months, it is ideal for a training academy.

Selling the building to a company which wants to make a fast buck would slam the door on these dreams: training doesn’t make money for shareholders. When Jenny Dawe said refurbishing the King’s was a top priority, I don’t think anyone thought selling it was what she had in mind.

Andrew Carnegie laid the foundation stone of the King’s in 1906 because he had a vision that public institutions should be properly funded. Perhaps Jenny Dawe could learn from him.

&#149 Rami Okasha is co-ordinator of www.savethekings.org.uk.