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Post by Deleted on Dec 13, 2017 16:56:20 GMT
An upper-middle class theatre in one of the richest parts of the world silences a working class Northern woman writer's voice because they're uncomfortable and embarrassed about their own history with a man - now very old - doing what he did there, apparently unchallenged, in his heyday. Dunbar's work is honest and she was a victim of the lifestyle it portrays. Portrays, not celebrates (the film has a happier ending, btw). I saw it before the revelations came out but I can't imagine these revelations were 'news' to those within the industry. Before we took our seats, we'd been discussing the issues in it because one of the women I was seeing it with works in social services and liaises with police over grooming and child exploitation in the same areas Dunbar knew. It was a strong production and we all enjoyed it. How would I have felt seeing it now? I don't know, but I think cancelling is the wrong decision, especially given the wording of the theatre's statement which comes across as an attack on the play itself.
Is it a class or gender thing?
I would have liked to have seen it. I think they shouldn't have cancelled it, but I understand why they did what they did and I am reluctant to have a massive go, esp as there may be other issues behind the scenes informing it
I would rather they told us those reasons And were transparent They are quick enough to open their gobs to ask for money |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 13, 2017 17:06:03 GMT
Some slight overreactions here methinks. Resolving to never again go to a theatre you've never even been to once? Writing off the entire country as pathetic because of the decision of one comparatively small theatre? Never let it be said theatre fans don't have a flair for the dramatic! The Royal Court also have just announced this, coincidentally on the day I had originally booked for. Might not smooth over all your bleeding wounds, but I think it sounds interesting anyway: royalcourttheatre.com/whats-on/the-andrea-project/ |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 13, 2017 17:23:39 GMT
I would have liked to have seen it. I think they shouldn't have cancelled it, but I understand why they did what they did and I am reluctant to have a massive go, esp as there may be other issues behind the scenes informing it
Anyone know how it was selling...? I'm imagining not very well. I think that resorting to pulling the run of the production is a monumental f***-up on so many levels. It smacks of a fear of not being able to make a satisfying counter-argument against those who might criticise the Royal Court for staging a play featuring sexual grooming in a production directly linked to Max Stafford-Clark. They could have run all sorts of events and talks alongside the play - to look at the issues in the play, to talk about how culture depicts issues like grooming, to delineate how a play can be about something without it being for something - but they have instead reduced the play and the production to being contaminated. They don't wan that stench anywhere near them so they've turfed the production out. I worry that the Royal Court - particularly under Vicky Featherstone - only wants to be on the right side of any argument. As soon as the tide starts to show any sign of turning then everybody needs to get out of the water. |
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Post by jadnoop on Dec 13, 2017 17:29:09 GMT
Some slight overreactions here methinks. Resolving to never again go to a theatre you've never even been to once? Writing off the entire country as pathetic because of the decision of one comparatively small theatre? Never let it be said theatre fans don't have a flair for the dramatic! The Royal Court also have just announced this, coincidentally on the day I had originally booked for. Might not smooth over all your bleeding wounds, but I think it sounds interesting anyway: royalcourttheatre.com/whats-on/the-andrea-project/I completely agree. As I mentioned elsewhere, I do think that there's a problem with the arts trying to actively remove certain topics that represent unpleasant aspects of human behaviour. However, IMO that's not really what's going on here; it's a change of programming reflective of the fact that theatre as an artform is still reeling from these specific issues. Naturally, we don't know the full story, but based on the information that has been publicised, it sounds like they are understandably weighing up whether putting this show on *in the current climate* is the right thing to do, especially given the aims of the theatre. This is hardly equivalent to 'silencing' the playwright and IMO making big leaps like this isn't particularly helpful. The reality surely is that, as with everything in life, there's a greyscale to all of this and each of us would draw the line somewhere. You might feel that this was wrong but perhaps a slightly different set of circumstances might be different for you; if, say, they had planned to put on a production connected strongly to Harvey Weinstein(?) or whatever. To illustrate this; to my memory there have been a few recent threads on this forum about violent plays being put on around the time of recent terrorist attacks in the UK, and whether those were appropriate to be performed. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 13, 2017 17:30:20 GMT
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Post by crowblack on Dec 13, 2017 17:31:20 GMT
This play would always have been an uncomfortable watch, surrounded by a Sloane Square audience. But they are precisely the sort of mollycoddled people who should see it. I watch a sitcom like Motherland, where getting the hairdo for a book launch ruined by a children's pool party is compared to a war zone, and it really brings home the huge gulf between the life experiences of those whose voices dominate the media and politics and those who really need help and understanding but have instead been abandoned and ignored for generations. Instead, they're turning the play into a battleground for the theatre's own internal mistakes in not tackling abuses they should have tackled within their ranks years ago but are now doing posthumously. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 13, 2017 17:53:55 GMT
Likely that Out of Joint would like to have pulled the tour but financially it would affect them badly. I was thinking of going in Huddersfield but I don't have the heart to see it now.
Why is it likely that Out of Joint would like that? M S-C left OoJ weeks before the start of the tour, which is presumably why the new AD stepped in to direct it. So the direction must have been done in the context of the M S-C business. Most of the tour has been to places that share the culture of the play. The audience of the Royal Court leg would have been an anomaly. I'd booked to see it there as a convenient venue but I'd have preferred to see it with a more natural audience, at most of the other tour venues. I think the audience should empathise with the girls. Think of Parsley's comments about Road! This play would always have been an uncomfortable watch, surrounded by a Sloane Square audience. I agree with you about the RC audience but this, of all Stafford Clark’s previous successes, is one that raises questions about the company and how he operated within it. To have it touring now is a constant reminder of that, where other plays might not have been. |
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Post by wiggymess on Dec 13, 2017 23:03:35 GMT
I own the play but haven't read it yet.
I have to say I'm very surprised that it has been cancelled, only because I had always assumed it was a play about grooming rather than one that glamourises it. Is that not the case then?
Seems bizarre to have tarred this play with the general zeitgeist brush, when it could have triggered important discussions.
Although, there may be more at play here with regards to, as others have suggested, the actual original putting together of the play / how Dunbar was treated herself, but that's all pure speculation.
I respect and applaud the way the RC has dealt with the ongoing issues and how they have put themselves forward as an important, historical cultural institution that is willing to take a stand and try to affect real change, but this specific cancellation does seem odd to me.
Missed opportunity I think.
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Post by samuelwhiskers on Dec 13, 2017 23:13:41 GMT
I'm sorry but crying because a theatre pulls a show is the very definition of snowflake.
A good friend of mine is involved in the Andrea project and it looks to be something special.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 13, 2017 23:38:11 GMT
I'm sorry but crying because a theatre pulls a show is the very definition of snowflake. A good friend of mine is involved in the Andrea project and it looks to be something special. Who's crying? It's all well and good to produce 8 new voices and call this the Andrea project, but it is NOT Andrea's voice. To excise this play is to whitewash part of the Royal Court's history. M S-C was a very hands-on director (excuse the pun). He worked very closely with all the writers he encouraged and played a huge role in the development and direction of those plays. Are they now going to ban all the plays he was involved with including Top Girls and Our Country's Good? Are those plays tainted too and if not why not? Because they are not about underage sex? Plays at the Royal Court should make us feel uneasy and leave us asking questions. At the moment the plays at the RC have me asking all the wrong questions e.g. what the hell was that all about? Historically, the Royal Court has worked hard to avoid censorship, so I think they are on very dodgy ground here. Dunbar wrote the plays she wanted to and they should be honoured. They should be produced at the Royal Court which is the theatre that discovered her when she was a schoolgirl. By all accounts becoming an award winning writer was one of the most important and significant things that happened to her. How many working class writers are produced at the RC? Not many. You can probably count them on one hand without running out of fingers. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 13, 2017 23:43:51 GMT
I am so upset I could cry |
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Post by lynette on Dec 14, 2017 0:00:25 GMT
Are they not putting on the play because of its subject matter or because of accusations against someone associated with the company putting it on? Methinks the lady doth protest too much. Ben Jonson got away with murder literally so we shouldn’t expect any of his work to be staged from now on. And all plays written before last week are probably dodgy. My reasoning is as muddled as theirs isn’t it. Geddit?
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Post by lonlad on Dec 14, 2017 0:43:54 GMT
>>Are they now going to ban all the plays he was involved with including Top Girls and Our Country's Good
Obviously not as long as they aren't directed by Max. Like the decision or not, it's about the man at the helm, not the playwright. And frankly his work in recent years has been so sub-par (hobbled by illness as he has been etc) that it was very sad seeing his stuff of late, set against the theatrical dynamo he once was.
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Post by youngoffender on Dec 14, 2017 9:25:59 GMT
As Lynette suggests, the rationale for this cancellation seems very 'conflictual' itself. If it were just about Stafford-Clark's association with this production, then in the context of the allegations around him I might understand. But the RC's statement makes clear that it's now uncomfortable with the play itself, because of its themes of "grooming and abuses of power of young women", and this seems absurdly to conflate the thematic concerns of Andrea Dunbar's work with the alleged behaviour of someone on the creative team. The alarming suggestion is that Dunbar is complicit, that merely writing a play about these topics makes her an accessory.
The full statement then ties itself in further knots by saying 'The show has successfully toured to ten venues this Autumn and we remain incredibly proud that the shared collaboration made the tour possible.' So which is it - how can you be proud of something that you find too tainted to stage in your own theatre?
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Post by Deleted on Dec 14, 2017 9:30:55 GMT
I urge you all to watch Clio Barnard's film "The Arbor" which explores Dunbar's work, life and legacy. It is a very sobering portrait, especially when you consider what happened to her kids in later years. The Estate that she set her plays on became subsumed by the drugs culture. In the light of this, as far as I'm concerned, the Andrea Project would only have any clout if they were working with kids from the Buttershaw Estate (if it still exists) in Bradford. I sincerely hope that Dunbar's children do not miss out on royalties with the cancellation of these performances. For me this issue is not about MS-C it is about Andrea Dunbar, one of very few working class female playwrights, who gave us an unflinching portrait of the world she inhabited. I would also add that her emergence as a playwright is a testimony to her survival of oppression. That says a great deal about the power of theatre.
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Post by wiggymess on Dec 14, 2017 9:34:49 GMT
The RC's statement makes clear that it's now uncomfortable with the play itself, because of its themes of "grooming and abuses of power of young women", and this seems absurdly to conflate the thematic concerns of Andrea Dunbar's work with the alleged behaviour of someone on the creative team. The alarming suggestion is that Dunbar is complicit, that merely writing a play about these topics makes her an accessory. Completely 100% agree with this, and it's why the decision doesn't sit right. |
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Post by oxfordsimon on Dec 14, 2017 9:34:59 GMT
Am I alone in finding the word 'conflictual' really grating? I know it is a real word - but it just seems very clunky as words go!
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Post by Deleted on Dec 14, 2017 9:36:48 GMT
I had to google it to make sure it was a real word. I'm not sure why "conflicting" wouldn't have sufficed but there we go.
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Post by oxfordsimon on Dec 14, 2017 9:39:45 GMT
I had to google it to make sure it was a real word. I'm not sure why "conflicting" wouldn't have sufficed but there we go. Same here |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 14, 2017 10:14:07 GMT
The RC's statement makes clear that it's now uncomfortable with the play itself, because of its themes of "grooming and abuses of power of young women", and this seems absurdly to conflate the thematic concerns of Andrea Dunbar's work with the alleged behaviour of someone on the creative team. The alarming suggestion is that Dunbar is complicit, that merely writing a play about these topics makes her an accessory. Completely 100% agree with this, and it's why the decision doesn't sit right. The director (and Stafford Clark was the original director of this revival, then co-director) is the lens through which a play is seen. The same play directed at the present time by, say, Marianne Elliot, would have a different dynamic than one directed by Stafford Clark. It is not the writer who is complicit but the director.
I'm struggling to understand why people think this is an attack on Dunbar and her play, it is not. If it is directed by an acknowledged sex pest, however, and it become something less healthy. There are two threads running on this subject, confusingly, but on one of them I wondered why people are making one play directed by one director into something supposedly wider and all encompassing. Again, it isn't so why try and make it as such?
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Post by wiggymess on Dec 14, 2017 10:19:32 GMT
Completely 100% agree with this, and it's why the decision doesn't sit right. The director (and Stafford Clark was the original director of this revival, then co-director) is the lens through which a play is seen. The same play directed at the present time by, say, Marianne Elliot, would have a different dynamic than one directed by Stafford Clark. It is not the writer who is complicit but the director.
I'm struggling to understand why people think this is an attack on Dunbar and her play, it is not. If it is directed by an acknowledged sex pest, however, and it become something less healthy. There are two threads running on this subject, confusingly, but on one of them I wondered why people are making one play directed by one director into something supposedly wider and all encompassing. Again, it isn't so why try and make it as such?
I just don't understand how you can claim that the following is not directed at the play: "the staging of this work, with its themes of grooming and abuses of power on young women, on that same stage now feels highly conflictual." That is a reference to the TEXT, not the director. Unfortunately we cannot just throw aside the fact that the play itself has been cancelled, that - along with the above quote - is a huge statement to make on the play itself and it doesn't sit right for me. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 14, 2017 10:27:13 GMT
I chalked that up to clumsy phrasing. "Work" doesn't automatically mean "just the text and nothing but the text", in the case of theatre it's going to include acting and directing and design, and although the content of this tweet comes over as a bit of an after-thought, it does clarify that it's nothing against the play or playwright and all about the wider context.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 14, 2017 10:36:43 GMT
It's worth clarifying, for clarifying's sake that the play was actually directed by Kate Wassarberg (Stafford Clark left I think 2-3 days into rehearsals) But of the course the wider point the Court is making still stands.
I believe that the tour post-Court is still continuing as planned as well.
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Post by wiggymess on Dec 14, 2017 10:36:43 GMT
I chalked that up to clumsy phrasing. "Work" doesn't automatically mean "just the text and nothing but the text", in the case of theatre it's going to include acting and directing and design, and although the content of this tweet comes over as a bit of an after-thought, it does clarify that it's nothing against the play or playwright and all about the wider context. It probably is clumsy phrasing, which in itself is very disappointing considering the importance of the subject and how the RC have put themselves forward as an organisation willing to tackle the issue (which is to be applauded). I'm glad they are putting on the Dunbar event, but those 2 tweets do seem to contradict each other. As I haven't seen the production, I can't comment. Perhaps it is ill-judged? Perhaps it does send out the wrong message? Perhaps, in the absence of the writer, it does the text an injustice by missing the point completely? That would be a very different scenario, but none of that is implied in what has been said. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 14, 2017 11:29:04 GMT
As I haven't seen the production, I can't comment. ! |
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