Lingering on here to see where networks go next - though otherwise not using it.
Fundraising / Strategy stuff? Go to
@We_Are_BAP
for website / links.
Personal gram if I know you outside of work.
Otherwise LinkedIn for beige stuff + also threads.
Website + email in bio.
So I saw Swan Lake today at
@RoyalOperaHouse
having never been to a ballet before and I can think of no more appropriate way to celebrate than recount the experience in memes because I am a millennial.
If you're in an interview for a job / development scheme / commission and they ask if you have any questions at the end and you can't think of one.
Ask "Is there anything you were hoping to see from me that I haven't demonstrated today?" it has helped me loads recently.
I am still in my dressing gown but just found out Iโve got ACE funding to find and commission 10 community (migrant / working-class) creatives in my local area and curate a creative development programme for their outdoor practice. ๐
Jobs in the arts are low-skilled?
In furlough alone Iโve written / supported nearly ยฃ250K of successful fundraising applications across the sector.
Get in the bin.
SURPRISE ๐ I wouldn't be doing this if it weren't for how much
@wearestockroom
have supported + invested in me over the years. Very sad to go, but also excited to be joining the KHT senior team.
(If any experienced execs want to be friends would love a chat)
North London fringe theatre the
@kingsheadthtr
has appointed Tom Ryalls (
@boyandpen
) as its new executive director and Sofi Berenger (
@sofiberrin
) as producer, as it prepares to move to a new, purpose-built home in 2022
To be really blunt - I am going into xmas with ยฃ7.5k of unpaid invoices and that shouldn't be the case.
Individuals in organisations work so hard to get people paid, but the sector is on its knees, cash flow is a nightmare, and this is now a pretty standard level.
@Ofcom
If you want to complain about this, then here is the complaints procedure buried in their website:
You can't complain about their decisions, but in this their staff are demonstrating biased behaviour and you can complain against that.
First he jokes about telling kids at his school they would get shot if they didnโt let him win at football then heโs going on about Uber drivers being frisked while they sit in a mansion with absolutely no idea of the precariousness of those drivers.
This whole thing was gross.
"There's an Uber driver out there... being frisked"
Prince William organised a special delivery for
@petercrouch
on
#ThatPeterCrouchPodcast
๐
More on his guest appearance here:
Today I thought of the death of Katherine Bowes-Lyon. The disabled cousin of Queen Elizabeth who was locked and hidden away, and whose funeral was apparently not attended by the main royal family members.
Have had two email threads go cold recently because I had to ask the theatre for a phone / Skype meeting instead of in-person. Hereโs a note on engaging with working-class artists / just artists whose reality doesnโt involve the flexibility that comes with a financial safety net.
Was on my way to Argos earlier when my first ever "proper" commission contract dropped into my inbox, no "seed" before it, a number of 0s I can get on board with, I don't have to fundraise anything, just write.
We're doing big Christmas this year kids.
(Also might cry)
I appreciate the complexity of the situation but the fact that Cameron Mackintosh's personal net worth is ยฃ200M higher than the annual budget for Arts Council England throws into questions the necessity of any redundancies.
The West End productions of Hamilton, Les Misรฉrables, Mary Poppins and The Phantom of the Opera will not reopen until 2021 due to continued uncertainty from government over social distancing, Cameron Mackintosh has confirmed.
Today is
#PurpleDay
! A day to raise awareness of epilepsy so I've come up with three easy changes theatres and companies could make by the end of today to make their shows more epilepsy-friendly as part of my
#BlackHole
project. RT and tag your favourite theatre!
This is really sad. I have no reactive offer because I donโt think quick decisions are always helpful to emerging artists, but we are going to work out if thereโs meaningful support we can properly offer to cancelled shows. Donโt scramble, take your time, value your art.
It is with broken hearts that we announce the decision to cancel VAULT Festival 2022. Our full statement follows in the thread below and is available now on our website at:
Just putting it out there that I would love to do a show where a designer goes first and I write in response to that. I donโt know how that works but I am so game if someone wants to make that happen.
There's also the Nathalie Olah observation that because middle-class kids, who are ingrained with the belief they deserve access to a higher paying profession (law, medicine), choose the lower pay of theatre, they genuinely believe they've given up their class.
Theatremakers who play down their middle-class origins and promote a narrative of unceasing struggle are doing a disservice to those who genuinely lack privilege in the arts, says
@lyngardner
โ honesty would go a long way
Ultimately it wasn't half bad and I was very impressed. People actually shout bravo like in the films, too. It's the most upper class applause I've ever seen and my shorts were very out of place but 10/10 would go again next time I can take out a loan for the tix
Genuine question: considering lots of big shows are running at reduced capacity and therefore selling out - are any supporting smaller shows by offering them as a "why not see ..... while we're sold out?"
Sharing platforms to make sure the whole sector makes it through.
Then the queen gives the prince a crossbow and tells him to find a bride (my mum did that before I came out) but before that the prince's best mate does some crazy cool twirls and i'm basically gagged because his legs are like a windmill.
I sometimes think quick changes are my favourite part of theatre.
Not the scripts, not the art, not the politics, it's the quick changes that keep me here.
@kimgoodwin
I ventured into the comments. So many of these responses are just men trying to mansplain mansplaining. The irony.
Lads, we mansplain. It's real. If you need a man to say it he's saying it.
Natalie says if you kill him the curse can't be broken. Well, she dances steps to that affect and then it's morning and poof she's a swan again. This is also the bit I think where you get the famous Doooo do do do do do do do music and I recognised it and felt clever.
Hearing lots of
@ace_national
"other applications preferred" going out today and just want to give everyone permission to pull your show if you need to. You're not a failure, the world will keep turning, artists' credit cards are not a sustainable funding source.
Iya! I've designed a year-long Pay-what-you-can programme to help freelance artists and small companies go from putting in random bids to having a framework to work strategically on fundraising.
Who might be good partners? For distribution / need a big zoom account.
I have largely tried to stay out of this because I don't think twitter is the medium for it but this statement is really quite wild.
A flawed dramaturgical argument wrapped up with condescension and an attempt to repackage the issue a something that can be managed away.
I kid you not there were like 14 bows. 14. Like, fair play that was some of the most incredible dancing I've ever seen but is that standard in ballet? I'm taking gloves if I go again because I was getting chapped.
.
@Out_of_Joint
is abandoning the traditional model of commissioning individual writers and will instead form a collective of artists and creatives who will collaboratively develop its plays from now on
Then we went to find gin and turns out you can't take drinks into a ballet so we got to the doors and had to down them and from here on in everything is less clear and my mum giggles at things.
There was a prologue where Voldemort turns Natalie Portman into a swan. Still not really sure why? Was this some way of hiding a horocrux? Either way, ballet is incredible.
Theatre people arenโt usually remembered by name in my family.
They once watched that BBC doc about
@mrJamesGraham
and told me โwe watched something about a writer, I donโt know if heโs doing too well because he only seems to own one jumper but I thought you might want to knowโ.
I think I can probably say now that Iโve been invited to join the
@ace__london
Area Council. ๐
Very excited to help ACE implement strategy for my 4 year term, starting with the NPO decision-making.
Some thoughts below ๐ฝ
No energy for the discourse but before I disappear I've gotta say that the national effort to performatively grieve one privileged man is going to be greater than the national effort to grieve and honour the 120k+ deaths from a year of coronavirus and that does not feel human.
Why do people not warn you that when youโre getting your play ready to be published for the first time ever that you cry quite a lot at the โFor...โ bit.
Then the prince runs off to a lake and meets a swan who's actually Natalie Portman and is like BAZINGA I fancy her. Then Voldemort comes back and the prince is gonna shoot him and I was like...nah, you got to do 7 films before this bit and kill a snake.
If youโre tweeting today about how awful it is that you have to go back to your arts job please bear in mind the amount of people who lost their jobs last year.
Can we take a minute to recognise that a show that was at
@CamdenPT
in 2015 is about to be adapted by The Royal Ballet ?!?! via a run in The West End ?!?!
CPT is the foundation of the talent pipeline for so many artists it's phenomenal โจโจโจโจ
๐คฉOur next Season is looking set to be an exciting one, both on and offstage
We're announcing our biggest and most impactful national learning programme to date, inspiring the creativity of children and young people across the UK
Read here:
#2324Season
Said goodbye to
@wearestockroom
today. Will always be grateful for 3+ years of their belief in me, and everything I learned. Did a cry in the big Morrisons round the corner, was very surreal to see the door close.
But now time to go build something new with
@KingsHeadThtr
๐ฅ
Um...Iโm going to be joining the
@CloreLeadership
programme
#InclusiveCultures
๐
Gonna be spending time on my work as a trustee with
@weareunltd
and how we might tear down the ableist governance structures in the cultural sector.
Inaccessible boards - Iโm coming for ya huns ๐
Anyway then you get another interval and we avoided the gin this time and instead read the programme.
1) I can't afford anything in the adverts
2) the ROH do screenings sponsored by BP which is not cute.
3) there are about 700 people in this show and it must be so expensive.
A few years ago I committed to relaxing shows and doing them in venues with step-free access and while weโre surrounded by a number of venues without proper access
@Iristheatre
have BUILT a ramp for the festival. This is the vision we need to ensure theatre is accessible. ๐
Basically Act 3 he gets to choose a princess and Voldemort creates a mirage of Natalie Portman except it's Mila Kunis and the prince pledges his love then Voldemort takes over in true battle of hogwarts "As Long as you're mine"-esque fog.
Thereโs a reason why theatre gets called โthe industryโ so much. The structures that underpin it are business structures, driven by the constant optimisation capitalism demands.
Thereโs no surprise in the bunker take over, this is a feature of the system, not a failure.
Contacted a theatre saying I have COVID and they will not exchange tickets, so I will have to attend the show or lose the money for the tickets. It is increasingly difficult to advocate for an industry that treats audiences like this.
This has been such an incredible and exhausting week, Iโm so proud of what we achieved across Black Hole and EEK.
But one thing as I fall asleep which really grinds me is that I fundraised, produced and got a show all the way to Covent Garden and not one industry invite came.
Twitter notifications have gone crazy. Thanks for the lovely introduction to the ballet world. If a famous person retweets me can you let me know because I need to screenshot it to my mum (she doesn't do twitter)
#WillGif4Tix
When I have to chase someone by email Iโve started signing-off โis it easier if I give you a quick call about this?โ because suddenly when filled with the absolute dread that they might have to speak to someone on the phone people start replying.
Watching The Ocean at the end of the lane by
@neilhimself
(adapted by Joel Horwood) at
@NationalTheatre
and I think the bath tub scene in Act 1 (you know) is the closest Iโve come to running on stage to stop a scene during s show.
If you were/are a sensitive kid, prepare urself
Later this year I have some capacity to take on extra fundraising bits around my current commitments. Need a bid writer / strategist / support worker? I basically dramaturg your funding.
I work a lot with disabled / neurodivergent teams + do day rates for independent artists.
THEATRES! While lots of theatres are doing refurbs, I run some community arts projects that could use some sound equipment to do outdoor movement + dance stuff.
If anyone (sees a theatre) is getting rid of anything sound-related, can we have it?
(don't ask, don't get etc.)
One thing I'm really recommending at the moment is that people include a line like this in their funding applications ๐
Digital Poverty hugely affects who engages with your project, some people don't have laptop or internet connections to do your zoom engagement.
I've been called out in
@ShentonStage
's latest drivel for attending 'Cock' press night. Apparently this makes me an "autistic seal" which is offensive on so many levels.
Maybe I should keep my mouth shut but I am sick to death of the way Mark bullies and insults everybody.
In our platonic co-dependency
@daisthehale
and me just became joint secretary of a residents association to resist developers using compulsory purchase order to evict people at the end of our street.
Jackie Weavers in the making ๐๐ป
Big thanks to
@ace_national
for a
#DYCP
grant to do mentoring / research / development on strategies for ADHD writers working on longer material which Iโve affectionately named โHow to finish the bloody scriptโ.
The prince comes chasing her but Natalie throws herself off a rock and it kills Voldemort (she must have been his horocrux) because he's already promised his love to Mila and he can't break her curse now. This is when I realise Siegfried is basically all of my exes.
There is a special piece of rage in my brain for the amount of posh kids in theatre who use council aesthetics to try and mask their privilege while also preaching about owning your privilege.
Joined this company 3 years ago as an Ops Assistant knowing very little about subsidised theatre + at every step they have supported me to develop inc. the
@artsfundraising
fellowship so now Iโm a Head of Development ๐
Long-term support is how you develop people in theatre ๐๐ป
Weโre very excited to say one of our team
@BoyAndPen
will be stepping up into the new role of Head of Development, working across all of our fundraising activity.
Congrats! ๐
Hereโs a blog Tom wrote on the importance of artist-led fundraising:
Very cool that
@CamdenPT
team have all brought masks / done lat flows etc. so that CEV artists can work in the building this week (it happens whenever needed).
Access is not just an adaptation around shows - it's also a cultural change in working practices.
First week of full-time ED life, not sure what the most useful offer is but having a go:
Freelance? Not got a manager? Need a 1:1?
It's 30 mins on Fridays at 1pm. You can use this link which will auto update with the next 4/5 available Fridays:
Lots of change today - leaving full-time life. Going to spend some time in my strange writer/fundraiser/strategist work seeing how much ยฃยฃ I can get out to creatives + how we structure it better starting with working with Peggy the dog who runs
@WeAreZooCo
on their development ๐ฅ
๐ So I guess Iโm going to be spending lots of time in Oxford writing a play Iโve always been scared to write about the kinds of love we inherit between generations in working-class families ๐
Also look at how amazing the group is I am so excited ๐
Playhouse Playmaker is our Writers' Attachment Programme for playwrights, led by playwright
@BayleyClare
.
We're pleased to announce Anna Angerman,
@lizdaramola
, Carla Grauls, Gayathiri Kamalakanthan,
@rhianna_ilube
&
@BoyAndPen
as our new Playmakers!
The TV + Theatre industries are having a moment looking at disabled / neurodiverse writers (largely) for the first time. If you're running these programmes then please go read about Crip Time first. Responsive + quick is good, but it can also be ableist.
3 vaccinations, still got COVID, still had to isolate, still awake at 2am coughing 2 weeks after I got it. Not to sound preachy but have a think whether your big NYE night out is worth it, because this is not fun, got out of breathe doing the cleaning today.
If I did a short course in "Fundraising for social change" which focuses on helping small arts comps / freelancers go beyond project bid writing e.g. developing strategy, basic case for support. esp. if your company doesn't fit neatly into capitalist structures.
Helpful? Or no?
The NHS has saved my life more than I can count (childhood epilepsy will do that) and today I finished my training to become a volunteer vaccinator with
@SJAVolunteering
to pay that back a bit. Thanks for the incredible training, feeling very ready to help out.
"It is not a fault of the system that 29% of the creative workforce is privately educated while only 7% of the UK population is, itโs a feature of it."
My article for
@CamdenPT
about why private education dominates theatre, and what change will threaten:
๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ you can buy my play from tomorrow ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ๐ญ
So thanks to lots of lovely people over the next few months I'm going to some more ballet / opera / contemporary dance (which I can only assume is a live dance mum's) to gif them and turn them in to
#MillenialArt
and see them from an outsider's perspective. This can only end well
Smashed the half-marathon. This is my new mate Michelle, we were both struggling around the 10th mile so we ran together to the end ๐๐ป
I will send a proper thank you to all the sponsors when I can walk again because my legs now hate me โค๏ธ
I donโt think Iโve had a badge since I was at school but got a
@stjohnambulance
pin this morning, for volunteering as a vaccinator during the pandemic. I also got my confirmation to start my FA training next month, so excited to keep being part of the SJA team.
Disabled people are a marginalised group that experience systematic barriers to artistic development.
Non-disabled people who have an accessible practice are not in the same category.
Second time I've seen it now and we need to knock this on its head before it spreads.
Ultimately Opera is better than what you see on reality TV,
#ROHBoheme
is a sensational first-time opera. I even got to the end and realised I didn't need the subtitles or a programme synopsis which is something for a kid from Doncaster. Get ๐ your ๐ tix ๐
Lovely day but Iโve got COVID. Iโm triple vax so my symptoms are very mild. Christmas in London, cat is very happy he doesnโt have to get on a train, I would like to see my family after a year of a lot of them being ill but there we go. We keep going + keep hating the gov.
I don't know that you get applauded for talking about class when you've just fought a battle to avoid paying a 1.2 million tax bill which would have funded necessary services for working-class people.
#LorraineKelly
'We're all the same and we all should be treated exactly the same.'
@reallorraine
delivers an inspiring speech as she accepts the Outstanding Contribution to British Television award at
#RTSAwards
.
#Lorraine
@RTS_media