It’s no surprise that there are changes afoot at Belvoir….

For sometime there has been a slow merge towards the downstairs space at Belvoir Street Theatre more and more similar to the programming of the upstairs space… for sometimes some have noticed the graduation effect ie the downstairs theatre is where directors, actors etc can be spotted by the Artistic Director and launched upstairs into the lime light.

Writers and new plays go from downstairs to upstairs … it’s been an unofficial development wing… a test for artists…

And perhaps what is happening is just a formalisation of what Belvoir has been headed towards-

Indicators of this shift from a co-op /independent venue to mainstage include:

The 2010 Season indicated a shift with one of the mainstage shows being slotted into the downstairs theatre…

The downstairs brochures of recent times are slicker- they feel like “upstairs” shows brouchures used to a few years back…

There has been some fairly significant mainstage style programming- The Lonesome West … Homebody/Kabul…. big writers in the little 70 seat space.

The shows downstairs that move upstairs: The Seed, Ruben Guthrie…

The Artistic Associates/Belvoir Staffers being given slots in 2009 eg: Sam Strong, Eamon Flack

This has been evolving for a while…

.. And it’s a little confusing. I’m not sure what it means- does it mean the appreciation of independent artists that will be able to enjoy the shelter (financial support) of a larger company?
Or does it mean that Company B’s recently blossomed artistic associates (and there’s a bunch of them) will all get a slot, fully funded and supported… is this Belvoir’s Wharf 2 Theatre?

Have independent artists lost a space? Or have they gained support? And if they have gained so much support that they are no longer independent – what does this mean? What is the value of independence? Is this a wonderful thing for playwrights and play development?

I don’t know, yet… but I’d love to hear your thoughts… Read more

A small, brittle paged copy of Under Milk Wood, sits in my book case. A faded blue/green photograph of a town by the sea on the cover- and on the back, a price tag (from a long time ago) says “$1.60.” The pages are yellow – especially around the edges, like an old man’s white moustache stained with nicotine. As a child, I remember my father, in a brown velvet chair, musing on the sound of Richard Burton’s voice on a Sunday afternoon. Later, in my first year of University, I purchased a sturdy, (second hand) hard cover copy from Gleebooks, and sent it home for fathers day… Read more