RTYDS Connect Artist journal 2/12/21
It’s been three months since the start of the ‘Connect’ project, and it’s been great to speak with other members of the cohort, sharing our ideas on how we’d like to see theatre change for the better.
In November, I shared my project ‘A Beginner’s Guide to Widowhood’ at Bedlam Festival as part of their scratch night. While the sharing went well, with some great pieces of theatre being explored in front of a fantastic audience, the journey to getting it shared was most definitely an uphill struggle, and I’m interested in exploring how the industry could support artists in similar situations in the future.
The first issue was casting. The role calls for a female, aged between 35-50 from a South Asian background. The actor we had worked with in our R&D for China Plate’s First Bite festival was unavailable, so I spoke to somebody else I had been in contact with to take on the role. She did an amazing job and I’m very glad to have worked with her, however, she was based in Stratford-upon-Avon, which was problematic for two reasons.
Firstly, having to ‘import’ talent from other regions is an issue. Although Stratford is within the Midlands, it is by no means local to Derby. Given that 12.6% of the population of Derby identify as Asian, why is it so difficult to cast for Asian roles? This question becomes more troubling when we look at Nottingham and Leicester, whose Asian populations are 13.1% and 37% respectively. I believe there is an issue with representation, but I also feel this issue is systemic. In the youth theatre I run, not one of the children aged 8-12 is from a South Asian background, with only a single child being from the global majority. In addition to this, having to travel from Stratford to Leicester, which is where we were rehearsing, isn’t cheap. To make it worthwhile, we had to pay additional travel expenses on top of our actors' fee to make her time worthwhile. And given that our budget was extremely limited, this proved a strain, which leads me into my second point.
We were unsuccessful in securing a commission we were hoping to get for the project, which meant we ended up having four weeks to try and raise the money to enable us to share the work. Bedlam festival offered us a fee to share the piece, however given that we were a collective of individuals rather than a solo performer, it was only enough to cover one person’s fee. Our goal was to try and raise close to £2500 to allow for writing, a week of rehearsals, wellness support, and travel. Our initial instinct was to not attempt a crowdfunder for two reasons given the timeline and stage of development. So how were we going to raise the money?By contacting individuals and organisations directly, with a specific ask.
This is by no means reinventing the wheel. In fact, some of the biggest shows in London rely on individual donors to get off the ground. However, this patronage has a whiff of nepotism about it, and often the success of your fundraising is dependent on who you know. It’s also a rather degrading part of the job. So what can we do to help other artists avoid this in the future?
Well, part of our budget included £150 for a wellbeing support practitioner; another line was for travel. I’d personally like to see organisations being bolder, offering micro-commissions with quick turnarounds for specific components of project budgets, that enable artists to make and explore their work. Theatres in the East Midlands do a fantastic job of offering in-kind support to local artists, but I’d like to see this go one step further. Why can’t they offer £30 towards travel expenses that would otherwise make a project impossible to get off the ground? What happens when more people include wellbeing support into their budgets because they know it will be supported by one-off matched funding from a venue who believes in wellness being a core aspect of theatre?
In the end, we raised around £1400, which was enough to get in a room and explore the work. It also meant that I contributed a small amount from my own pocket to ensure everyone else on the team was paid fairly. I didn’t mind doing this, because I was in the privileged position of being able to do so. But for those artists who are just starting out, for whom a train-ticket for an out of town actor means a budget becomes infeasible, having nowhere to turn to for financial support, and there not being anyone local who can step in, becomes a real problem.