Playhouse company's disappointment at university's theatre deal with council
THE board of Derby Playhouse Ltd theatre company said it was disappointed the University of Derby had agreed a deal with the city council.
Under the deal, the former Playhouse building will be re-branded Derby Theatre and the city council's entertainment arm, Derby Live, will organise what is staged there.
The lease of the theatre was sold to the university in April after the building fell into limbo because Derby Playhouse Ltd, which ran it, got into financial difficulties in late 2007.
The chairman of the board set up to try to rescue the company, Jonathan Powers, revealed he had attempted to strike a deal with the university for the company to manage the theatre itself.
He said: "We are, of course, disappointed that the university has not chosen us to manage the theatre for them.
"We had proposed to help develop a new model for training in theatre arts, which we believe would have helped to ensure that the university became the place of choice for such work in the English-speaking world.
"The university, we know, will ensure that real care is taken of this beloved building. We also gain encouragement from the fact that they have asked us to produce work."
In December last year, creditors of the company agreed to allow Stephen Edwards, the theatre's former artistic director, to take a "charge" on the lease in exchange for £45,000 to cover the company's overheads.
That gave him the power to sell the lease to recoup his costs, pay creditors and give the Playhouse board working capital to continue the theatre company.
Mr Powers said: "As mortgagee in possession, Stephen could have followed the professional advice he was given and sold the theatre to a developer prepared to pay a premium price for this prime site.
"Instead he chose to sell to the university in order to preserve the building for produced theatre for the rest of the century."
But while the Playhouse Ltd company was disappointed by the Derby Theatre deal, amateur groups were celebrating.
This is because they will get 10 weeks within each annual programme to stage their shows.
Tony Jaggers, chairman of Derby New Theatre Association, which represents amateur groups in the city, said he was delighted. He also welcomed the renaming of the venue as Derby Theatre.
The university will pay the council to manage the theatre while the council will pay it in return for renting the space.
The Derby Telegraph understands the management fee is around £280,000 while rental costs are about £230,000.
It is also believed the terms of the deal will mean 22 weeks of in-house theatre will be produced by Derby Live, four weeks will be set aside for university productions, 10 weeks for amateur groups, 10 weeks for presented programmes of drama, musical theatre, comedy and dance and a six-week period when the theatre will be closed for maintenance.
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by Anne Powers, Quarndon
Monday, June 01 2009, 10:33AM
“Interested Observer - I am sorry you have seem to have misunderstood the information from Tenon. The agreement reached with the creditors in December was that £500k of the money realised form the sale of the lease would be assigned to the Company Voluntary Arrangement (CVA) to pay Tenon's fees and in final settlement with the creditors. A full report from Tenon in due course will give details of what the creditors receive. This will be considerably more than the nothing at all that they would have had if the company had been liquidated.”
by Interested Observer, Derby
Friday, May 29 2009, 9:02AM
“Anne you totally missed the point. Councillors bless them sometimes want to appear innovative for the benefit of their electorate. If memory serves me well Derby Live first came into use in 2002. The pink Live has been plastered all over the Assembly Rooms and their literature ever since.
Further if as has been suggested there was collusion between the City and ACE, I just can't see it. All local authorities and Arts Council regions talk to one another, its called joined up thinking.
Anyway I have just seen the latest figure from Tennon and they show that only £500000 was obtained for the lease . What a waste of time and public money has been caused by this vendetta against the Council and ACE. let's not forget the Council Tax Payer who also has an interest in this farce. The egos have won and we have lost.”
by Kit Lane, Derby
Friday, May 15 2009, 9:42AM
“Interested Observer. I don't wish to bore people with technical details but the domain 'derbylive.co.uk' was registered on 6th July 2007 by "Assembly Rooms and Guildhall Theatre".”
by Anne Powers, Quarndon
Friday, May 15 2009, 9:40AM
“Interested Observer, thanks for that. My point was simply that it was claimed afterwards that Derby Live had been conceived as a response after the Playhouse went into administration. All the evidence indicates otherwise. Since the concept included the use of the Playhouse I find it strange that neither the Arts Council nor DCC thought to inform the then Board of their intentions, and that in September 2007 they discussed the liquidation of the Playhouse being preferable to administration, also without talking to the Board about it despite there being two City Councillors on that Board as well as an ACE observer.
However, that is all in the past and we now have a new situation. As I said in the previous post I am happy to leave it to the various independent complaints bodies to reach their own conclusions about what went on.”
by Anne Powers, Quarndon
Friday, May 15 2009, 9:30AM
“James, the time would have been much better spent running the theatre. However, though I'm not suggesting weight alone indicates the quality of the evidence, it does indicate the care that has gone into its preparation. I indicated the weight because some commenters here seem to think it was possible to post a summary on this comments page. Much of the package was taken up with supporting evidence for what is much like a legal process. That it is being taken seriously is indicated by the number of times further information has been requested. Let's leave it to the Independent Complaints Reviewer and the Ombudsmen to judge the quality.”