In spring 2020 Julian Bird, CEO of UK Theatre and the Society of London Theatres, held a Zoom call to pool producers’ forecasts for what audiences would want from theatre after the pandemic. The UK was a few weeks into its first lockdown and there was hope for the Christmas season.
According to attendees on the call, Bird was cautious and conservative. When theatres did reopen, audiences were still likely to view them as a health risk: only the most committed would rush back. West End theatre-goers are an elderly demographic—no one could predict whether the cough-sweet generation would be extra careful or would gleefully make the most of their priority in the vaccine queue. Whoever did make it back, said Bird, would want a good knees-up: musicals and broad comedies.
Some younger producers were indignant, feeling that this was the moment theatre should reach out to the dispossessed. But Bird’s analysis was shared by many. Nimax Theatres owner Nica Burns told me in May 2020 that she would be programming “pure fun,” expecting audiences to be “desperate to have a good time.” Producer Sonia Friedman agreed, putting on The Comeback, a comedy about a gig where everything goes wrong.
Everything did go wrong for The Comeback—as it did for the West End’s Christmas programme. England’s second lockdown finally lifted on 2nd December 2020. Culture secretary Oliver Dowden incentivised producers to invest in a Christmas season under “Operation Sleeping Beauty”; but less than a fortnight later, the government closed theatres in England again. The Comeback began performances on 8th December and closed a week later without formally opening. The lucrative panto season was aborted. Millions of pounds evaporated.
One year later and here we are again. Theatre officially re-opened across the UK in late summer 2021. Lavish, retro musicals were the order of the day. In London, the Barbican put on Cole Porter’s Anything Goes, and Sadler’s Wells Singin’ in the Rain, with requisite Strictly Come Dancing star in the form of Kevin Clifton. (Anything Goes won the battle of the reviews, but a delightful evening could be had at both.) In early December, the blockbuster productions were expected to kick-off, betting everything on the Christmas market (again). Thanks to Omicron, that bet failed.
The National Theatre invested in Hex, a new musical based on Sleeping Beauty, while the Almeida bought the rights to Spring Awakening, the musical adaptation of Frank Wedekind’s 1891 play, which made stars on Broadway of Lea Michele and Jonathan Groff. But the top ticket was Rebecca Frecknall’s Cabaret, which charged you £325 to sip champagne and dine at a table, while watching Eddie Redmayne and Jessie Buckley sing about abortions and the rise of Nazism. (“Leave your troubles outside,” promised the advance advertising.)
Cabaret, however, turned out to be pretty good. It wasn’t Redmayne’s Emcee (charismatic, but gurning in eroticised grotesquery) that won me over, or Buckley’s Sally Bowles, (pictured above) but Liza Sadovy and Elliot Levey’s heartbreaking turns as a pair of widowers hoping for love second-time round. Levey is an actor who guarantees something special. As Herr Schultz, the Jewish greengrocer whose Aryan betrothed decides against the risk of a mixed-race marriage, he distils every beat of this production’s sensory overload into a few moments of crystal-clear cohesion.
What Cabaret didn’t manage was to make me feel Covid-secure. Although it requires evidence of a negative LFT on entry, cast and audience members mingled in the clammy underground corridors of the Playhouse Theatre. My blood pressure hit the roof as a flirtatious performer approached the table next to me, sipped an audience member’s drink, and handed it back to her. Yet Cabaret got lucky. Its press nights opened as planned in the second week of December. Like most shows in the West End, it has endured a few cancelled performances due to cast members self-isolating—but not many. By contrast, Hex and Moulin Rouge both postponed their press openings twice thanks to Covid. (Hex has now been posptoned to the end of the year.) In the week before Christmas, Six, Hamilton, The Book of Mormon, Cinderella, The Lion King, Mamma Mia!, The Play That Goes Wrong and James Graham’s new Best of Enemies all cancelled performances.
The closures of Christmas 2020 were bad, but at least there was clarity. Over Christmas 2021, theatre struggled on without a directive to close (and the proper insurance), but in practice was largely unable to function. Meanwhile, theatres have imposed different health-and-safety regimes on their casts, which has caused considerable ill-feeling. Each winter will offer the risk of new waves. How long can British theatre endure without a reliable Christmas season? Next year, all bets are off.
