On The Record »

• A night in Funderland

  April 24, 2012 @ 9:29 am | by Jim Carroll

  It’s nearly a year since OTR last went to the theatre. I know, I’m as much a philistine as most of you suspect I am. You’re supposed to go to the theatre if you’re writing about culture of any sort, right? But as I’ve noted before, theatre and me parted ways many, many years ago after too many nights spent watching writers using a script and the stage to work out issues with their alcoholic fathers.

  I went my way and it, well, it didn’t really seem to go anywhere. Theatre gets an incredible amount of attention and coverage compared to other forms of culture, yet there’s rarely anything which pokes its way into the world which appeals to anyone beyond the hardcore. Occasionally, it does happen, but that’s the exception which proves the rule. Sure, the dedicated hardcore who go to opening nights and always check out what’s on in the Abbey (the women with scarves, to coin a phrase) are to theatre what Mogwai fans are to live music, but there are times when you surely have to go beyond the heartland.

  Alice In Funderland is one of those occasions. I’d wager that the vast majority of people who were in the Abbey last week for the performance I saw are not regular theatre-goers. You can tell that by their hands-in-the-air reaction to the pumping house music which played during the interval. In fact, I reckon most of the people who were there wouldn’t consider the theatre when it comes to a night out.

  But this is Alice In Funderland, a colourful tale of camp magic, mischief and machinations in an acid-trip Dublin you’ll recognise with a grin, and this is why we’re here. We’re here to be entertained (even theatre audiences want value for money in 2012) and we get that. We’re here for some pokes at the pantomine villians who landed this country in the mess it’s in and we get those. We’re here for a big night out and, yep, we get that in spades.

  Yes, there are flaws. It’s far too long and some of the text needs to be reworked (there are a couple of clanging one-liners which even Oliver Callan would have deleted and we’re not just talking about the bizarre Scissor Sisters’ tune). It also pulls its punches a bit when it comes to addressing the state we’re in, which is often mentioned but never properly articulated. However, it is a musical and we were never going to get beyond mere surface in that context. On the other hand, there’s nothing flawed about the energy of the performance. Everyone on the stage works their butts off and it’s that magnetic, passionate energy – and the Damien Dempsey taxi-driver – which keeps you entranced for nearly three hours. For once, the groupthink is right: it’s a hit.

  Kudos therefore to Fiach Mac Conghail and the Abbey for bringing Thisispopbaby and Funderland to the big stage. It’s a brave, bold move which needs to be recognised and saluted and you hope that it won’t be the last time the Abbey takes chances like this. The Abbey needs to take chances. Wouldn’t it be great if we got more challenging, interesting and unorthodox works like this rather than safe fare designed at filling the stalls over the summer months with tourists?

  I can already hear the Abbey spinners say that they need to be all things to all men and women (and Americans), but it’s a national theatre and the concept of what a national theatre is must change, just as the notion of what this nation is has changed. After all, Ireland today is more Funderland than Playboy of the Western World. More pieces like Funderland will mean a performance like this on the Abbey stage is the norm rather than a novelty. It will also see the theatre full of people who might – might – increasingly see a night at the theatre as their idea of a good night out.

  

• Cultural confidence and cash

  August 17, 2010 @ 10:37 am | by Jim Carroll

  Many readers will probably nod their heads in agreement at Irish Times arts blogger Laurence Mackin’s piece on the new bustle in the capital city’s cultural hedgegrows of late. Laurence writes about knees-ups and soirees in new venues like the Joinery Gallery, Monster Truck Gallery and Centre of Creative Practices. You could also add gigs in city-centre apartments and joints like Space 54 in Smithfield to that list.
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• Why whinging about cutbacks in arts funding gets you nowhere

  March 9, 2010 @ 11:03 am | by Jim Carroll

  For the last month or so, I’ve been waiting for someone else to bring up Macnas artistic director Noeline Kavanagh’s remarks about the arts in Ireland. I thought at the time that they’d form a jump-off point for a good think-piece from some arts activist about the state of the arts nation, but that doesn’t appear to have been the case. The remarks were reported by Lorna Siggins in the paper and that was that. There were other matters for the arts cognoscenti to get their teeth into. Rhubarb was in season or something.

  A huge pity because what Kavanagh had to say about the arts was hugely informative at a time when every other arts organisation, especially those in the theatre sphere, seems to be exerting their energy whinging, fuming and complaining about Arts Council cuts. No-one is denying that the cuts will not have an effect or that they should be discussed, but Kavanagh’s take on this is very interesting. And they’re as relevant now as they were a month ago.

  Siggins reports that Kavanagh believes “artists should stop engaging in the “blame game” about funding cuts and seize the “re-invigorating” opportunities created by recession. A “co-dependency” and “drip-feed” reliance on Arts Council finance, which leads to a “slash-and-burn” approach during the economic downturn, is neither good for artistic groups nor for the State body.”

  Kavanagh knows cuts will run deep, but says this won’t prevent her and her team from ploughing ahead. “We had to let three people go last year, we rely on two full-time and one part-time staff and a community employment scheme, but we will work within this and look to the future. Artists have always survived on the outskirts, and recession is not a challenge for the imagination of the mind and the heart.”

  It’s a brave stance and I’m sure there are many other arts organisations around the country who are similarly fired up. These are the ones staffed by people who got into their specific sectors to perform great work, to contribute something to the culture, to make some kind of difference. They probably didn’t get into the arts because they prefered it to working in a bank.

  Yet the general mood of late in the arts sector has been one of endless complaints about cuts in Arts Council budgets. A lot of this comes down to a feeling late last year, aided by that Farmleigh House love-in and smart lobbying from the National Campaign for the Arts, that the cuts would not be as savage as those mooted by the McCathy Report. However, when the sums were done, the cuts were as bad if not worse than once feared. The Arts Council didn’t have any cash so they cut to the left and cut to the right and then went back over the body with the knife again.

  Some practitioners have become so incensed about what they see as a U-turn (a U-turn in their heads at any rate) that they have commenced a letter-writing campaign seeking to have the council abolished and its functions taken over by the Department of Fun. However, they may feel a little differently about that campaign this morning, seeing as that department is now under the thumb of well-known arts lover Brian Cowen following the departure of Minister for Fun Martin Cullen from the scene. There may not even be a Department of Fun in a few weeks time once the reshuffle takes place.

  Regardless of this, it’s probably time for a rethink about funding in general. Over the last two decades, a huge swathe of the arts in Ireland have become over-dependent on government funding. This dependancy culture means many organisations are now as adept, if not better, at filling out forms and seeing to meet Arts Council criteria than putting on fantastic work. This has brought about, as seems to have happened elsewhere in Irish society, a strong feeling of entitlement to these funds. Some will argue that you need the funding to make the work in the first place, but others will look at Kavanagh’s approach and realise that cash from Merrion Square is not going to stop them in their tracks.

  And that’s the rub of the issue. It’s the work, not the complaints, which should pull people in. And ultimately, it’s the work, not the ability of the arts administrators to fill out forms, which should get the cash. I have written before here and elsewhere about how the government have completely neglected popular music when it comes to splashing the cash. Yet instead of fuming about this state of affairs, most of those actively involved in popular music have simply given up on the Arts Council and have found other ways to get the money needed to proceed. Be it tapping the folks at Culture Ireland for some cash to do stuff abroad or making two and two make 75, they’ve got on with the job. No fuming, no writing letters to the editor of the Irish Times, none of that old guff.

• It’s all about priorities

  October 22, 2009 @ 9:23 am | by Jim Carroll

  This piece by Guy Barriscale about our “wonderful cultural infrastructure” contains plenty of food for thought. Barriscale is the production chief at the Regional Cultural Centre in Letterkeny, a brand spanking new state-of-the-art venue and arts centre which is located fairly near to An Grianan, another state-of-the-art venue and arts centre. I didn’t think there was that much of the aul’ art going in in Letterkenny to require two state-of-the-art centres, but there you go.
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• Doing the state some service. No, really.

  October 13, 2009 @ 9:36 am | by Jim Carroll

  Looking through the Programme for A Brave New World Full Of Unicorns, Fluffy Marshmallows and Chirpy Tellytubbies Who Look Like Eamon Ryan and Mary Hanafin, one particular promise caught my eye. It’s down towards the end of this fabulous document and, surprisingly, doesn’t have anything to do with the Green Party’s widely held belief that minks are more important than welfare recipients. (By the way, read Fintan O’Toole this morning for more on how the Greens have been reduced to gesture politics)

  Anyway, the relevant commitment which is of interest to OTR this morning is: “we will help the economy realise the full potential of the arts in creating employment and economic growth by expanding community arts schemes, provide free physical space for visual artists and community groups to display their work”. There appears to be an “and” missing from the above, but I suppose they were in a hurry to get the programme together for the Greenwash on Saturday and couldn’t check everything unless it had to do with minks and fur.

  It’s an interesting proposal, even if, like much of the rest of the document, it is really merely aspirational. It’s more of the nice pie-in-the-sky cuddly politics which will appeal to the people who have lost enough marbles to consider voting Green again next time around. I hope someone has pointed out to the Green membership that furry animals don’t have a vote.

  But this idea of “free physical space” is an interesting one, especially as the Irish taxpayer is about to become the biggest landlord in the land as soon as NAMA comes into being. We will then hold the keys and leases to hundreds of buildings around the country which are currently lying idle and will have empowered the current government to be our agents in managing these properties. While the obvious aim will be to make some money from these buildings, it’s unlikely to happen for some time – if at all – due to the Fianna Fail/Green Party partnership’s chronic mismanagement of the economy (bet they’ll love that down in Green HQ).

  It’s an ideal time, then, to look at what we have (all these vacant buildings) and look at what could be done with them (see commitment from the programme above). Instead of leaving the buildings idle until there is enough money going around to open a new Spar to sell shit coffee and terrible sandwiches, why not turn the buildings over to arts groups of every stripe? We’ve banged on here before about this lack of affordable and usable space in the city-centre and now, thanks to NAMA, we may have the solution for a whole host of Exchange Dublin-like ventures.

  Take Smithfield in Dublin, for example. Every time I go to see a film in the Lighthouse, I remark afterwards on how empty the cinema is and how quiet the whole area feels. Someone working at last weekend’s Darklight fest, which was based in Smithfield this year, said you couldn’t even find a rogue tumbleweed in the area after 10pm. The area is one of the saddest white elephants in the land.

  Cometh the hour, cometh the NAMA and many of those currently unoccupied and unlet buildings become the property of the state. Imagine then if you turned these buildings over to people to turn into makeshift studios, galleries, performance spaces or rehearsal rooms. Charge tiny or non-existent rents for the first twelve months, turn a blind eye to some of the more ridiculous health and safety regulations which have popped up in the last few years to scupper other lo-fi enterprises (most of which came about in the first place merely to create non-sustainable jobs and boost sales of high-vis vests) and see what happens.

  Give it a year and I bet you’d turn areas which are currently as dead as a doornail into buzzy zones with lots going on and lots of people coming down to check out the activities. And you may also end up with proof that arts and culture businesses can contribute to the economy and don’t have to rely on Arts Council handouts to get off their arse to get things done. Well, some of them anyway. Can’t see many theatre companies having the get-up-and-go to avail of this without some sort of handout.

  Crazy? For sure. Full of “buts” and “ifs”? You bet. However, if the government really are serious about all aspects of their fluffy document, here’s one way to test it. To misquote the Sultans of Ping, we don’t like your manifesto, but we’ll put it to the test-o nonetheless.

  And no, no need to thank OTR for this suggestion. We’re modest like that. Just give us a seat in the Seanad next time out, alright? I mean, you’re not planning to get rid of that august establishment any time soon to save a few bob, are you? Sure, if you did that, Dan Boyle would have nowhere to go.