Plans for a £50 million redevelopment of the Abbey Theatre in Dublin have received the support of the Minister for the Arts, Ms Sile de Valera. The project, proposed by the Abbey Theatre board, was outlined to the Minister yesterday when she was taken on a tour of the building.
Ms de Valera said she was aware of many problems with the structure and the need for its facilities to be upgraded. She therefore concurred with the board's decision to gut the Abbey and provide a new interior.
"The Abbey is our national theatre. It now needs a radical approach and, as Minister for Arts, the board's own option is the one I'd favour." She said she would be speaking to the Minister for Finance about Government assistance for the project.
The Abbey Theatre's artistic director, Mr Ben Barnes, said the building was failing both artists and audiences. "It should excite expectations, not confound them," he said.
He and the board hoped they would be able to proceed with their plans in the near future, provided there was State funding. They believed work would take two years to complete and that the theatre would be open before December 2004, when it celebrates the centenary of its location on Abbey Street.
A new Abbey and Peacock Theatre would be contained in the redesigned building, with improved rehearsal, storage and dressing-room facilities, and better public areas.
While there are outline plans for the redevelopment, no architect has yet been appointed. It will be offered, according to the theatre's managing director Mr Richard Wakely, on the basis of competitive selection. Dissatisfaction with the Abbey Theatre's design, exterior and interior alike, has been voiced for many years. Among its most obvious problems are poor acoustics.
After a fire destroyed the original building in 1951, a new theatre designed by by Michael Scott was opened in 1966. Almost no work has been done on the interior since, although the bleak main facade was given a portico and upper glass-fronted bar in the early 1990s.