Madam, – It is beginning to look as if Minister for Arts Martin Cullen has got the bit firmly in his teeth with regard to his crazy idea that the Abbey Theatre be rehoused in the GPO (Front page, December 12th).
Before this nonsense becomes a fait accompli, I strongly suggest that the board of the Abbey, theatre professionals and theatre goers unite to say No. Does Minister Cullen and his mysterious architect have any concept of the intricacies of theatre design; that best practice in stage design calls for wing space on either side of the stage be at least a minimum of two-thirds and preferably the full width of the stage itself. If our National Theatre is ever going to have the theatre it deserves, let it wait until better times come and finance becomes available for a theatre designed on a suitable green field site by the best theatre architect available.
Otherwise it will find itself trapped in the middle of a mausoleum, in much the same way that concert hall was shoe-horned into an empty Exam Hall and Imma coffined into a hospital. – Yours, etc,