Dinner theatre is now served, writes PETER CRAWLEY
Culture, someone once hissed, is what the middle classes turn to when they’ve had their dinner. That’s a nasty dismissal of the arts as the preserve of the affluent and well- fed, one we can reject vehemently over that scrummy theatre menu they do in Chapter One.
Recently, though, a number of theatre companies have started to cut out the middle man and offer their plays with a meal included. Why is this happening? Why should anyone who works in an industry where the turnover is so volatile, the customers so demanding, the reviewers so merciless and the tips so meagre suddenly move into catering too?
No prizes for guessing “the economy”. Art may be for all, some of it is even free, but it’s hard to appreciate a painting, poem or musical if you happen to be starving. People who enjoy dinner and a show, or courting couples, now want their night out to be entertaining, romantic and cost-effective. So two-for-one deals begin to look very attractive.
Does Dinner Theatre cheapen the medium? Anything derived from an American resort-hotel aesthetic, where your waiter is as likely to burst into song or solve a murder as mix up your order and forget the water, would suggest so. It’s a triumph of themed entertainment over art. If theatre holds a mirror up to society (to resort to a cliché), Dinner Theatre holds up a cheese plate. But as we enter a fretful theatrical landscape, hungry for any sign of conspicuous consumption, more and more people are beginning to swallow it.
A couple of months ago, Wonderland staged a production of La Locandiera, a Carlo Goldoni comedy set in a tavern, in a Dublin tapas restaurant. I don't know what Spanish cuisine has to do with a French-inspired Italian comedy, but amid the sexual shenanigans, sprightly songs and feisty power play, the performers served you wine and umpteen courses, apportioning out the menu in tandem with the plot. In both cases, the fare was exquisite.
Recently, Tall Tales, Meridian and Gavin Kostick all treated their audiences to either a meal or a decadent platter of wine and cheese. Sometimes, it’s part and parcel of the show. Often, the experiences are meant to be held separately. But in our associative minds they never are. Years ago, I reviewed both the show and the soup at Bewley’s Café Theatre (“provocative and edgy”). I never heard the end of it.
All of which is to say that Faulty Towers … The Dining Experience, can now legitimately claim to be a hotly anticipated piece of theatre. A ferociously popular Australian show that skirts copyright infringement with a jokey misspelling, it features Basil, Sybil and Manuel explaining and spoiling the specials. If you don't like duck, I suspect you're rather stuck.
But as theatre companies decide that the quickest way to an audience’s wallet is through its stomach, expect many more courses. It may not have the nutritional benefit of art, but you can always rely on the filling stodge of entertainment. We have entered the age of theatrical comfort food. Dinner is served.
