Art ScapeWhat next for the Crypt? The arts centre at Dublin Castle, which has performed a vital role in helping emerging talent and theatre companies, is facing a bleak future - and the loss of its premises.
First came the almost simultaneous blows from the Arts Council and FÁS last December. The council cut its funding of €40,000 a year by 100 per cent - "we use the word removed, they say it was not re-awarded," says director John O'Brien - and FÁS decided to scale back community employment (CE) schemes in arts organisations, which left the Crypt with no staff. The Crypt's annual funding loss is between €150,000 and €200,000, says O'Brien.
"Mary Harney has no interest in CE schemes which support and build viable arts organisations and provide valuable training and life experience for people," says O'Brien. The arts centre had expected the CEs to be replaced by a "social economy" scheme, for which it had completed a viability study, but this isn't happening. The last FÁS workers left in February and directors O'Brien and Niall O'Sioradain have been off-salary, working for nothing since early March. The centre has since been limping along, with a network of more than 50 volunteers - there is a tremendous sense of support for the place, says O'Brien - and the venue is programmed until the end of the Fringe. "We feel obliged to honour last year's bookings, regardless of the Arts Council's decisions," O'Brien adds.
Now the Crypt faces another hurdle. The venue will close for six months on October 11th to become a media centre (probably for the Austrian press) during Ireland's six-month presidency of the EU. The closure was well signalled, and O'Brien says the Office of Public Works has kept him informed. The good side is that it involves renovation of the premises; the bad side is that it won't be able to reopen in July of next year without funding.
"I can't work for nothing, and it needs a staff. It is criminal for individuals to be expected to subsidise the arts in this country, in their spare time," O'Brien says. "The Arts Council says it's a development agency but an essential development resource in Dublin theatre is going."
As a venue, it costs less to rent than the New Theatre, and certainly the Project; with City Arts Centre up for sale, there are fewer and fewer venues for emerging companies.
The Crypt has long been a lucky bag in terms of shows - you can pull a gem or a dud, as is the nature of such a resource - but it has been a breeding ground for individuals and organisations who have gone on to great things, such as Conor McPherson, Jason Byrne/Loose Canon, Joe Devlin (now at Focus), David Horan (now assistant director at the Abbey), and actors from Eithne Woodcock and David Pearse to Ned Dennehy and Gerry O'Brien.
The EU presidency has proved an inadvertent stumbling-block for cultural organisations in Dublin Castle: Poetry Ireland is still looking for a new home, since facing the loss of its Bermingham Tower premises at the castle, and is in discussion about various future options.
Coming to the small screen
While the summer means we've reached the doldrums as far as the TV schedules are concerned, RTÉ has released its list of what we can expect when everybody comes back from their holidays, writes Shane Hegarty. Flush with the licence fee increase, the station has promised 15 per cent more drama and that will include a medical drama, The Clinic, which the station claims, somewhat predictably, is "set to get the pulses racing". Expect blood and romance in equal measure.
There will also be Red and Blue, a docu-drama based on the events at Holy Cross School in Belfast, and Expensive Silence, a four-part thriller set in Dublin and Copenhagen, starring Orla Brady. Bachelor's Walk will return, although On Home Ground has been dropped.
There will be a supernatural thriller, Chosen, a co-production with Welsh producers HTV, while The Big Bow Wow will be a twentysomething drama promising "hedonism at its post-Celtic Tiger best". A teen soap is promised for 2004, while a youth drama, Foreign Exchange, is being filmed in Ireland and Australia.
There will a documentary series, The Underworld, on gangland crime, and another, Maybe Baby, on several couples' experience of fertility treatment. Documentaries commissioned include an Alan Gilsenan film on private detectives and one on guitarist Rory Gallagher.
Council revamps grants
The Arts Council has clearly been busy following its new structure and staff changes. First, it has been planning a much-needed improved grant application process for next year, in readiness for the great unknown that the Estimates will bring. Funding applications for grant aid in 2004 will be considered by the council at the end of this year, once the level of its own Government funding is known.
Funding applications are invited on new application forms (on paper or online at www.artscouncil.ie) and "the council will set a budget which is fully informed by the known level of demand from the sector". A new department will deal with the funding relationships with the 500-plus arts organisations that receive council grants, and there have been some meetings between these.
The applications are invited over a six-week period (September 1st to October 10th), which is earlier than last year, to allow contact between Arts Council staff and the sector, and the evaluation of proposals.
The new forms (available from the Arts Programme Department from September 1st) replace the "one size fits all" approach used in previous years, and include variations for different kinds of organisations, and one for first-time applicants. The big question - following the pain and uncertainty created by the Government cut of €4 million in Arts Council funding, and the subsequent council decisions about how to deal with the cut - is what happens with next year's funding.
Meanwhile, also following its restructuring, the council has invited tenders for a part-time opera specialist. The role will involve producing an opera development plan, and monitoring its implementation; advising the council on artistic promise and achievement in opera; and working with staff on delivering the council's objectives for opera. Candidates should have at least five years' experience working at a senior level within opera in Ireland or overseas and a developed knowledge and understanding of the aesthetic and artistic environments, public policy and artistic and commercial operating conditions within opera, nationally and internationally.
The deadline is noon on August 25th; information from Adrienne Martin/Karen Whelan at the council (tel: 01-6180219).
Shakespeare in the square
RTÉ Radio Drama, in association with Temple Bar Properties, is presenting Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet at 8 p.m. next Sunday (August 3rd) in Meeting House Square, as part of Temple Bar's Outdoors programme. The production will be broadcast live on Radio 1 and stars Aidan McArdle and Hilary Cahill as the lovers, Barry McGovern as Friar Lawrence, Cathryn Brennan as The Nurse and Alan Stanford as The Prince. Mixed with Prokofiev's music, and sword-fight sequences, it should be a lively evening. Tickets are free from Temple Bar Properties, 18 Eustace Street, Temple Bar, Dublin 2 (maximum: four per person).
And for fans of the Crazy Dog gang, also recording live is Crazy Dog Audio Theatre's Beyond the Back of Beyond, six "weirdly paranormal adventures" written and directed by Roger Gregg. Maria Doyle Kennedy and David Norris guest, along with Owen Roe, Anne Byrne, Deirdre Molloy, David Murray, Morgan Jones, Gregg and the rest of the gang. The recordings are on Thursday nights at 8 p.m. (until August 28th) and are being streamed live on the Internet at www.radio1.ie. For further details, see www.crazydogaudiotheatre.com
And furthermore . . .
CAFÉ Publications (in association with Clann Credo, with support from Comhairle) has just published the fifth edition of the Irish Fundraising Handbook, a guide to fundraising in the voluntary sector in Ireland, with contact details of 750 sources that provided almost €2 billion in funding and support this year. The guide is available from CAFE (Creative Activity For Everyone) Publications for €20 (plus €2.50 p&p). Telephone 01-4736600, or e-mail café@connect.ie or see www.communityartsireland.com. Speaking of CAFE, the arts resource organisation is changing its name of 20 years to CREATE, to reflect the work it does in supporting artists and organisations, offering advice on fundraising, project development and delivery, training and finance management.
After a week of floods of almost biblical proportions in Galway, leading to two shows of The Mysteries being cancelled at the arts festival, Macnas is clearly looking to the future. It has advertised in The Irish Times for a new general manager to take over from outgoing Declan Gibbons; it'll be interesting to see who is chosen to take the company forward into a new phase.
As the festival - following many triumphs despite the wrath-of-god-like weather - winds down in Galway this weekend, Kilkenny is gearing up (see interview with director Claudia Woolgar on Weekend 7) for its start with a firework display on Friday, August 8th. And continuing the festival's commitment to professional development, it has announced that violinist Anton Sorokow will be holding a masterclass (August 16th) during his stay in Kilkenny. The 25-year-old was appointed first concert master with the Nuremberg Philharmonic Orchestra earlier this year. For further information on the masterclass, contact Kilkenny Arts Festival (tel: 056-7751704). See also www.kilkennyarts.ie
Goldfish Memory, the Irish film directed by Liz Gill, has won the Audience Award for Outstanding Narrative Feature at OUTFEST, the gay and lesbian film festival in Los Angeles. The film opens in Ireland on September 5th. Meantime, Dublin's Lesbian and Gay Film Festival opens next Thursday and runs until August 4th: www.gcn.ie/dlgff
The Punk Puppies, only famous because of their stardom in The Irish Times TV ad for The Ticket, now have their own website: www.punkpuppies.com