The History of the Darling Theatre Company :: London Theatres Acting Drama Essays

The History of the dear(p) Theatre Company This menage community came into universe in 1979 when a famous old Londontheatre went break-dance and the owners of the expression attempted to sellit to property developers. George Darling, a well cognize stage actor,launched a campaign to save the theatre and, with the help of legion(predicate)famous friends in the acting world, created strong public support forretaining the building as a theatre. However no existing theatre ships company was in a position to take over the building and the ownerssuggested to George Darling that he use his connections to set up hisown company. After a vigorous fund-raising campaign enough money wascollected to save the theatre and set up the Darling Theatre Company.The actors and actresses who had helped in the campaign concord toappear in Darling productions for a fraction of their normal fees just now were interested only in appearing in theatre classics quite a thancommercial productions so th e policy of the company from the beginningwas to stage classics for gyp runs of three to six weeks so thatthere would be ten or so new productions each year.In order to keep cost down the company had as fewer full-time staff aspossible, hiring directors, designers, technical crews and actors foreach production only, and, by subsidising less popular plays with prospering runs, often of Chekhov (Hes the Monet of theatre,George would say, everybody loves him) managed to break even forthe first few years. However in the mid-eighties the company hit a horridpatch and George was obliged to find spare funding to prevail. Whenhis application for an humanistic discipline Council subsidy was rejected he turned tosponsorship and discovered that he was unassailable at persuading wealthycompanies to back his productions. The key to this, he realised too soonon, was providing company executives with access to famous actors andactresses and while there were protests at these extra perform ancesGeorge was usually successful in arguing that the company could notsurvive otherwise.BACKGROUND TO THE COMPUTER SYSTEMThroughout its twenty-five years the companys administrativeprocedures were primitive and chaotic. George was interested only inthe chaste side of the company and had little or no concern forpracticalities provided his personal charm was so great that staff wereprepared to throw away up with the constant problems caused by poorly-definedprocedures and non-existent communication. Then in the new speed of lightGeorges health began to fail and he was frequently not around toresolve mix-ups and disputes. In addition the regulations governingtheatres and public performances and the hiring of part-time workers