![]() ![]() “We have already cut back the workforce – this is the workforce that worked so hard above and beyond during the pandemic and have already been pared down from previous cost efficiencies,” says Owen Calvert-Lyons, artistic director and chief executive of Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds, which saw its energy bill soar by £47,000 in August. Whilst the government’s business energy price cap offered some relief, it still means energy costs for businesses are twice what they were in October 2021. These theatres, cinemas, pubs, clubs and music venues have been struggling to recover from the Covid pandemic since autumn 2021 – in some cases unsuccessfully, like the UK’s Cineworld chain, the world’s second largest, which filed for bankruptcy in the US at the start of September. Indeed, a 2015 report by the Building Research Establishment’s Future Cities Research programme said that a diverse city centre lit by the social glow of cinemas, shops, restaurants and theatres reduced violent crime. Owen Calvert-Lyons, artistic director and chief executive of Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds, points out that lighting drives a theatre’s marketing. “They add to the vibrancy of the street,” he explains. Lighting is even integral to a theatre’s marketing – with street display banners acting as more than simply naming the show. ![]() It would be helpful if we had a proper intervention on capital and infrastructure.” Short-term solutions only deal with this year’s problem. “We switched to LED lighting, which cost us £1 million, but I know other theatres haven’t and the cost involved, particularly in Victorian theatres, is high at a time like this. “The normal instruments of control when you have a building the size of five football fields are just nibbling at the edges,” The Lowry’s CEO Julia Fawcett tells me. Salford’s Lowry has two theatres, a drama studio, the Pier Eight Restaurant and an art gallery. Although management are planning to turn off the heating when possible, Craig Hassall, the chief executive, said there was little leeway when electricity and lighting is intrinsic to most modern shows. According to the Society of London Theatre and UK Theatre, theatres are facing an average cost increase of 600 per cent after last week’s energy cap with the Albert Hall staring down an increased energy bill of £1 million between October and February despite the government’s intervention. The same is true for theatres, which also face soaring production budgets – up at least 30 per cent in terms of timber, metal and build costs alone. “For the average ticket, studios already take around 50 per cent,” says Clapp, “but we can’t load the costs onto ticket price if we are going to get customers struggling themselves.” Energy is now the largest single expense, overtaking staffing. In 2021, energy costs for the average cinema were 20 per cent of money out it is now 35 per cent or more. “We can’t turn off the lights or the projector.” “Cinemas need to be lit and heated to welcome customers,” says Phil Clapp, chief executive of the UK Cinema Association. In Athens, the Greek parliament is flicking the switch at dusk, and in Paris – the very city of light itself – the Eiffel Tower’s glow is now dimmed when the last visitor leaves.Īnd yet switching off the lights to save energy isn’t much use to Britain’s cultural industries. ![]() In Berlin, the Victory Column and the Berlin Cathedral remain unlit at night. The lights are going out all over Europe, to paraphrase Sir Edward Grey’s World War I lament. ![]()
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