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

The History of the Darling Theatre Company This theatre company came into being in 1979 when a famous old London theatre went bankrupt and the owners of the building attempted to sell it to property developers. George Darling, a well known stage actor, launched a campaign to save the theatre and, with the help of many famous friends in the acting world, created strong public support for retaining the building as a theatre. However no existing theatre company was in a position to take over the building and the owners suggested to George Darling that he use his connections to set up his own company. After a vigorous fund-raising campaign enough money was collected to save the theatre and set up the Darling Theatre Company. The actors and actresses who had helped in the campaign agreed to appear in Darling productions for a fraction of their normal fees – but were interested only in appearing in theatre classics rather than commercial productions so the policy of the company from the beginning was to stage classics for short runs of three to six weeks so that there would be ten or so new productions each year. In order to keep costs down the company had as few full-time staff as possible, hiring directors, designers, technical crews and actors for each production only, and, by subsidising less popular plays with successful runs, often of Chekhov (‘He’s the Monet of theatre,’ George would say, ‘ everybody loves him’) managed to break even for the first few years. However in the mid-eighties the company hit a bad patch and George was obliged to find extra funding to survive. When his application for an Arts Council subsidy was rejected he turned to sponsorship and discovered that he was good at persuading wealthy companies to back his productions. The key to this, he realised early on, was providing company executives with access to famous actors and actresses and while there were protests at these ‘extra performances’ George was usually successful in arguing that the company could not survive otherwise. BACKGROUND TO THE COMPUTER SYSTEM Throughout its twenty-five years the company’s administrative procedures were primitive and chaotic. George was interested only in the artistic side of the company and had little or no concern for practicalities but his personal charm was so great that staff were prepared to put up with the constant problems caused by poorly-defined procedures and non-existent communication. Then in the new century George’s health began to fail and he was frequently not around to resolve mix-ups and disputes. In addition the regulations governing theatres and public performances and the hiring of part-time workers