MANIFESTO!

Britain’s appeal for a re-nationalised National Theatre.

Britain’s national theatre is not relevant to its entire audience. Housed in London, it appeals to a small demographic of society, making little attempt to leave its monumental home in search for the nation’s performance capacity. It’s become a platform for indulging in celebrity as a means of civic pride. Rather than expressing its nations talent it seeks to maintain and glorify its own status.

The audience is limited and exclusive. The performance selection process is inherently biased. It’s become a place of representing what British theatre should be, rather than enhancing national theatre as it could be. Token gestures of ‘community engagement’ don’t encourage ownership, but limit involvement!

Today, a far more democratic performance showcase is already rising. This grassroots system is grown through making use of the Internet in a relevant and clever way. Utilizing video sharing technology, no one organisation body has to decide what is shown, neither are audiences targeted specifically. The success of work is based on the popularity, and therefore the ranking of the piece.

Britain needs a National Theatre that is completely renationalised, a theatre that exists not in one place, but is dispersed across the length and breadth of the country. In the streets, people’s homes, in schools, abandoned factories, leisure centres, church halls and fields the content is decided by its online audience.

Work would initially be selected for development through a democratic audience ranking system. The work is then eventually shown in the original location. This location could be anywhere in the country, not just London.

Our Monument of civic pride on the South Bank will inevitably be questioned. What is the need for a physical centralised building when there is a thriving self-supported National Theatre that is far more transient and broader than one geographical location?

Britain needs to take ownership of its theatre heritage, navigating its way forward, instead of leaving responsibility to a few, predominantly middle class people in one part of the country.

Conceive an institution known for creating politics rather than representing them, one that counters the hierarchical structure of our society in which we make theatre, one pushes our working method into the new millennium.