Wish you were here: Theatre

FOR A GOOD TIME, GO OUT: At Your Service: The Life and Yarns of Robert Service – My Glorious Youth, with Jeffrey Renn, at the Max Cameron Theatre.

BY PIETA WOOLLEY

In the middle of September, actor Jeffery Renn came back to his hometown to perform At Your Service: The Life and Yarns of Robert Service – My Glorious Youth, at the Max Cameron Theatre. It’s an internationally-touring one-man show.

But in the 400-seat theatre, just 28 people filled seats that Saturday night. Afterwards in the lobby, Max Cameron Theatre manager Jacquie Dawson said that in the three-night run, no night attracted more than 30 people.

“I normally wouldn’t book a show in September,” she said. “It’s not a great month for audiences, but that’s when he was coming through on tour.”

Even by September’s standards, the audience was tiny. Too small to cover the costs (other audiences at The Max have been much larger since then, however.)

Jacquie is a life-long theatre professional, with a distinguished career going back to coordinating the cultural village and performers for the 1978 Commonwealth Games in Edmonton, through managing national touring shows and music, and much more. For the past 15 years, she has been at the helm of qathet’s largest presenting theatre: the Max Cameron, at Brooks Secondary School.

This winter, Jacquie is raising the alarm that audiences have shrunk so much since COVID – and realistically, over the last 10 years – that qathet may lose at least some of what we have.

SHE’S NEVER SEEN ANYTHING LIKE THIS:

Max Cameron Theatre manager Jacquie Dawson (on stage at the Max with the members of Tiller’s Folly) has been working in the performing arts field across Canada for more than 40 years. She is concerned that if audiences don’t come back – in qathet and nationally – we’ll start to lose what we’ve built. That’s true here and across Canada.

Indeed, COVID blasted a crater in our collective show-going habits, here and across Canada, as we discovered the joys of the couch and Disney+, Sportsnet, and of course, Netflix. Now, coming out of COVID, we’re also struggling financially with expensive groceries and fuel, sharply-higher housing costs, and debt. Plus, many of us are staying home to avoid this season’s flu and respiratory virus… not to mention omicron, which is still circulating.

Performing arts audiences are down nationally by at least 40%, according to a pair of Zoom seminars this fall collaboratively prepared by several national arts agencies. However, here in qathet, it’s hard to generalize. Most presenters describe audiences as “hit and miss.” Very hard to predict. Sometimes, they’re sold out. Other times, they’re not.

The region’s big five theatres – the Max Cameron, the Patricia, the Evergreen, James Hall at the Academy of Music, and Cranberry Hall – plus the Kings at the Hap Parker Arena – are all hoping to increase the size of their audiences in 2023. Those at the top know it’s going to be a fight.

The Patricia Theatre (showing Minions, summer 2022)

Adding to the stress on the big venues are just the sheer number of events that can happen on a single night in town. Smaller venues have become popular places to see live performances and film. For example, the Forest Bistro hosted the Townsite Actors’ Guild original play, Weed Lube: a Slippery Slope this fall (it’s coming back March 2 to 4). All four performances were sold out, packing the 70-seat Marine Avenue establishment – which also served tapas and cocktails to the audience to enjoy during the show. That’s something most larger venues can’t do.

Sherman Downey at Cranberry Hall

Locals and visitors can enjoy live music regularly at The Boardwalk Restaurant in Lund, 101 Bistro at the Lund Hotel, Wildwood Public House, Forest Bistro, Seasider Restaurant, the Carlson Community Club, the Open Air Market, the Royal Canadian Legion and elsewhere. The Patricia Theatre re-opened in October 2021 under the nonprofit management of the qathet Film Society, and may expand to be able to host more live performances as well. Royal Zayka screens Bollywood films some nights. The ARC on Alberni, Townsite Market, the Library, Tidal Art Centre, qathet Art Centre, the Loggers Memorial Amphitheatre, the Rotary Pavilion at Willingdon, the re-built Lund Gazebo, the re-built stage at Palm Beach, Townsite Brewing, and more are relatively new venues that host performances. Lang Bay Hall, the Italian Hall and the soon-to-be-upgraded Lund Community Hall are historic and still-vibrant venues. Even the new Resource Recovery Centre will feature a natural amphitheatre with concert potential. And more.

Kathaumixw at James Hall

If all of qathet’s 21,000 people were invested in going out and seeing something one night a week – live music, a movie, a hockey game – we could certainly support all these venues. But for all the reasons listed above and more, we haven’t been. So, like everything else in 2023, our venues are vulnerable to our social and economic flux.

It would be tragic to lose them.

pieta@prliving.ca