The King’s Theatre is in danger. Will Quinn, Broughton arts critic and editor of the Quinntessential Review, explains the crisis facing a cultural asset for the whole city.
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There remain only a few weeks for Capital Theatres, locally based stewards of the historic Leven Street venue, to keep the doors open for this and the next generation.
The A-listed institution has welcomed audiences for over a century, hosts Scotland’s best-selling panto (Top 3 in the UK), and has long been a principal stop in the UK’s high-quality touring-theatre circuit.
The 1,350 seats are vital to the International Festival, as well as to the ambitions (and fundraising ability) of leading amateur groups and community organisations.
Faced with the pressing need for renovations, Capital Theatres have been raising and saving the requisite funds for years. They successfully accrued the £26m originally quoted, but global instability and inflation then abruptly raised costs by an eye-watering £8.9m.
The deadline for greenlighting the works is rapidly approaching, and if the money cannot be secured from either public or private pockets, the doors will close and the keys be passed back to the City Council.
The city’s cultural landscape would be badly damaged, jobs lost, and vital revenue stripped from nearby shops and hospitality businesses. The building would fall into ruin, be restored at even higher cost by the Council alone, and/or be sold off to some outfit managed by a faceless investment firm.
If this seems rankly undesirable to you, now is the time to write to your councillors, MSPs and MPs to urge them to do whatever they can to keep the King’s Theatre alive and in local hands.
[Image: By kim traynor, CC BY-SA 2.0.]
