Jotting Number Twenty-six – well, I’ll be jiggered.

I guess it’s time for some sort of a semi-annual review, especially since I am becoming increasingly aware that my eyesight has continued to deteriorate since my stroke, so ere long I may have to stop writing. Over the weeks, I have tried to work out what you like, dear reader, and more importantly what you don’t like. Amazingly, you approve of my reflections about Theatre, even when they are based on my own reminiscences, and I know beyond doubt that you can’t get enough news about the Granary Theatre community, especially its avian contingent.

But, this time, I want to write entirely for myself

And this is a good place to appraise you of a discovery I made this week when my daughter tried to send me an e-mail via the amdram link. It did not reach me as it should have done; technology dictates that it should have whistled straight through to this computer. I am forced to wonder how many other people have been disappointed when I did not reply to them, so I’ll confide in you that you alone can use my personal e-mail address: rodoweft@aol.com (note the f), but don’t tell anybody else.

From this personal standpoint I want to discuss with you the singular and vital role that community-based amateur theatre could play in today’s world.

The phrase ‘today’s world’ begs examination and the construction of an historical perspective. I feel that amateur theatre has lost its way and could wander to extinction unless it finds a sense of purpose that complements and uses the pressures of today’s society. Its problems have accelerated during the past fifty years, but they began long before, when Oliver Cromwell closed theatres as demonic devices. Before he did this, theatre was enjoyed by people from all levels of society; indeed, ordinary people must have been infinitely more poetically and literally sensitive than most people today. When, at the Restoration, theatres were reopened, their productions had been priced out of the reach of ordinary people. A mechanisation had taken place and it was only the music hall that eventually made its way back to ‘working’ people, as their expression. It is my personal concern that Drama never made its way back into the control of ordinary working people, it was hijacked by a pretentious minority who continue to stifle its development as the expression of the community.

But, please, dear reader, allow me to explain why I think the demise has been accelerated during the course of my own lifetime, in this way: I was born into a world in which citizens of ‘civilised’ countries were about to start killing each other in thousands every day. Sixty-five years later, I view a world divided into two cultures, both ruled by commerce, convention and particularly by religion. In one, it has been found convenient – in pursuit of self-indulgence and self-justification - to sideline religious morality in favour of the acquisition of wealth and status. In the other culture (in which I have lived and worked at various times in the last forty years, sometimes for quite long periods), religious fervour has been used as a tool with which to manipulate the population. In many countries of this persuasion, Theatre – together with other forms of assembly and expression – is illegal. Both cultures continue to use interpretations of their holy teachings to achieve given objectives. Inevitably this has led to conflict and the emergence of antisocial extremism.

In our headlong rush toward ‘the acquisition of wealth and status’, we have wrought a technological revolution in which electronic devices have taken command of our lives and our cultures. Where once a family unit provided the basic building block of society and families formed into vociferous communities that entertained themselves, all aspects of life have been reorganised as elements of a massive commercial exploitation on at least a national basis if not worldwide. Technologies overtake technologies in pursuit of corporate profit, often without regard for the effect on society. Families of relatives have been replaced by families of characters in television soap-operas. Outlandish and antisocial behaviour becomes accepted as normal. If you doubt this, please undertake the simple experiment of transferring the utterances of men and women with each other in any televised duologue.

I’m telling you nothing new or revolutionary when I say that our minds and our lives are manipulated by the media. The media are forced by their corporate employers to attract the largest audience possible, therefore they pander to the lowest common denominator, which is why we find ourselves required to be fascinated by oafish characters in boring situations. We have descended through the dross of watching people cooking, decorating and gardening, until we have reached what I hope is the bottom of the brainless barrel in which we watch groups of people sitting around doing absolutely nothing. George Orwell got the year wrong.

If you still doubt that our brains, minds and opinions are manipulated, I draw your attention to a certain police ‘soap’ with which some of you know of my association. These days, some 20% of Metropolitan Police officers are women and a good thing too, but, at the Sun Hill station, 57% of the ‘officers’ are women. In this, I must admit to bias since I worked my way through actor-training by serving as a constable in the Metropolitan Police. At that time, we had control of the streets by commanding the respect and support (even the affection) of the public. Times have changed.

Our minds, opinions and resources – especially financially – are manipulated.

In all this – except for the technology by which lighting and sound effects are achieved - the principles of live theatre have changed not one iota since monks performed the mystery plays in churches, storytellers assembled their eager audiences and troupes of strolling players set up stages in market places. Changes HAVE taken place, however, in the training of actors. As a 19-year-old drama student I learned the disciplines of Voice Production, Speech, Movement, Mime, Dancing, Fighting, Singing, Character Analysis, Text Interpretation and so on and so on, all with a view to performing efficiently in theatres of different sizes. Since then, as theatres have closed and more and more paid work has become available in Television (also Film. but...) the emphases have changed and commercially-orientated actors have been taught televisual techniques. After all, they have their livings to earn.

But nothing has changed in amateur community theatre; we still have the same disciplines to learn in order to communicate good plays to living Audiences in our theatres located in towns and villages throughout the land.

And yet – by and large – our theatres are accepted as the province of a relatively small sector of each community. In conurbations with populations numbered in many thousands, we are content to play our plays to Audiences that can be measured as a very tiny percentage of the potential customer-base. Why?

It is open to every amateur theatre company to question its community in order to discover what is required to attract all sectors of the community in their thousands into our theatres.

If Manchester United can work it out, so can we. We have a better product to sell. I can hear you choking on your G&Ts from here. as I write

Yes, it means losing some of our traditional self-delusion. We have to cease aping our far better financed superiors in the West End of London. We have to cease comparing ourselves with Film and Television, which are totally different in every respect from our beloved Amateur Theatre. We have to demand of ourselves exceptional standards of craftsmanship as we learn all aspects of our trade.

Above all, we have to channel the repressed energies of our people. This might mean opening our minds to the possibility that brilliant original material could come from within our very own community. Perhaps we have playwrights. Perhaps we could develop material of relevance to our community by building in workshop.

O.K., I’ll shut up and let you work out the rest for yourself.

Thank you for listening.

Jonah was a very experience director, teacher and writer who sadly passed away in February 2006. He was also the author of the highly successful "Playmaker - The Craft of Directing Plays (The Way I Seen It)".