Local Theatre is Suffering
Amateur performances of plays, musicals and operettas have been a staple for local communities across the country for hundreds of years. Amateur theatre develops a sense of community, it can produce the professional stars of tomorrow, and helps to support local economies… but since the pandemic it is suffering, badly.
A brief insight to CTC
CTC have been staging shows locally for more than 50 years. During our history we have performed at Christchurch Methodist Church and Hind Leys College in Shepshed, Barry Young’s Stardust Theatre in Bardon, and of course Loughborough Town Hall and now Mountsorrel Memorial Centre (MMC).
As a society we have staged 100+ shows, countless concerts and have entertained thousands of people across our community, we have always been hugely thankful to the local audiences who have supported us in all we have done.
Over our 55 years, audiences have supported us when we have performed well known musicals such as The Sound of Music, Blood Brothers, and Jesus Christ Superstar, Grease and Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, alongside lesser-known titles such as Jekyll and Hyde, Rent and The Witches of Eastwick.
Hundreds of members have been involved with the society both on stage and off, with a number of these talented locals moving on to work professionally within the theatre industry.
The Pandemic
In March 2020 the country went into lockdown in response to the recent pandemic, and as a result we had to cancel our production of Kander and Ebb’s Chicago. We finally had the privilege to perform together again in January 2022 in our production of Shrek the Musical, but due to the emergence of the Omicron variant, and the need for self-isolation, ticket sales were not as high as we were used to.
Looking ahead
The threat of low-ticket sales is still worrying going into 2025. Moving forward, it seems the viewing publics buying and viewing habits have shifted notably, with more and more people leaving ticket purhcases until the very last minute and buying “on the day” or only a matter of days ahead, which makes it difficult to plan budgets for shows.
Over recent years we have seen production costs rise considerably. Every aspect of a production comes at a cost, including costumes, wigs, make up, scenery, props, lighting, sound, orchestra, publicity, advertising, insurances, rehearsal space and performance venues, and in all areas the prices have increased. People may be surprised to learn that an average production, costs between a staggering £45,000 and £50,000 to stage.
As a local amateur theatre company, we receive no external funding, we rely solely on membership fees and ticket sales to finance our productions, and what many of our audience members don’t realise is that we don’t receive every penny from each ticket sold.
When staging a show, local amateur theatre groups must pay a license fee, this tends to be around 16% of every ticket sold. This is on top of the £1.50 per ticket that is paid to the venue as a booking fee. So, for each £22 ticket sold, CTC only receive around £16.00 to £17.00.
This means that audience support, and ticket sales, is the difference between us breaking even and being able to carry on producing high quality productions or making a significant financial loss which makes the society unsustainable.
Can you help?
As a society we realise that we are going through unprecedented times, with rising living costs.
CTC have been a stable part of the local community for the past 55 years and we hope to continue staging productions for the community for many more, but without audience support our future looks very uncertain.