{"id":11705,"date":"2020-08-16T08:02:22","date_gmt":"2020-08-16T08:02:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/?p=11705"},"modified":"2020-08-19T15:53:40","modified_gmt":"2020-08-19T15:53:40","slug":"we-must-pay-to-view-the-action-online-and-onstage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/2020\/08\/we-must-pay-to-view-the-action-online-and-onstage\/","title":{"rendered":"We must pay to view the action online and onstage"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Every moment her light was growing fainter; and he knew that if it went out she would be no more. \u201cDo you believe?\u201d he cried.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Peter Pan: JM Barrie<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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With the lightest touch, David Greig raises the spirits of Peter Pan, Tinker Bell and their maker, JM Barrie, in the opening sequence of the National Theatre of Scotland\u2019s magical haunting film My Light Shines On: Ghost Light<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A ghost light, in theatre lore<\/a>, is the light left on by the last person to leave the building and switched off by the first to arrive. \u201cIts constant illumination,\u201d says NTS,<\/a> \u201crepresents the enduring spirit of theatre in dark times.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the 30 minute film by Hope Dickson Leach the light flickers through every nook and cranny of Edinburgh\u2019s empty Festival Theatre, the old Empire on the Covid-cleared South Bridge which should be heaving at this time of year. It teases and tantalises Afton Moran\u2019s Peter Pan, casts offstage shadows on Thierry Mabonga, throws a dazzling halo behind Siobhan Redmond performing Jackie Kay\u2019s Waiting in the Wings<\/em>.<\/p>\n

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httpss:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=AXajvQfXsu4&feature=emb_logo<\/p>\n

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Spellbound, you follow the trail round the building through dressing rooms, up lighting tower, along corridors, into cupboards, foyer, prompt room, and back on to the stage. As Thom Dibdhin\u2019s fine review<\/a> for the Stage observes, the NTS which has mastered the art of creating \u2018theatre without walls\u2019 now rallies us to the cause of buttressing those theatre walls by getting \u201cright into the fabric of a theatre building \u2013 its bones, as it were.\u201d<\/p>\n

How to support this cause? Peter Pan knows how. Tink will survive if children believe in fairies. “If you believe,” he shouted, “clap your hands; don’t let Tink die.” Many clapped in JM Barrie\u2019s version though \u201csome beasts hissed”. In Ghost Light, Afton Moran\u2019s heart-tuggingly solitary, echoing, clap seems to revive the waning Tinker Bell and we are drawn towards the morning light streaming through an opened window.<\/p>\n

We can do more than clap\u00a0<\/h2>\n

In real life we need to do more than clap. The EIF YouTube<\/a> channel is fast filling with a treasure trove of talent: music, theatre, ballet. There\u2019s more still \u2013 poetry, dance, plays \u2013 via NTS YouTube<\/a> channel and so many others on different platforms: The Stand Comedy, jazz, piping via Inner Ear<\/a> to pick just one more.\u00a0 But we have not yet acquired the habit of paying online for what we crave in real life. In our new Neverland, big tech Captain Hook grows ever richer while lost boys and girls of theatre, music and all performing arts struggle for survival as we gorge at home on good things \u2018free\u2019 to view. Streaming giants of the US \u2013 \u00a0Netflix<\/a>,\u00a0Amazon Prime<\/a>\u00a0Video and\u00a0Disney Plus<\/a> \u2013 have all grown fatter during UK lockdown. At the last count Amazon\u2019s Jeff Bezos is now worth $188.2 billion<\/a> and, says Forbes: \u201c<\/strong>Despite the employee complaints, business is booming at Amazon and Bezos keeps getting richer by the day.\u201d<\/p>\n

We have a vital part to play in this drama crisis. We can and must put pressure on government to invest in our cultural core. Not just the great national institutions \u2013 our concert halls, theatres and big line-up arenas \u2013 but the local lifeblood projects that would be filling basement bars, community halls, backlane studios and choir stalls. But we can also, and must, get into the habit of paying for enjoying the wonderful motley mix of human skills which brings music, dance and theatre to our screens. Just as we would if we were attending the events in real life. Or see a generation of talent fade away.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThe clapping stopped suddenly,\u201d writes JM Barrie<\/a>, \u201cbut already Tink was saved. First her voice grew strong, then she popped out of bed, then she was flashing through the room more merry and impudent than ever. She never thought of thanking those who believed, but she would have liked to get at the ones who had hissed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then off she flies with Peter Pan to rescue Wendy from Captain Hook.<\/p>\n

Featured image is a screenshot from the film Ghost Light directed by Hope Dickson Leach \u2013 in collaboration with NTS artistic director Jackie Wylie and dramaturg Philip Howard.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Some essential viewing<\/h4>\n

Edinburgh International Festival: My Light Shines On, celebrating the Festival City.<\/a><\/p>\n

National Theatre of Scotland: Theatre Without Walls<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

Fringe comedy, The Stand streamed, music, discussion: Inner Ear livestream<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

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<\/h2>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Theatre and all performing arts are in crisis. We can, and must, get into the habit of paying for online culture, just as we would if we were attending the event in real life. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":11706,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[604,519,518],"class_list":["post-11705","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","tag-covid-19","tag-edinburgh-international-festival","tag-national-theatre-of-scotland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11705"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11705\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}