Somebody, somewhere, must want an opera company, right? That seems to be the thinking behind the latest agreement struck between ENO (fighting to stay alive) and Arts Council England (fighting to save face).
After ACE cut ENO’s annual funding from a cool £12.8m to a freezing zero in November last year, and demanded that it move to Manchester (much to Manchester’s surprise, and that of Opera North, which operates very effectively in the region ta very much), there was an outcry.
ENO fought back, and the latest news, announced this week, is that the opera company will now be able to apply for £24m in public funding between 2024-26 (they’ve already been handed £11.46m for 2023-24 to keep them alive, though this remains below what ENO got as a National Portfolio Organisation), “to support the ENO’s transition to a new artistic and business model with a primary base out of London, whilst they continue to manage and put on work at the London Coliseum.”
What does that even mean? Do they need another theatre to act as their second home, or will opening an office in, say, Norwich, tick enough boxes to meet the chaotic demands of a post-Dorries ACE so that we can pretend this whole sorry affair never happened?
Either way, as anyone who has moved house knows, it’s going to be expensive, and what about the cost of running a second base, what impact will that have on ENO’s ability to develop world-class work in London? Equity warns the project “will come at a huge cost to the workforce”.
I care deeply that the provision of arts outside of the capital should be enriched and increased, and that local councils should be encouraged to help and support arts organisations across the UK.
But would it not be more efficient for ACE to encourage a new business model for ENO (which could do with a tidy up) while remaining in its home so as to avoid the cost of setting up elsewhere? Two bases will almost certainly mean more travel, not less.
And, crucially, they could stipulate that a good chunk of funding can only go towards vigorously developing regional relationships, with a view to creating more widely toured co-productions. Levelling up, if we must call it that, by way of empowering regional organisations and creatives to work with larger companies and bigger stars, and ensuring that there’s a robust touring infrastructure in place to get quality work to even more places around the country. Two bases sounds to me like stretching an already beleaguered company that bit too thin.
