Village Squire, 1979-06, Page 15London playwright Peter Colley returns to the Blyth Summer
Festival this season with his new play I'll Be Back to Get You
Before Midnight, a comedy thriller.
would drive inland to visit a theatre.
Local people for the most part thought theatre was either
something confirmed to the big city or practiced by the local
lawyer or housewife in an amateur company. Those who had
already discovered the joys of theatre already had two theatres
within easy driving distance. the huge and prestigious Stratford
Festival, and the Huron Country Playhouse in Grand Bend which
had just gottert, off the ground a couple of years earlier but was
moving ahead rapidly.
But the road had been paved for interest in relevant theatre by
the success of The Farm Show of Theatre Passe Muraille. It was
the first live professional theatre seen by many Western Ontario
people and they were fascinated at seeing people like themselves
appear on stage as characters, in seeing their problems and
frustrations acted out on the stage. When people learned that the
Blyth theatre was providing the same kind of programming, they
began to come in. it was this local audience, the audience from a
40 or 50 mile radius of the village, that still provides the bulk of
the patrons for the theatre.
Local support was . strong from the beginning. The first
opening night saw a packed hall as the Blyth village council and
the Legion took part in ceremonies that rededicated the
Memorial Hall to the memory of the fallen soliders of two world
wars. It was a memorable night. Patrons were plagued by the
problem that was to be one of the most stubborn in the next few
years: heat. The temperature of the building rose as the night
wore on. Actors costumes changed color. The old varnish on the
seats in the hall became tacky and patrons stuck to their seats.
Yet there was a feeling of electricity in the air during the
performance and at a reception afterward. There was a feeling
that those present were witnessing a historic beginning.
The first season had a tiny budget of only 510,000 including a
grant of $2500 from the Ontario Arts Council. The professional
staff numbered only six. Local amateurs were recruited for the
additional roles in The Mousetrap. A local high school student,
Mark Battye played the young Harry in Mostly in Clover. Mr.
Roy's wife, Anne worked as unpaid administrator and interested
people from the community chipped in to help any way they
could.
This year the staff will number over 30 at the Festival. It's still
understaffed in many ways, but the workload is certainly easier
than in the old days. The budget, though still small in
comparison to many theatres, is now over $110,000. The theatre
is able to accomplish more with its money than many theatres
because of the skills of Mr. Roy and administrative director Jan
Dutton of squeezing the most out of every dollar. Still,. like all
theatres it is heavily dependent on private donations and
government grants. Some $29,000 must be raised each year from
private donors.
That first season saw nearly 3000 people attend the theatre.
Last year nearly 14,000 people paid their way in. They found
things much more comfortable than the hardy audiences of the
1975 season. The sticky seats have long since disappeared after a
Local Initiatives Project in the winter of 1975-76 saw Memorial
Hall spruced up from top to bottom with new paint and a
cleaning up of the woodwork. Last year the improvement so long
awaited by audience members and actors alike was added with
the installation of air conditioning.
The airconditioning was step one of a program to update the
facilities of Memorial Hall to make it a first class place to perform
theatre as well as watch it. One of the banes of actors has been
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June 1979, Village Squire 13