Equity

The Arts Theatre in the heart of London’s West End, where Peter Hall premiered the English language version of Waiting For Godot, is threatened with demolotion. It is the first to be listed on Equity’s brand new theatres at risk web site. Equity is now encouraging members to use the web site to back the campaign to save the Arts.

Gamma Investments, which owns the building on Great Newport Street, wants to demolish the Arts Theatre as part of a plan to redevelop the block of surrounding property, possibly into a hotel, although Gamma has said that the re-development would include a theatre.
Edward Snape, the director of the Arts, has been fighting Gamma’s plans in favour of refurbishments which are now urgently needed. The Arts went dark in July at the end of the run of Immodesty Blaize and Walter’s Burlesque!

Edward Snape issued the following statement in July: “The Arts Theatre, the first London home to the Royal Shakespeare Company, has reached an important crossroads in terms of its future. Its future lies in the hands of the freehold property developers who now seem on course to knock the theatre down and build hotels and offices around a new smaller theatre space.”
Recent work at the Arts Theatre includes Another Country, Entertaining Mr Sloane, The Vagina Monologues, Jesus Hopped the ‘A’ Train, Gagarin Way, Eden, the Pet Shop Boys’ musical Closer to Heaven, and Corin Redgrave in his one-man show Tynan.

Before his heart attack Corin Redgrave joined the campaign to save the Arts Theatre and called on fellow performers to defend the West End venue. Speaking to The Stage he said: “I think the case is overwhelming for retaining the theatre. Anyone who has lived and worked in the theatre knows that lots of us wouldn’t be