“I think it’s one of the sillier plays I’ve written; it’s nice to be silly occasionally!”
Thursday, June 22, 2017
Taking Steps in rehearsal
A play widely regarded as Alan Ayckbourn’s funniest, and his one true farce, Taking Steps, joins the programme at the Stephen Joseph Theatre next month.
When tongue-tied solicitor Tristram is sent along to oversee the sale of a large and crumbling house, he may have bitten off more than he can chew: hardware tycoon Roland Crabbe and scheming builder Leslie Bainbridge are not the easiest of clients. Roland’s wife Elizabeth is on the brink of leaving him with the help of her brother Mark and his shrinking-violet fiancée Kitty. Misunderstandings multiply and play out in every corner of the three-storey house.
Alan Ayckbourn says: “Farce is the most difficult thing to write because it has to be a riot from beginning to end. Taking Steps is a difficult piece to handle, and I like a challenge - it requires the most delicate balance and the steadiest of hands to work.
“I think it’s one of the sillier plays I’ve written; it’s nice to be silly occasionally!”
Taking Steps goes is currently in rehearsal with a cast of six: Russell Dixon, Antony Eden, Laura Matthews, Laurence Pears, Louise Shuttleworth and Leigh Symonds.
The creative team comprises designer Kevin Jenkins, who has recently designed several productions with Alan at the SJT, including The Karaoke Theatre Company, Consuming Passions and No Knowing; lighting designer Jason Taylor, who has worked on many productions at the SJT.
Taking Steps can be seen in the Round at the SJT, in rep, from Thursday 13 July to Thursday 5 October. Tickets, priced from £10 to £25, are available from the box office on 01723 370541 and online at www.sjt.uk.com.
“I think it’s one of the sillier plays I’ve written; it’s nice to be silly occasionally!”
Friday, June 16, 2017
60 Years At The SJT: 1985 - 1987
2017 marks the 60th anniversary of Alan Ayckbourn joining the Library Theatre, Scarborough, in 1957. Alan has been indelibly associated with the company since that time as actor, writer, director and Artistic Director.
60 Years At The SJT: 1985 - 1987
The period of 1985 to 1987 is an unusual one for Alan Ayckbourn and the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round in Scarborough.
For it was dominated by another theatre completely, namely the National Theatre and Alan's decision to take a two year sabbatical to the NT between 1986 and 1988.
In 1984, following on from the success of Alan's production of A Chorus Of Disapproval at the NT, its Artistic Director Peter Hall asked Alan if he would consider taking a position as a company director at the NT for two years.
By this point Alan had been associated with Scarborough since 1957 and had been Artistic Director since 1972. It was, Alan later admitted, the only offer he would have ever even remotely considered to take a break from Scarborough.
On 3 June 1985, the Scarborough Evening News broke the news that Alan Ayckbourn was to take a sabbatical from his adopted Scarborough home, but there was no mention of where he was going other than he frequently received offers to work with other theatres; it does appear though that despite the NT not being named, it was a badly kept secret and common knowledge that was his destination.
So associated with Scarborough had the playwright become, there was a huge amount of media interest in the news alongside questions of why Alan was leaving and whether he would be returning.
Considering all that was to follow, the answer was given at the very start by his partner and personal assistant heather Stoney, who noted: "Alan is looking for a break because he is very tired, but does not want to lose touch with Scarborough in the meantime. He will still be writing plays for the Scarborough theatre."
Implict in the initial announcement was Alan was leaving for a pre-determined period and would be returning to Scarborough. The theatre's manager, Ken Boden, admitted the theatre had known about the move for some time and had been 'taken aback' but the theatre felt it was a great honour that there was so much interest in Alan.
Plans were meanwhile put in place for his sabbatical with Alan's frequent collaborator Robin Herford being named Artistic Director of the venue alongside Alan Ayckbourn; Alan would not step down from the role, but would delegate the day-to-day running of the theatre to Robin.
It was confirmed at the end of the year that not only would the NT indeed by Alan's home for the next two years but the theatre's long-standing general manager, Ken Boden, would be standing down. Ken had been involved in the running of the theatre since Stephen Joseph founded the company in Scarborough in 1955.
Aside from feeling a need to take a rest from Scarborough, Alan announced that the offer by the NT was too good to refuse and offered a huge challenge to him which he hoped would re-invigorate him for Scarborough. The contract included working with his own company with three productions in each of the National Theatre's auditoria including the world premiere of a new work in the Olivier. It would give Alan an exposure and challenge he had never had before.
"A myth has grown up, quite without foundation, that the Theatre In The Round's success depends on me. This myth is particularly prevalent in London where some people think that every play produced at Scarborough is written by me," said the playwright at the time.
Although he did not write a new play for Scarborough for 1986 before he left - his final premiere before the sabbatical was Woman In Mind in 1985 - he did write a new adaptation of the Aldwych farce Tons Of Money, which he would also stage at the NT, and revived his classic Time & Time Again. He did confirm there would be new plays for both 1987 (Henceforward...) and 1988 (Man Of The Moment).
Alan left Scarborough in February to begin his work at the NT and, almost immediately, the gossip began that he was not to return, despite the fact it had been plainly stated from the start that he would not stay in London.
The prime instigator behind this appears to be the then Financial Times critic Michael Coveney who wrote an article implying that the playwright was leaving the seaside resort for good.
"There have been differences of opinion with Alan Ayckbourn's home town of Scarborough and he is sinking anchor at the National Theatre and running his own company."
The Scarborough theatre was quick to deny any such suggestion and rubbished claims that Alan had a rocky relationship with the town council; in fact, it had been a turbulent year for both Alan and the theatre, but no more turbulent than numerous other years between 1972 and 1986 including ones where he had publicly threatened to quit the town.
This unfounded report though did sting Alan and he quickly responded shooting down the allegation whilst also shedding a new light on his relationship with the Scarborough theatre, particularly another vicious rumour that he was personally profiting from the theatre.
For the first time it was revealed that he had never drawn a salary as Artistic Director of the theatre, had put in more than £70,000 of his own money to finance productions and that 1% of his gross box office receipts from productions of his work elsewhere went to the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round. He also confirmed he would be returning in May to Scarborough to direct the world premiere of Henceforward... before retrying to the NT.
Alan was then - as now - completely committed to the theatre which had made such a big impact on his life having been encouraged and inspired to write and direct by the company's founder Stephen Joseph.
To a small extent the rumours continued for several months, but it was tacitly acknowledged there was no story and the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round was also thriving even without Alan running it.
Late in 1986, the playwright confirmed he would be back in six months once he had directed two final shows at the NT; his remit having been extended from three to four productions.
In 1988, Alan returned to the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round, reinvigorated and re-enthused. His first production was the incredibly ambitious and classic Man Of The Moment and within two years he would be making his most ambitious plans for the theatre yet with plans to finally move the company to a permanent home.
His time in London had been a huge success, he had been lauded and won awards and his production of A View From The Bridge was acclaimed by Arthur Miller as the definitive production of his play.
He had proved a point. He had stretched his wings, met a new challenge and demonstrated to London his skills as not just playwright but also director, whilst also demonstrating the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round was not dependent on him alone and could run successfully without him.
Point proved, his began to eye his next challenge. One firmly set in Scarborough and the theatre he loved.
60 Years At The SJT: 1985 - 1987
The period of 1985 to 1987 is an unusual one for Alan Ayckbourn and the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round in Scarborough.
For it was dominated by another theatre completely, namely the National Theatre and Alan's decision to take a two year sabbatical to the NT between 1986 and 1988.
By this point Alan had been associated with Scarborough since 1957 and had been Artistic Director since 1972. It was, Alan later admitted, the only offer he would have ever even remotely considered to take a break from Scarborough.
On 3 June 1985, the Scarborough Evening News broke the news that Alan Ayckbourn was to take a sabbatical from his adopted Scarborough home, but there was no mention of where he was going other than he frequently received offers to work with other theatres; it does appear though that despite the NT not being named, it was a badly kept secret and common knowledge that was his destination.
So associated with Scarborough had the playwright become, there was a huge amount of media interest in the news alongside questions of why Alan was leaving and whether he would be returning.
Considering all that was to follow, the answer was given at the very start by his partner and personal assistant heather Stoney, who noted: "Alan is looking for a break because he is very tired, but does not want to lose touch with Scarborough in the meantime. He will still be writing plays for the Scarborough theatre."
Plans were meanwhile put in place for his sabbatical with Alan's frequent collaborator Robin Herford being named Artistic Director of the venue alongside Alan Ayckbourn; Alan would not step down from the role, but would delegate the day-to-day running of the theatre to Robin.
It was confirmed at the end of the year that not only would the NT indeed by Alan's home for the next two years but the theatre's long-standing general manager, Ken Boden, would be standing down. Ken had been involved in the running of the theatre since Stephen Joseph founded the company in Scarborough in 1955.
"A myth has grown up, quite without foundation, that the Theatre In The Round's success depends on me. This myth is particularly prevalent in London where some people think that every play produced at Scarborough is written by me," said the playwright at the time.
Although he did not write a new play for Scarborough for 1986 before he left - his final premiere before the sabbatical was Woman In Mind in 1985 - he did write a new adaptation of the Aldwych farce Tons Of Money, which he would also stage at the NT, and revived his classic Time & Time Again. He did confirm there would be new plays for both 1987 (Henceforward...) and 1988 (Man Of The Moment).
Alan left Scarborough in February to begin his work at the NT and, almost immediately, the gossip began that he was not to return, despite the fact it had been plainly stated from the start that he would not stay in London.
The prime instigator behind this appears to be the then Financial Times critic Michael Coveney who wrote an article implying that the playwright was leaving the seaside resort for good.
"There have been differences of opinion with Alan Ayckbourn's home town of Scarborough and he is sinking anchor at the National Theatre and running his own company."
This unfounded report though did sting Alan and he quickly responded shooting down the allegation whilst also shedding a new light on his relationship with the Scarborough theatre, particularly another vicious rumour that he was personally profiting from the theatre.
For the first time it was revealed that he had never drawn a salary as Artistic Director of the theatre, had put in more than £70,000 of his own money to finance productions and that 1% of his gross box office receipts from productions of his work elsewhere went to the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round. He also confirmed he would be returning in May to Scarborough to direct the world premiere of Henceforward... before retrying to the NT.
To a small extent the rumours continued for several months, but it was tacitly acknowledged there was no story and the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round was also thriving even without Alan running it.
Late in 1986, the playwright confirmed he would be back in six months once he had directed two final shows at the NT; his remit having been extended from three to four productions.
In 1988, Alan returned to the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round, reinvigorated and re-enthused. His first production was the incredibly ambitious and classic Man Of The Moment and within two years he would be making his most ambitious plans for the theatre yet with plans to finally move the company to a permanent home.
His time in London had been a huge success, he had been lauded and won awards and his production of A View From The Bridge was acclaimed by Arthur Miller as the definitive production of his play.
He had proved a point. He had stretched his wings, met a new challenge and demonstrated to London his skills as not just playwright but also director, whilst also demonstrating the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round was not dependent on him alone and could run successfully without him.
Point proved, his began to eye his next challenge. One firmly set in Scarborough and the theatre he loved.
Friday, June 9, 2017
60 Years At The SJT: 1984
2017 marks the 60th anniversary of Alan Ayckbourn joining the Library Theatre, Scarborough, in 1957. Alan has been indelibly associated with the company since that time as actor, writer, director and Artistic Director.
60 Years At The SJT: 1984
1984 saw the premiere of a play that is now considered an classic of the Ayckbourn canon, yet it had the potential to be very different.
We have already seen in 1982 how Alan Ayckbourn nearly wrote a thriller, Sight Unseen, but then changed his mind, salvaging only the characters and location to write Season's Greetings.
Two years later, he had another idea and although the basic concept always remained the same - a play set around a newcomer joining an amateur operatic society - the actual form it could have taken was wildly different from what was originally written.
The roots for A Chorus Of Disapproval go back to January 1984 when Alan received an enquiry from Peter Hall, Artistic Director of the National Theatre, whether he had any ideas for a new play for The Olivier at the venue.
This was the largest space at the NT and Alan took the opportunity to conceive an idea which would fill the stage with an amateur dramatic company and its production of Rudolf Friml's The Vagabond King....
I know what you're thinking, A Chorus Of Disapproval is centred around John Gay's The Beggar's Opera.
But not originally.
Alan had read The Vagabond King and admits it 'amused me no end' - and not in a particularly good way.
"It's one of the funniest Samuel French scripts in existance, because the songs have all got very, very painstakingly detailed stage directions on choreography: 'Man 2 and Man 13 run five paces down to L. and kneel, while Woman 15 dashes across to Man 4 and grasps him by the hand.' I had this image of this director, trying to direct the thing from a French's edition. As with all amateur societies, five of them hadn't turned up, two of them are standing in for others - you know, the comic results could be enormous!"
The ludicrous stage-directions would have obviously have had comic potential, but Alan had even grander ideas for the play - the first of his plays to include unexpected interaction from the audience.
"There would have been a large amateur choir, who would be scattered through the auditorium, reducing the audience capacity from its usual 303 to about 215 seats. There'd be about 85 singers, completely incognito, sitting in scattered seats, and at various points starting to sing from their seats - thus causing the person next to them to look absolutely alarmed."
It should be noted that in Paul Allen's biography of Alan Ayckbourn, he notes it would have been 20 people in the audience, but 85 or 20, it's still a fairly ludicrous amount of audience plants within a play.
To make this work for the original production in Scarborough, Alan needed more actors than he could possibly have afforded to pay, so he decided to turn to Scarborough's amateur community itself; creating a play about the amateur community populated by members of the amateur community - no possible chance of conflict there....
To this end, the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round placed an advert in the Scarborough Evening News, looking for budding amateur operatic members to appear in Alan's new play with the advert reading:
"He [Alan] is anxious to meet AMATEUR SINGERS who would be interested in taking part in this venture. Some Soloing experience is required at least sufficient to cope with the demands of the average Light Opera Society Repertoire."
Auditions actually took place with Alan Ayckbourn and leading members of the amateur community helping. Or rather not. At one point, Alan was shocked to see an auditionee begin singing before being abruptly told to leave. When Alan thought this had been done too harshly, he was told it was best not encourage them!
It was at this point that the whole project began too unravel and, perhaps, this was a blessing for the playwright who was uncertain about the direction the play was taking.
"Several things conspired to thwart the original idea. The Rudolph Friml Estate, fearing for their play, refused to release the rights. For which I didn't blame them one bit. Simultaneously, those members of the local Scarborough Operatic Society whom I had approached seemed reluctant to accept anything but leading roles, for which I didn't blame them either; and finally Equity, the Professional Actors' Trade Union, declared the whole idea of including amateurs in this way unacceptable. Which forced me into swift solutions, all of them, it transpired, blessings in disguise."
Alan returned to the script and abandoned The Vagabond King, which he later admitted was 'a load of garbage' and found instead a piece which he genuinely loved and was inspired by, John Gay's The Beggar's Opera.
"I greatly admired and had always wanted to produce, Gay's The Beggar's Opera. Which in turn provided the missing piece to the whole venture. Gay's play had a plot which echoed almost perfectly the one I intended to write and provided the perfect mirror image on which to build my own dramatic structure. Moral: always work with something you admire and not with something which you only set out to make fun of. That way you might even manage to raise your game rather than lower it."
With Equity having forcibly refused Alan's desire to have 85 amateurs in the company - presumably misguidedly believing Alan was about to employ 85 extra professionals - he jettisoned the grand scale for a small professional company and the play as we know it today began to take shape.
It was not all a wasted experience though as although Alan has frequently emphasised no-one in A Chorus Of Disapproval is based on a real person, his experiences with the amateur community did provide plenty of inspiration particularly for Pendoan Amateur Light Operatic Society's Artistic Director, Guy ap Llewellyn.
Alan, meanwhile, had written to Peter Hall and informed him of the changes to the play he had initially proposed.
“Needless to say, the play is vastly different from the one I described to you on the phone a few weeks ago. No chorus of amateurs. Just a few good singers. (Equity intervened there). I had to go back to John Gay as his agent was the only one who didn’t raise an objection.”
On 2 May 1984, A Chorus Of Disapproval opened at the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round, Scarborough, much altered from its original concept and none the worse for it. It would prove to be tremendously popular both in Scarborough and, the following year, at the National Theatre.
It would go on to become one of the most revived and popular plays in the Ayckbourn canon - and much beloved by amateur companies, which is not something the playwright would ever have predicted.
60 Years At The SJT: 1984
1984 saw the premiere of a play that is now considered an classic of the Ayckbourn canon, yet it had the potential to be very different.
We have already seen in 1982 how Alan Ayckbourn nearly wrote a thriller, Sight Unseen, but then changed his mind, salvaging only the characters and location to write Season's Greetings.
Two years later, he had another idea and although the basic concept always remained the same - a play set around a newcomer joining an amateur operatic society - the actual form it could have taken was wildly different from what was originally written.
This was the largest space at the NT and Alan took the opportunity to conceive an idea which would fill the stage with an amateur dramatic company and its production of Rudolf Friml's The Vagabond King....
I know what you're thinking, A Chorus Of Disapproval is centred around John Gay's The Beggar's Opera.
But not originally.
Alan had read The Vagabond King and admits it 'amused me no end' - and not in a particularly good way.
"It's one of the funniest Samuel French scripts in existance, because the songs have all got very, very painstakingly detailed stage directions on choreography: 'Man 2 and Man 13 run five paces down to L. and kneel, while Woman 15 dashes across to Man 4 and grasps him by the hand.' I had this image of this director, trying to direct the thing from a French's edition. As with all amateur societies, five of them hadn't turned up, two of them are standing in for others - you know, the comic results could be enormous!"
The ludicrous stage-directions would have obviously have had comic potential, but Alan had even grander ideas for the play - the first of his plays to include unexpected interaction from the audience.
"There would have been a large amateur choir, who would be scattered through the auditorium, reducing the audience capacity from its usual 303 to about 215 seats. There'd be about 85 singers, completely incognito, sitting in scattered seats, and at various points starting to sing from their seats - thus causing the person next to them to look absolutely alarmed."
To make this work for the original production in Scarborough, Alan needed more actors than he could possibly have afforded to pay, so he decided to turn to Scarborough's amateur community itself; creating a play about the amateur community populated by members of the amateur community - no possible chance of conflict there....
To this end, the Stephen Joseph Theatre In The Round placed an advert in the Scarborough Evening News, looking for budding amateur operatic members to appear in Alan's new play with the advert reading:
"He [Alan] is anxious to meet AMATEUR SINGERS who would be interested in taking part in this venture. Some Soloing experience is required at least sufficient to cope with the demands of the average Light Opera Society Repertoire."
It was at this point that the whole project began too unravel and, perhaps, this was a blessing for the playwright who was uncertain about the direction the play was taking.
"Several things conspired to thwart the original idea. The Rudolph Friml Estate, fearing for their play, refused to release the rights. For which I didn't blame them one bit. Simultaneously, those members of the local Scarborough Operatic Society whom I had approached seemed reluctant to accept anything but leading roles, for which I didn't blame them either; and finally Equity, the Professional Actors' Trade Union, declared the whole idea of including amateurs in this way unacceptable. Which forced me into swift solutions, all of them, it transpired, blessings in disguise."
Alan returned to the script and abandoned The Vagabond King, which he later admitted was 'a load of garbage' and found instead a piece which he genuinely loved and was inspired by, John Gay's The Beggar's Opera.
"I greatly admired and had always wanted to produce, Gay's The Beggar's Opera. Which in turn provided the missing piece to the whole venture. Gay's play had a plot which echoed almost perfectly the one I intended to write and provided the perfect mirror image on which to build my own dramatic structure. Moral: always work with something you admire and not with something which you only set out to make fun of. That way you might even manage to raise your game rather than lower it."
It was not all a wasted experience though as although Alan has frequently emphasised no-one in A Chorus Of Disapproval is based on a real person, his experiences with the amateur community did provide plenty of inspiration particularly for Pendoan Amateur Light Operatic Society's Artistic Director, Guy ap Llewellyn.
Alan, meanwhile, had written to Peter Hall and informed him of the changes to the play he had initially proposed.
“Needless to say, the play is vastly different from the one I described to you on the phone a few weeks ago. No chorus of amateurs. Just a few good singers. (Equity intervened there). I had to go back to John Gay as his agent was the only one who didn’t raise an objection.”
It would go on to become one of the most revived and popular plays in the Ayckbourn canon - and much beloved by amateur companies, which is not something the playwright would ever have predicted.
Friday, June 2, 2017
60 Years At The SJT: 1983
2017 marks the 60th anniversary of Alan Ayckbourn joining the Library Theatre, Scarborough, in 1957. Alan has been indelibly associated with the company since that time as actor, writer, director and Artistic Director.
60 Years At The SJT: 1983
In 1983, Alan Ayckbourn made the headlines nationally as he was announced to be more popular than Shakespeare.
Since then, that fact has been regurgitated endlessly in the media despite patently being untrue - it wasn't even substantively accurate in 1983!
In a culture today where 'fake news' is seemingly on every one's lips, Alan Ayckbourn has been the subject of it for more than three decades. For if you've ever read any article which proclaims that Alan Ayckbourn is the most performed playwright in the UK or the second most performed after Shakespeare, it has no basis in fact and is actually completely unprovable.
And, more importantly, doesn't reflect the original facts from which these statements were originally drawn.
All that can be said with absolute confidence is that Alan Ayckbourn in 1983 - within a very specific and narrow context - was demonstrably proved to have been produced more than Shakespeare.
On 2 November 1983, the Arts Council issued a press release leading with 'Ayckbourn more popular than Shakespeare.' The rest, over time, has largely been forgotten.
The report was drawn up to highlight attendance at the UK's regional, subsidised theatres at the time and covered just 36 theatres. Within this most narrow of contexts, audiences to see plays by Alan Ayckbourn were higher than those to Shakespeare's with Willy Russell in third place between 1981 and 1983.
During those two years, 327,000 people went to see an Ayckbourn play as opposed to 318,000 to a Shakespeare play - however the Bard nudged Ayckbourn on performances with 1,060 compared to 1,034.
It was notable at the time and subsequent reports over the next few years had Alan swapping between first and second places fairly regularly. Again, always within a very specific, defined context of regional subsidise theatre.
The reports which are no longer produced offer an interesting insight into regional theatre at the time and do prove that Alan Ayckbourn was very popular in the regions, but little more.
The reports did not include the West End (although he was exceptionally popular throughout the '80s in the West End) nor commercial theatres nor amateur theatres. Now had all these been included it's highly likely Alan would still have been in a similar position, but there are - nor have there ever been - statistics which include all theatrical venues / productions in the UK.
But that did not stop, over the years, the story transmuting until it became regular practise - still to this day - to name Alan as the second most performed playwright in the UK after Shakespeare.
With no evidence. No facts. No references.
Now he may well be the second or third most performed playwright after Shakespeare, but there are no statistics available to back this up. All we know is he is very popular and consistently performed by professionals and amateurs throughout the UK.
When in 1990, Alan was named the second most performed playwright after Shakespeare in the same Arts Council survey, this was also widely reported and seems to have become the source of so many 'facts' reported in Ayckbourn stories ever since.
So if anyone ever says to you, Alan Ayckbourn is more popular than Shaksepeare, you can reply: "Yes. Yes, he was. Over a specific period of two years in 36 regional, subsidised theatres in England, he was more popular than Shakespeare. But in 2017, all we can say is he's very popular and been very successful."
And being popular and produced is more than enough to satisfy the playwright, be it in 1983 or 2017.
60 Years At The SJT: 1983
In 1983, Alan Ayckbourn made the headlines nationally as he was announced to be more popular than Shakespeare.
In a culture today where 'fake news' is seemingly on every one's lips, Alan Ayckbourn has been the subject of it for more than three decades. For if you've ever read any article which proclaims that Alan Ayckbourn is the most performed playwright in the UK or the second most performed after Shakespeare, it has no basis in fact and is actually completely unprovable.
And, more importantly, doesn't reflect the original facts from which these statements were originally drawn.
All that can be said with absolute confidence is that Alan Ayckbourn in 1983 - within a very specific and narrow context - was demonstrably proved to have been produced more than Shakespeare.
On 2 November 1983, the Arts Council issued a press release leading with 'Ayckbourn more popular than Shakespeare.' The rest, over time, has largely been forgotten.
During those two years, 327,000 people went to see an Ayckbourn play as opposed to 318,000 to a Shakespeare play - however the Bard nudged Ayckbourn on performances with 1,060 compared to 1,034.
It was notable at the time and subsequent reports over the next few years had Alan swapping between first and second places fairly regularly. Again, always within a very specific, defined context of regional subsidise theatre.
The reports which are no longer produced offer an interesting insight into regional theatre at the time and do prove that Alan Ayckbourn was very popular in the regions, but little more.
With no evidence. No facts. No references.
When in 1990, Alan was named the second most performed playwright after Shakespeare in the same Arts Council survey, this was also widely reported and seems to have become the source of so many 'facts' reported in Ayckbourn stories ever since.
So if anyone ever says to you, Alan Ayckbourn is more popular than Shaksepeare, you can reply: "Yes. Yes, he was. Over a specific period of two years in 36 regional, subsidised theatres in England, he was more popular than Shakespeare. But in 2017, all we can say is he's very popular and been very successful."
And being popular and produced is more than enough to satisfy the playwright, be it in 1983 or 2017.
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