For an organisation that is reliant on members and audiences, the South London Theatre had to adapt last year but with the help of some cultural recovery money (£87,000) overseen by the Heritage Lottery Fund, they diversified and introduced some adult learning online, including a Creative Writing class, and even took the theatre outside with a promenade performance in West Norwood cemetery. This means they have managed to keep going until the eagerly awaited re-opening, and now have a season with a slightly limited audience (60 out of our 90 capacity).
The Shorts, started by the team who ran West Norwood’s arts festival 3 years ago, is returning to the SLT after being a short film competition last year and has been curated by LilyAnn Coleman. “We had 32 entries, whittled it down to the final 10 to create a balanced evening of funny, serious, sci-fi, political, sad, and romantic. We also have a good balance of new writers as well as more experienced ones. Next was pairing directors to the scripts they felt an affinity with, and then, of course, casting. We really hope audiences appreciate the great mix as well as the local writing talent.”
A spokesperson said, ‘The building is old, Grade II listed and as such needs a lot of love and attention. Being largely empty for over a year small things have started to deteriorate. Our octagonal tower needs re-pointing, there is a badly rusting support beam, we are beefing up the security of our listed front doors and as we are over the river Effra there is a damp issue in the basement. We did manage to improve the air handling units during lockdown so now our audiences will be promised a cool and well ventilated space. Never has that been so important as now. As a trustee, it is a real privilege to be one of the custodians of such a beautiful building but as she is over 130 years old she will keep needing help so we have to keep fundraising and really need our audiences back and people to join the club.”
The shorts run for 3 nights from 12th-14th of August, 8pm
The SLT season of full plays continues on the 24th-28th of August with Shelagh Stephenson’s comedy-drama, The Memory of Water. Thursday 26th will be a streamed performance.
Tickets for all productions are available: ticketsource.co.uk/SLT
