Theatr Clwyd - one gap year later...
- Richard Evans
- 2 minutes ago
- 6 min read
Richard Evans talks to Liam Evans-Ford and Kate Wasserberg at Theatr Clwyd, now in the middle of the theatre’s 50th anniversary year following a full year out for a £50million refurbishment.
Regular theatre-going can be habitual, so there is a potential problem for theatres obliged to alter their familiar plans. Disrupt audience routines and you take the risk of seeing regular theatre visits become occasional visits, with falling audience numbers the potential result.
On the other hand, there is the chance that you will create a general longing for what is being missed - and by all accounts Theatr Clwyd definitely falls into that latter category.
Not long after Covid, the theatre embarked on a huge, £50 million renovation project to revive the crumbling building. Apart from its pantomime, the theatre closed its doors for an entire year, reopening partially in June 2025 and fully that October, ready for the theatre’s 50th anniversary this year. How would the closure disrupt the venue's operations and followers?
At the centre of the work were Liam Evans-Ford and Kate Wasserberg: the former the theatre’s executive director since 2016 and instigator of the renovation, alongside previous artistic director Tamara Harvey (now at the RSC); the latter the theatre’s current artistic director, appointed in 2024.
It must have been a little unusual, starting a new post at a theatre doing fewer productions than usual: “It was a slightly chaotic time," admitted Kate, "but it gave me something most new artistic directors don’t get - the luxury of time to plan. It was also like coming home, as I fell in love with this place when I first joined the theatre in
2008.”
Fears of an audience dip proved unfounded: this anniversary year has so far been a genuine success, with 150,000 people through the doors - matching pre-refurb levels in less than a full year. The theatre has also counted 25,000 covers for the new Bryn Williams restaurant - a substantial improvement on the small, limited cafe that preceded it. The restaurant at last offers the full dining-and-theatre night out, as well as offering an income stream independent of theatregoing, helping to re-establish and build stronger links with the community.
The raw figures don’t do justice to the reach of the work. The theatre now has a core company of 200 people - a substantial increase on 2016, with a strong “team” ethic and a collection of talented individuals engaged in a wide variety of activities.
“In truth the theatre kept more than a tickover pace during Covid and the refit,” explained Liam. “We used temporary venues and the marquee to keep the theatre working, while community group users of the building met elsewhere in town.
“But since reopening, the work has blossomed. It’s been a great experience to see people filling the building again, and a reminder that we now have one of the largest, best-equipped theatres in the country. Spaces that we planned, fretted-over, gutted, then saw return to full life, now have people milling around them, making the space their own and enjoying it.”
There have been teething problems, as might be expected with such a large project - including a major flood that had people in wellies and pyjamas baling water from the building. But even these were considered mere blips along the way.
“It was an excellent illustration of the strong team spirit here,” Kate said. “Many came late at night to help with the flooding, and stayed to make sure the place was cleaned up.”
Liam is proud of the fact that the public consultation held before and during the refurbishment gained responses from more than 8,000 people - meaning the new building isn’t a dry bricks-and-mortar exercise conducted in an architect’s office and the boardroom, but the expression of a mass of people - some professional, but most just keen to have their say.
The result is a familiar but imaginative space that promotes theatre in its widest sense.
Theatr Clwyd now has more diversity, even though the function room, the children’s play area and the wellbeing garden have still to be completed; there is an increase in casual visitors, and the community groups have returned; everything from amateur theatre for all ages to groups working with young people at risk and families in areas of high social deprivation, early-onset memory loss and even the menopausal now call Theatr Clwyd home. The theatre also holds storytelling experiences in local libraries and has taken responsibility for delivering music lessons to Flintshire schoolchildren; Theatre Clwyd is much more than a stage, it’s a community hub.
Having said that, an ambitious, forward-thinking programme is at the heart of the theatre. The building reopened with Tick Tick... Boom! and went from that slick, modern American musical to The Red Rogue of Bala - a decidedly local tale of a Robin Hood-like outlaw, as well as productions such as Our Town, Under Milk Wood and Twelfth Night - universal stories, but with a local, human feel. And there was also, of course, the pantomime centrepiece, bigger than ever...
When asked about the key things she wanted to see, Kate was clear; “I want to promote the wealth of talent we have in Welsh theatre, and lead with new Welsh work, while continuing to offer huge variety," she declared.
“I also want us to be representative of the entire community, even those currently marginalised in society. That was one reason behind our distinctive LGBTQ take on Twelfth Night, and the prominence given to deaf, disabled and neurodivergent people in Under Milk Wood. It‘s important for people to see themselves represented on stage. It also helps to start conversations that cause people to consider their values and those of the people around them”. If this approach proves successful, it moves theatre into the education field, as well as that of entertainment.
The presence of two renamed stages: the main auditorium, Theatr Moondance and the smaller, more intimate Theatr Weston allows for highly popular productions and also smaller, niche presentations not chosen for their profit potential. The smaller theatre has a full-sized stage and adaptable seating, permitting theatre in the round or an apron stage, and its intimacy brings an immediacy that is hard to capture in a big theatre. Most recently, Theatr Weston hosted Atlantis, a new play by Welsh writer Emily White, that picked up on the experience of Fairbourne in West Wales, where a decision was made to stop reinforcing sea defences and allow the global warming-induced rising sea levels to overwhelm the town from 2052. Not a play expected to draw big crowds, but a distinctive, thoughtful addition to the Theatr Clwyd programme.
Liam is grateful for the Arts Council Wales funding that makes such productions possible: “There's a two-fold benefit,” he explained. “The theatre can promote less popular, more thoughtful productions - where performance is more important than profit; and it allows ticket prices to be kept lower.”
Some price rises are inevitable, given current political and economic pressures, but Theatr Clwyd’s regular theatregoers can still buy a ticket for less than £20, with further discounts on season tickets.
“That makes us more accessible to nearly every section of the local community," he said. "It allows people to choose a more unusual show, one not to their usual taste. We hear all the time from people who say they went to something they wouldn’t normally go to, and thoroughly enjoyed it.”
At a time when some theatres are struggling, Theatre Clwyd has had a highly successful year with a lot to be happy about, but of course that need not have been the case. Big-name, big-budget productions in London are often very successful, but the number of West End productions touring is falling, and some regional theatres face hard times. Many theatres, especially subsidised regional ones, must work ever-harder to build their audience, which means taking an active role in the local community. This is where Theatr Clwyd scores: two highly impressive aspects of its work are its distinctive programming and its commitment to the local community, the latter supported by local authority funding.
Having opened in 1976, the presence of the principality’s major producing theatre in a market town of only 10,000 people has made a significant contribution to the local economy, and is one of the factors that makes Mold a thriving town when others nearby have suffered the closure of vital amenities.
Despite facing challenging circumstances, there is an optimistic, ambitious vision driving the management, one that intends to maintain the legacy of 50 years of well-loved, distinctive theatre and strives to become one of the arts world’s best employers.
“The last 10 years have been a bit of a roller coaster, to say the least,” said Liam. “The realisation that the theatre as it stood was unsustainable, then Covid, then moving the theatre to temporary accommodation, closing the building, then a reopening; it wasn’t the easiest of rides!”
“But the place is alive again,” said Kate. “We did our best to keep people coming to theatre activities during the closure, so the hiatus was less of a blow. Now there is a revitalised theatre, inhabited by a group of people who couldn’t wait to return to make it thrive again, visited by audiences who have returned to make Theatr Clwyd something of a cultural home from home.
"We have every intention of keeping that feeling going for another 50 years.”
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