Masked theatre – treading the boards in a time of pandemic

“Go back 12 months and have a look at Mullingar. We had 20 panto shows planned, 19 of which were already sold out by this time last year. The fleadh was on its way and everything looked rosy. The last thing anyone expected was a pandemic that would shut everything down,” says Mullingar Arts Centre director Sean Lynch.

When the country went into lockdown at the end of March, the arts centre, like everything else in the country, closed.

An uncertain future lay ahead, but the old saying rings true – ‘where there’s a will there’s a way’.

Last week’s eight-night run of Chicago at Mullingar Arts Centre was, therefore, a test in many ways.

It is the first show to take to the local stage since the outbreak of the pandemic, and an experiment to see how live theatre could work within the confines of Covid-19 guidelines for theatres.

Thinking outside the box helps when it comes to staging a show, and never was this more true for Sean, who has brought new meaning to the industry term ‘the fourth wall’.

“We had a see-through gauze stretched across the stage, separating the stage from the auditorium. Another thing that went down very well, and this will horrify purists – the cast wear masks,” said Sean.

“Not one person I asked had a problem with it. Firstly, every word can be heard because of the clip-on mics, and secondly, they change their masks for every costume change. So if they’re wearing a blue costume they have a blue mask, and so on. It becomes secondary to the performance.”

The team also had the seating arrangements down to a fine art.

“We’re seating people efficiently as they arrive. We know how many people are coming each night, the number of tickets we’ve sold, we have our theatre laid out in such a way that when you arrive with a party of four, you’re put in one door, and you will be put sitting down so you won’t have to be disturbed by anyone else getting into the aisle. The seats immediately to the front of you, and behind, are also blocked off to give the recommended distance.”

And with the aid of an industrial sanitising machine, the auditorium is sanitised after each performance, as well as after all drama and dance classes.

The forgotten arts

With live music banned, and even the use of background music in pubs frowned on for fear of droplet transmission, never before has live performance been under so much pressure.

“There’s part of me that gets angry when I see what’s going on.

“You can have 100-plus people in a pub with social distancing, and only 15 in Cusack Park. The Cathedral in Mullingar is allowed to have 250 people inside, simply because they have five access doors, 50 using each of the doors, and as long as each 50 doesn’t cross with another it’s alright – but I go to Mass nearly every day and the 50 do cross paths!

“I argued that we should be allowed to have 50 upstairs in the balcony, and 50 downstairs – there’s more than four meters between the downstairs and the balcony – but that’s not allowed.

“I don’t believe anyone really has thought this thing through properly at all. I admire the great lengths Andrew Lloyd Webber is going to highlight the plight of the arts today, he’s only one who seems to be trying to do anything about this. Otherwise those in the entertainment industry have largely been forgotten about.”

Above photo: Eimhin Doherty as Billy Flynn. Headline photo: Meabh Ryan as Roxie.

Sean could have got angry too at the to-ing and fro-ing by legislators on issuing guidelines.

“Originally the government issued guidelines for pods of six in theatres. We went and bought €400 worth of perspex and built perspex screens.

“We already had the theatre mapped out into 2m squares for the dancers, but long story short, by the time we had finished the screens for the dancers coming in the next morning - which was a quick turnaround time, let me tell you - the Dept of Tourism and Arts or whoever announces that if you could have two metre distancing between pods of six, you didn’t need the perspex.”

But “instead of cursing the darkness”, Sean “complied and carried on”.

“We used the perspex in the changing rooms and got on with things,” he said, a little resignedly.

But, just how feasible is it to continue to stage productions costing thousands, when the arts centre is operating at 12% of capacity.

“We had a full house between eight shows, it doesn’t bother the cast because they can’t see anything when the lights are up.

“But I do believe there is a bit of tokenism going on, they have to be seen to be doing something. They brought in absolutes for the easy hits.

Chicago cost €10,000 to stage, including the performance rights and production costs such as costumes and sets.

“There was €7,000 written off in April when we closed. At that point we had most of the costumes, we had the rights paid for, we had the sets done. So we were down that money, we had to write all that off,” Sean says.

There are still plans to stage the Snow Queen for this year’s panto, however, and the rural stage schools in Kilbeggan and Killucan.

“We are following all the guidelines but ‘it’s all changed, changed utterly’,” says Sean.