Alnwick Playhouse facing closure as Northumberland venues react to Covid-19 measures

It comes in the wake of the press conference by Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Monday March 16, in which he called for the public to avoid the likes of pubs, restaurants, theatres and bars, as part of the latest steps to limit the spread of coronavirus.

The revamped Alnwick Playhouse held its opening event on the first weekend of January, but today announced the cancellation of a number of events in a statement under the heading – ‘The course of true love never did run smooth’, the famous quote from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.

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It continues: ‘We love our Playhouse and just when we got the building up and running again, we are now faced with closure due to Covid-19 virus.

‘Today we are in discussion with Northumberland County Council, McKennas, Queens Hall, Hexham, and The Maltings, Berwick, to plan our next steps.

‘However, closure is moving closer and as the Playhouse receives only 8% public funding, we are reliant on tickets sales and secondary spend, so there are difficult times ahead.

‘We respectfully ask any patrons who can afford to donate the price of their ticket or simply take a credit instead of a refund to do so during the closure.

‘We will contact all those affected in due course, so please do be patient where possible. Sincere thanks for your support.’

The Maltings in Berwick says it is doing its best ‘to reschedule performances for later in the year wherever possible and will provide regular updates on our website’.

It adds: ‘As a registered charity with modest financial resources, and to help ensure we’re as well we prepared as we can be for a very challenging few months, we respectfully ask all our customers to work with us in accepting a credit note if you can’t attend on the rescheduled date.’

The request for patrons to consider helping financially has been echoed by Hexham’s Queen’s Hall Arts Centre, which has announced it is closed to the public until Tuesday, March 31, as ‘our responsibility to play a part in delaying the spread of COVID-19 must come first’.

‘We are asking you today to please consider donating all or a portion of the price of your booking back to Queen’s Hall Arts,’ its statement says. ‘We recognise that this time of uncertainty affects everybody differently, but if you are in a position to help us remain a vital part of the community, we would be enormously grateful.’

In the south-east of the county, The Phoenix Theatre in Blyth is cancelling all performances for the next 28 days, with customers who have tickets for performances up to and including April 13 set to be contacted by the box office in due course, with ticket-holders asked to be patient.

The team said: ‘We greatly appreciate the support of our audiences at this testing and anxious time. It is a fast-moving situation; we are monitoring it closely and will keep you posted. We are hopeful that things will get back to normal soon and we hope to see you return in the not too distant future.’

Away from the theatres themselves, Northumberland Theatre Company – another arts organisation which is part supported by the county council – has announced that it is ceasing touring, closing its base at the Dovecote Centre in Amble to the public and suspending future programming until the end of May.

A statement on its Facebook page says: ‘The health and safety of our staff, visitors, artists and volunteers is of the utmost importance to us, and we believe given the current situation it is not viable to remain open to the public at this time.’

It adds: ‘We are being optimistic and will use this time to plan for the future and work on our upcoming productions – Jekyll and Hyde, Alice in Wonderland and Cinderella!

‘In terms of our cancelled events, we respectfully ask any patrons who can afford to donate the price of their ticket or simply take a credit instead of a refund to do so during the closure.’