JERSEY’S £12.7 million revamped Opera House is unusable for both international and local theatre groups and musicians without an urgent upgrade of its tech, it has been claimed.
In an open letter to Chief Minister Lyndon Farnham, the Performing Arts Development Group says that until the technical upgrades are made, popular shows such as Sunset Boulevard, Les Misérables and Shrek cannot be held in the building.
“It just can’t be used as it is now,” PADG chair Tim Evans told the JEP yesterday.
“It’s almost as if they’ve built an airport, but they’ve forgotten to build a control tower, or put the landing lights in or the landing system. You’ve got this fabulous building, but you can’t use it.”
In his letter, which is countersigned by the Jersey Amateur Dramatic Club, Jersey Green Room Theatre Company, The Curtain Up Theatre Group, TimpanAli Productions, Jersey Symphony Orchestra Association and Jersey Island Singers, Mr Evans says that the PADG always understood that the government would foot the bill for the upgrades to the tech at the Opera House.
“The members of this group were led to believe by the minister that the funding included for the improvements needed to bring the technical side into the twenty-first century,” Mr Evans writes.
The message comes just weeks after Jersey Opera House Ltd, the company that will manage the theatre when it opens, announced that it needed to raise £1.5m from the public after talks with the government over finding the cash to upgrade the building’s antiquated equipment had broken down.
JOH Ltd said that the building needed modern staging and lighting equipment, a new prompt desk, performance communication systems and cabling infrastructure. The PADG letter also highlighted a number of issues with the current tech at the refurbished facility.
“Much of the equipment is now over 25 years old and an outdated analogue system. To ensure that scenery can be changed, performers to be notified in dressing rooms and visiting companies to be able to bring in their digital sound and lighting equipment, modern staging systems need to be in place,” it says.
“Without an upgrade to the onstage and backstage sound, lighting and communication systems, the local companies would be unable to present any of the high-quality productions this island has come to know and love.”
On Thursday, Economic Development Minister Kirsten Morel said that the existing equipment at the Opera House was “in the main usable” but acknowledged it was “not the latest, not the greatest”.
Deputy Morel also criticised the Opera House board, claiming that it had only provided the government with one quote for the technical upgrades.
“I am not here to answer for other people’s failure to do the work that they needed to do,” Deputy Morel told the Economic and International Affairs Scrutiny Panel. JOH Ltd could not be reached for comment.
The JEP reported in January that JOH Ltd and the government had still not agreed a lease for the building, with talks stalling over how much the government should pay towards ongoing maintenance. Speaking that month, Deputy Morel said: “We can invest more over time, or they can invest more over time.”
The government was approached for comment.
