Abbey to get €30.2m in funds over three years

THE ABBEY Theatre is to receive €30.2 million in funding over the next three years, it was announced yesterday.

The Arts Council funding will allow the Dublin-based theatre to introduce a new programme of events that will be revealed later today.

It promises to be an “exciting” programme that will include presenting new Irish plays both nationally and internationally.

“This funding means the Abbey will be able to offer more opportunities to writers, actors and other theatre practitioners, while affording the public access to an increased amount of theatre of the highest quality,” said the director of the Arts Council, Mary Cloake.

The theatre is to receive €9.2 million next year, €10 million in 2010 and €11 million in 2011.

The theatre “takes its responsibility seriously in supporting and working with the Irish theatre community and helping create a strong future for Irish theatre both at home and abroad,” said the director of the Abbey, Fiach Mac Conghail.

The decision to continue funding is a “major endorsement of both the artistic policy and the management performance that we have worked hard to consolidate since 2006,” Mr Mac Conghail added.

The Abbey Theatre suffered financial difficulties in 2005. Three years of investment from 2006 to 2008 helped the theatre to restructure and to recover from its financial crisis.

“The Arts Council is very proud of its role in putting the Abbey back on a sound and sustainable financial footing,” said Olive Braiden, the chairwoman of the Arts Council.

The theatre’s 2006 to 2008 funding of €25.7 million was conditional on the introduction of changes in its financial management and the agreement of a three-year business plan.

In early 2006 a new company, The Abbey Theatre, was created. This followed the winding up of the theatre’s founding company and its debts being paid off by the taxpayer.

Over the last three years, the theatre has implemented “a major change process” and prepared for growth, Mr Mac Conghail said.

Other recent investment in the Abbey has included new seating.

The Abbey went on tour last month for the first time since the restructuring, bringing Conor McPherson’s The Seafarer to Cork, Galway and Letterkenny.