The Manoel Theatre: more illusions of grandeur

The article by Ms Gabriella Gusman (The Sunday Times, May 25) informing readers that there is "international acclaim for the Manoel Theatre" needs scrutiny, especially if we are to talk about cultural benchmarks, less than a year before Malta joins the European Union.

The article also beckons attention since it creates another hyperbolic illusion about the kind of theatre that is actually being produced by the Manoel.

Recently we have seen that, instead of ensuring artistic attraction for the tourist industry, a drama production that was staged as part of "the Baroque Festival" in Malta's capital city ended up with foreigners walking out of the theatre.

Ms Gusman's article, obviously written in collaboration with the Manoel Theatre's administration, stated that the recent presentation of The Knight of Malta, an obscure, plagiarised piece of little intrinsic worth by Messenger, Fletcher and Field, enabled the audience "to recognise the Elizabethan's playwrights' impression of the Knights of Malta".

Nothing is further from the truth. The audience, very thin in capacity on both nights of performance, was bored to death and people just walked out in disappointment. Among the deserters were people closely associated with the Manoel Theatre set-up itself.

Reviewing the performance of the baroque play in this paper (May 11) Victor Fenech revealed how the piece dragged into predictable melodrama and sometimes into confusion. This is hardly surprising. I have it from a member of the drama group staging the work that the troupe did not even understand what was going on in the confounding script, and that they performed only under "obligation", to compensate for the space they are given to meet for workshops at the old University building in Valletta.

Morover, according to the reviewer, the technical quality of the production was miserably poor: projection was often weak, scenes moved far too slowly and the pasting of Maltese ghana rounding the first act (when nobody knew that this signalled an interval) went limp and tended to give an unwarranted "farcesque touch" to the proceedings.

It would be pertinent to ask the Manoel Theatre whether there were, for that occasion, any foreign reviewers in the stalls who would risk putting their name to a critique commending the brand of theatre that is funded by our so-called "national theatre". The performance of The Knight of Malta, chosen to launch the "Baroque Festival", cost thousands of liri.

It appears from Ms Gusman's article that the "international acclaim" for the Manoel Theatre is coming via people invited to Malta on a free ticket. They are therefore obliged to recommend the island, at least, as "an ideal holiday destination" and to describe the Manoel as a "little chocolate box confection of gilded wood and plush". Any fledgling feature-writer could write that for Air Malta's in-flight magazine and cost the public coffers nothing.

According to the Manoel Theatre's administrative office, the sort of condescending, do-it-for-obligation coverage that the Manoel is receiving amounts to "international acclaim". The Manoel even sees those notices to stand for Malta's accreditation as "a world centre", influencing the "international theatregoer".

Such claims are turning us into the laughing stock of Europe. Farcically, the Manoel is being described by its administrators not as one other baroque outpost but is inflated, in the most magniloquent fashion, as "a world centre". No less. Such ostentatious sensationalism ought to embarrass us in the eyes of knowledgeable people.

Unfortunately, the Manoel Theatre is so short of vision and so lacking in professional and aesthetic standards that it has not even invested in providing a decent stage infrastructure for a box set, let alone performances of larger dimension. Nor has it trained technical personnel to undertake the basic responsibilities of managing light and audio requirements. Nor has it ever been able to construct a professional scenic department. Nor has it any direction in terms of a national theatre programme. Yet, the administration continues to promote the illusion that the Manoel is "a centre of excellence".

Ms Gusman's report in this paper quotes Tony Cassar Darien from the Manoel as saying that this theatre "has achieved what it set out to do, not only by publicising itself internationally, but also through the development of creativity in programme staging which has encouraged the international theatregoer." Such bloated affirmations, besides being tragically comical, are harming Malta's cultural dignity and self-respect.

Moreover Mr Cassar Darien does not seem to have the slightest idea of what are the current concepts relating to "creativity" in Europe. There is a new continental context that the Manoel Theatre is not even aware of. The very fact that the Manoel makes such fuss about its narrow interests betrays European trends. Cultural policies in Europe have nothing to do with baroque plays so pitifully staged in ornate "chocolate boxes" or "confections of gilded wood and plush".

European policy has to do the development of creativity in the context of transitions and transformations happening on the continent. The Council of Europe had appointed a specific Task Force which produced a very important document entitled In from the Margins (1997), written by none other than Professor Anthony Everitt, the same person who compiled the evaluation on Malta's national cultural report in 2002. The results of the European Task Force recognised not exercises in the reproduction of baroque "confection", but innovation as the central role of artistic creativity and cultural revival.

Creative Europe actually advises against closure and admonishes, in very clear terms, the idea of a "fortress Europe" that narrowly pursues defined interests belonging to a scheme of "museologised" culture, in which case artistic creativity and cultural innovations "would be the losers". To ward off such a situation, the Task Force set in motion by the Council of Europe (1994-1996) recommended that countries should transcend mythical traditional forms of making culture and start looking into an organic functional strategy that values democratic cultural production.

Europe is talking about cultural dynamics that involve policymakers, educators, critics, producers, entrepreneurs, alternative audiences, local governments and the community at large, so that the cultural scene is transformed into a factory of creativity to impact the social environment.

Two gentlemen who sit on the Manoel Theatre Management Committee informed me, earlier this month, that this "national" institution, funded heavily by public funds, is being derailed by a tiny minority with very narrow interests and that other committee members are serving as mere "rubber-stamps" to endorse decisions taken without consultation or debate. Hardly any financial information is relayed to the committee, and when sectors of the media do ask for statements, the reply has been that such data is too "commercially sensitive".

This should not go on and the Malta Council for Culture and the Arts ought to take stock of the situation and intermediate. It should make sure that Malta's cultural agenda is not dictated by small clusters who do not believe in communal diversity and the promotion and maintenance of a cultural milieu that generates creativity and innovation.

The European experts' report on Malta's cultural development is clearly defined and should provide perfect indications as to the checks and balances the Council for Culture and the Arts should be looking into.