Ellie Simpson: ‘The theatre industry was just devastated by the pandemic – and we’re still very much suffering from that’

JACK Whitehall, Joe Lycett, David Mitchell and Graham Norton are just some of the celebrities to have been trained up by a theatre charity that is now fundraising to secure its future.

Pleasance Theatre is one of the major players at the Edinburgh Fringe where it hosts 3,000 shows across the month-long festival.

Its permanent home is in North Road, near Cally Park, where it runs a “development centre” for budding actors, comedians and production workers alongside its regular listings.

The theatre has now kicked off a fundraising campaign in an attempt to stave off a combination of rising costs and flatlining ticket sales.

“The theatre industry was just devastated by the pandemic – and we’re still very much suffering from that. The impact has ripples that we’re going to be feeling for years and years,” said senior producer and programmer Ellie Simpson.

The theatre is now hoping to raise £20,000 with a Crowdfunder campaign as the lasting impact of the pandemic combines with the cost of living crisis. “Our outgoings are much bigger but the income ­hasn’t matched that,” Ms Simpson said.

Half of every donation will go towards meeting the charity’s costs, while the other half will go towards the Pleasance “Debut Fund” devoted to helping early-career artists bring their first show to the Edinburgh Fringe.

Pleasance in London acts as a “proving ground for artists, comedians, and theatre-makers to try out their work,” Ms Simpson said, adding the charity is keen to “feed into the theatre ecology”.

Ms Simpson describes Pleasance as one of the few organisations in the country offering young theatre-makers completely free rehearsal space and mentoring, along with funding for first shows and opportunities to develop and perform new work.

“The thing is, if we don’t support grassroots, early-career artists, who are we going to have on stage in two years’ time?” she said.

The theatre has served as a key training ground for those who have gone on to create some of the UK’s biggest TV series, films and shows, Ms Simpson said. “Lots of the stuff that’s come through [streaming platforms] in the last few years and has absolutely blown people out of the water started in the theatre.”

One example of this trend is the Bafta- and Golden Globe award-winning series Fleabag, written by Phoebe Waller-Bridge.

“I saw the first-ever showing of Fleabag when it was in Edinburgh – that started off in a studio space of about 60 people,” Ms Simpson said.

“Look at [Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s] career and what she’s gone on to do, she’s written Killing Eve, Fleabag went to TV, she’s written for Bond,” she added.

In a country where “there is very little support from the government” for artists, Ms Simpson said it was vital to keep charities like Pleasance afloat.

“Making art and theatre and telling stories is so much the foundation of what people enjoy and love in this country,” she said.

“If we don’t have spaces where artists can make work and comment on the world, how do we then tell stories, how do we reflect on what’s going on?”