Clive Conway Celebrity Productions featured in Total Politics
Public meetings are dead, and television trivialises important issues. Today, reports Amber Elliott, politicians are taking to the stage to get their message across.
Beware, voters. Your MP could be treading the boards of a theatre near you very soon. But before you conjure up disturbing images of John Prescott playing Falstaff or Gordon Brown as Richard III, take a deep breath. Because these politicians are not butchering Tom Stoppard or starring in panto. They are simply using the stage as a political platform.
Paying to see the nation's favourite political fi gures in playhouses is the latest trend. There are virtually no production costs - no sets, designers, sound engineers or pimply stage-hands - just a chair or a podium, and democracy in action. But what tempts national fi gures to participate? And why are audiences willing to pay top-pricetheatre rates to see someone they could watch free on television?
Clive Conway Celebrity Productions has created a box-office phenomenon. His company produces such events in over 100 theatres, with big names such as George Galloway, William Hague and Alastair Campbell among its speakers.
'An Audience with...' is the brainchild of Clive Conway, and a highly lucrative one. The right clients can pack a 2,000-seat venue with ease. Conway, who started as a classically trained musician, working with professional actors, got the idea when walking past Parliament one day.
He never looked back after his first production with a politician, booking Tony Benn to perform in Guildford. "The Daily Telegraph reviewed it the next day. Unfortunately they put my home phone number in, and I had to take an extra member of staff full-time just to answer the phone. That is how popular it was."
Tony Benn was due to appear at The Sage in Gateshead, a 1,600-seat venue, on 9 February. And Conway says he expects a sell-out. Benn's colourful past helps. The former far-left Labour politician, one of the longest-standing members of Parliament, strongly opposed the Iraq war and is president of the Stop the War Coalition. Benn says: "I am 84 in April. I have seen a lot in my life and I don't want anything."
He enjoys An Audience with... events because he gets to really understand issues that affect people. "I think the establishment- the media and the political class - underestimate people'sintelligence," he says. "I am always delighted to find really profound questions put, which you might not otherwise hear in a discussion."
The structure behind these theatrical spectacles is simple. In the first half, a celebrity speaker talks about their life. Ann Widdecombe, about to begin a five-stop tour, never prepares for this part. "It is quite impossible," she says. "I've done it for so long now, I know exactly what to do."
Then there is usually an interval in which books are sold and autographs signed. People return to their seats, and the house lights brought up so the political figure can take questions. "The second half is entirely the audience's own," Widdecombe explains.
She makes an ideal celebrity. A former Home Office Minister, she has never shunned the limelight. She took part in Celebrity Fit Club and presented her own television show for ITV, Ann Widdecombe Versus, in which she tackled issues including prostitution and truancy. But the one-time Shadow Health Secretary found her television work unsatisfactory at times.
Widdecombe can avoid the silly confrontation" of some television programming by speaking with audiences. "It is a very different atmosphere, a more intelligent atmosphere. You are not confined to two minutes. As long as you say something to make them laugh and don't just give them a dull evening, they like it too."
Benn takes a slightly different approach. "I always say at the beginning, 'You can relax. I am not asking you to vote for me.' There is a great sigh of relief. And people say to themselves, 'Well, if he doesn't want us to vote for him, we might as well listen to him.'"
So why are some of the most respected political figures lured out to regional theatres to talk to an electorate that cannot vote for them? Shirley Williams, now Baroness Williams of Crosby became involved through "curiosity as much as anything". She adds: "I like to think that they have a higher purpose. And if not, I like to think that they give people a sense of much greater involvement."
Like theatrical productions everywhere, it doesn't always go smoothly. Williams recalls one event in Southampton where the woman responsible for staging nearly knocked herself out. "As the first bell rang, she ran straight across the room into one of those mobile dressers.
"She was knocked over, broke her arm and came out semiconscious. By this stage, a voice was saying, 'One minute to the stage.' I decided that I had to wait with her. The paramedic got there about four minutes after the show was supposed to begin. I made sure she was OK and then went on stage, only to hear somebody saying, 'She's always late!'"
Other politicians have also suffered mishaps on tour. George Galloway MP missed a key Commons vote because he was in Ireland on his own oneman production. The Respect Party politician missed a Terrorism Bill vote to appear at the Everyman Palace Theatre in Cork, where local punters had the opportunity to ask Galloway about his 'beliefs and passions'.
Timing is vital when working with political figures, Conway stresses. He recalls doing a series of shows with Alastair Campbell just as the Hutton report was due out. The first show in South Shields sold out "just like that", Conway says. "The entire world's press was there on a Friday night. I think the going ticket price was about 950 quid."
On another tour, Campbell was due to speak at a large concert hall in Birmingham but got stuck in traffic. "There was no way that he was going to get there," Conway recalls. "He was 10 miles from the concert hall. But he ran across loads of fields, got to Spaghetti Junction, flagged down a bus, flagged down another car. He turned up, did a press call and then he went on stage."
The fact that audiences will pay demonstrates that there is still interest in the cut-and-thrust of daily politics. But what the public lacks perhaps is an access point - a way to identify with today's issues. To a certain extent, theatrical ventures provide this. Widdecombe argues: "The old style of public meeting is dead."
Public meetings used to be an open channel of communication for MPs and the public. But Widdecombe believes that this type of dialogue is no longer popular. "When I first fought Maidstone in 1987, I did 22 public meetings in my own constituency," she says. "Not one was a waste of time. In the last general election, I did two public meetings. At the first, there were about 15 present."
Williams thinks there is still a place for public meetings. "People ought to be able to bring up controversial topics with politicians and, for that matter, argue and heckle them. Is that over? I wouldn't be inclined to think so."
Likewise, Benn has spoken at 161 public meetings in the past year. "I left Parliament because I said I wanted more time for politics," he recalls. "People laughed, but I have never been busier. My life is one permanent election campaign, except I am not a candidate. I spoke in Trafalgar Square last Saturday to 15,000 people."
Williams points to Barack Obama as evidence that direct political interest is not dead. She claims his 'new message' captured people in a way that traditional politics has not. "Hundreds and hundreds slogged their way, not just to Washington DC, but to almost all the venues that Obama spoke at, to see him physically and not just on television."
So if theatre evenings are not replacing public meetings, where is the audience coming from? A lot of support comes from people tiring of political coverage on television. "Television tends to set the agenda," Williams says. "A lot of people who come to the shows say afterwards, 'We want to come and see real people. We've had enough of television. We want to ask questions ourselves.'"
Widdecombe believes television has helped to popularise publicspeaking events. She says: "I think audiences want to know more about the people that they see on television. I think one reason they come to hear people like Benn and myself is because they believe they will get straight answers. It won't be the party line necessarily. It won't be carefully crafted, measuring every word."
These productions rely on their headline act being candid and honest. Conway explains that the speaker also needs humour to "break the ice". "People want to be entertained and educated at the same time," he says. "These are their heroes. They become much more human and interesting when they are no longer tied by the party."
But Benn denies that his attraction is based on celebrity status. "I am really not a believer in that sort of personality," he says. "One thing destroying politics is that it is either knock-about - where people attack each other, which I don't think gets you very far - or all about personalities. That is not my line."
If you are a politician with a colourful past, controversial views or a flair for the dramatic, this could be your calling. Conway claims that linking the theatrical with the political will stand the test of time. "The one-man show is a wonderful thing," he says. "People just want to be drawn in, don't they?"
Swapping the stage for the despatch box
Glenda Jackson
Before becoming the outspoken, leftwing MP for Hampstead and Highgate in 1992, Glenda Jackson was considered one of Britian's leading actresses. She won many awards in the Seventies, including two Oscars and gained critical acclaim for her portrayal of Elizabeth I, and as Cleopatra in the BBC's Morecambe and Wise Show.
Michael Cashman
Labour MEP for the West Midlands since 1999, was the first Oliver Twist in Lionel Bart's Oliver as a child. He then went onto Eastenders, among other programmes, and is famous for the first gay kiss in a British soap. In 2007, he was elected MEP of the Year for Justice and Fundamental Rights by his peers.
Andrew Faulds
Faulds was best known for his portrayal of Jet Morgan in BBC radio drama Journey Into Space in the 1950s although he also acted in over 30 films in his time. A passionate MP for Smethwick from 1966-97, he was best known for his unruly behaviour in the Commons, once guilty of calling a Tory opponent "an honourable shit".
Adam Rickitt
Adam shot to fame as teenage heartthrob Nick Tilsley in Coronation Street in 1997. After a mediocre pop career, Rickitt became a Conservative PPC in 2005. He has made appearances on Sunday AM and Question Time. He is currently back acting in New Zealand having put his political ambitions on the backburner.
