Long road back to stage for Kirkcaldy am-dram

For years amateur theatre groups have been at the heart of the Kirkcaldy community with regular meetings for rehearsals and productions staged for local audiences to enjoy.

However, the Covid-19 pandemic has seen such groups stopped in their tracks.

With the closure of theatres and rehearsal spaces in March, some companies were forced to cancel their annual productions - or postpone them to a date not yet known.

The news will have come as a disappointment to all those involved in the productions, both on and off the stage, as in some cases months of hard work were wasted.

And although the country is now slowly coming out of lockdown and there is talk of potential dates when theatres may be able to reopen – with safety measures including reduced capacity in place – refurbishment work at Kirkcaldy’s Adam Smith Theatre means some local amateur dramatics groups face a longer wait before they can take centre stage again.

Kirkcaldy Amateur Operatic Society (KAOS) was due to perform two shows this year – one in spring and one in November – but both have had to be postponed.

Cathy Endeacott, president, said rehearsals had started in February for the spring production and they had to stop in mid March when the pandemic hit.

She said: “With the theatre being closed due to the pandemic and now the refurbishment of the Adam Smith, it looks like our next show is liekely to be in 2022.

“KAOS has been going for over 100 years and it’s a shame it will be two years that we can’t do a show, but it can’t be helped.

“It’s not just the theatre being closed that poses challenges for companies.

“There’s a lot to take into consideration in terms of how do you rehearse while social distancing and you can’t sing just now.”

Fife Opera had also been well under way with work behind the scenes for its 2020 production this autumn.

Alistair Digges, musical director, said: “It is a shame. We were doing a production of Lakme, which was all cast and auditioned, but it had to be cancelled.

“We now hope it will happen in November next year.”

Kirkcaldy Gilbert and Sullivan Society has also faced changes to its plans.

Kathleen Brown, president, explained: “Our June concert had to be cancelled, and we’d heard about the refurbishment plans at the Adam Smith.

“We were told the chances of the theatre opening next spring would be slim and it would likely be next October or November before it would open.

“That then presents problems for many groups, including ourselves, and means our show which normally takes place in the first week of March couldn’t take place there next year.

“However, as a society we are quite versatile and we plan to use the Old Kirk as an alternative venue.

“We’re planning a two night performance on March 5 and 6. It won’t be a fully staged show as we can’t do that there, but it does have a stage.

“The plan is to have the first half in a concert style covering Sullivan and Gilbert and Sullivan.

“The second half will be a semi-staged production of Trial by Jury.

“We have been trying to keep in touch with everyone. We have a weekly quiz on a Tuesday night, and we hope that perhaps come the end of October we might be able to meet in timetabled groups to practice for next March.

“We need to be positive and that’s our forward plan at the moment. We’re a versatile group so let us hope that the plans come to pass.”

The Auld Kirk Players are also doing something a little bit different this year.

David Potter, president, said: “Usually we do a three act play in the Hunter Hall, which draws a good crowd, but this year we’re going to do a film.

“We will hopefully be shooting it on the beach and in the grounds of the Old Kirk.

“It’s called When The Tide Is Low, and it’s about Lillias Eadie, one of the witches of Torryburn set in 1704.

“It is written by one of our members, Graeme Ferguson and co-produced by Fraser Anderson.

“We’re hoping to have it complete by the end of Ocotber, but the filming is weather dependent of course.

“As we can’t do our usual production we thought it was an opportunity to experiment to widen our repertoire.

“We’re the oldest drama group in Kirkcaldy and we’re determined to keep going. We’re definitely not going to give in to this virus.

“We’re relishing the opportunity to do something different and we’re looking forward to it.

“We usually do a performance in mid November and we’re hoping we may be able to show the film while social distancing in the kirk itself around that time but it depends on the restrictions.

“If we can’t do that then we will still have the film to show when we can.

“I fear for the future of theatre in general, and there are a lot of amateur groups, not just in theatre, that once they stop don’t start up again.

“We are determined to keep going even if it is in an unconventional way and we hope to be back to our three act play next year.”

Unlike some other groups, Kirkcaldy Youth Musical Theatre (KYMT) was in the fortunate position that it was able to stage its annual production, which this year was Shrek, before lockdown.

John Urquhart, from KYMT, said: “We do our annual production in February so we were lucky we managed to get our production in before lockdown with sold out, full houses.

“We are now suspecting we’ll be having a year out because next February is not going to be realistic, especially not with the renovations at the Adam Smith Theatre.

“We were lucky all the work and excitement of doing the show came off before things closed down.

“Other people had been doing all the work and then their shows were cancelled.

“We’re missing a year, but I have a funny feeling some people will be missing two years the way things are looking.

“At this point in time we’re not going to have a production in February 2021 but we have a view of starting rehearsals next September for February 2022.

“That’s what I hope is going to happen.”

John said that although theatres may be able to reopen, there are still a lot of questions around how things will work in terms of how groups can rehearse safely and even if there will be an audience waiting in the future.

He said: “We’ll be looking to see if we can get an audience in the future as I’m not sure how many people are willing to go in to a theatre situation at the moment.

“I know when you look at the social distancing in theatres, for some it would be cutting capacity down so much it makes things no longer feasible.

“One problem for us is we have a large amount of scenery which we loan out to people for donations.

“But, I’m afraid we’ve got the costs of that storage to carry on paying for.

“We’re going to have a year with no income coming in, and will still be paying for the storage, but compared to many other companies it’s not going to be a huge problem for us.”