Show goes on after Jonathan Church exits Sydney Theatre Company

Local or import? Only the best should do in choosing a new artistic director.

Jonathan Church, photographed in London’s West End.

To lose an artistic director after just nine months is a bad look for Sydney Theatre Company. Jonathan Church was a terrific ­appointment: a producer and ­director with an amazing run of hits in his native Britain, and with the profile and connections to build on the work of his predecessors at the Wharf Theatre, Cate Blanchett and Andrew Upton.

The idea was that Church would continue to run his own theatre interests in Britain — he launched his own production company not long before the ­Sydney appointment was ­announced — and make the commute from London to Sydney. ­Indeed, when STC broke the news last Thursday that Church was stepping down, he was already on his way back to London.

We can hardly blame Church for wanting the best of both worlds: as a commercial producer in London — with Cameron Mackintosh’s backing, no less — and as the head of Australia’s de facto national theatre. But STC will now face scrutiny about the wisdom of appointing a foreigner as artistic director, and other promising candidates, ­especially those with international careers, may think twice before embarking on a Sydney venture. Theatre­goers generally may wonder whether the shine has come off the company so soon after posting a $2.7 million surplus.

The question of hiring foreign artists and administrators can be a vexed one. In part, our isolation and small population makes us protective of our own. On the other hand, we recognise that cultural growth depends on a healthy exchange of people and ideas from other parts of the world.

Variations on this discussion happen every time there is a ­vacancy at one of our big arts ­companies. Should we appoint an ambitious and deserving local ­candidate, an expat who has run an arts company overseas, or a ­foreigner who may have little knowledge of our country and ­institutions?

Chief naysayer about Church’s Sydney appointment was the actor and director Jonathan Biggins, himself a candidate for the job and also a member of the STC board. Biggins regrets Church’s departure, saying it’s a shame that the collaboration could not continue. He was pleasantly surprised at the director’s constructive and engaging manner. But at the time of the appointment, Biggins could not hide his disappointment, saying that bringing in a foreign artistic director “doesn’t really send very positive signals to theatre-makers in this country”.

Australian arts companies, ­especially subsidised ones, have a duty to develop and provide ­opportunities for Australian artists. It is not only to do with ­national pride. We cannot continue to grow artistically and produce original, distinctive voices if we do not offer career pathways for artists. It’s the reason Adelaide Symphony Orchestra’s appointment last year of a new principal conductor was music to the ears. Nicholas Carter is the first Australian to head one of our state symphony orchestras since Stuart Challender in the 1980s.

At the same time, closing our cultural borders to outsiders makes us boring and complacent. Foreigners arrive and shake things up. We are refreshed when a touring dance company or orchestra visits our shores: not just for the novelty but because it provides a measure for our local companies’ ambition and distinctiveness. An outward-looking culture needs such points of reference.

When one of our festivals, galleries or orchestras makes an international appointment, some people merely see the arrival of a walking contact book with worldly connections. It’s so much more than that. Foreigners very often bring with them different ideas about ­artistic programming, management and strategy. As newcomers, they have the ability to draw a line under problems and to ­reinvigorate old relationships. A local candidate may be equally ­accomplished but a foreigner’s point of difference — of not knowing everyone, of not accepting the routine — can be an advantage.

Church was certainly an exciting prospect. In his decade at Chichester Festival Theatre, in southern England, he has presided over an enviable slate of plays and musicals, with many transferring to the West End and beyond. He was attracted to Sydney, he said at the time of his appointment last August, because STC was a successful company with a strong local audience and an appetite for working internationally.

“Here’s a company that’s firing on all cylinders, that has a strong relationship with its own city, which is how I think you make great work,” he said at the time. “Because of the quality of its work, that work is going international and that’s a very similar position to where we are in Chichester ... (To) be able to have a vibrant program and use that as a stepping board into its next phase is part of the ­attraction for me.”

In his nine months on the job, STC management allowed him considerable latitude. He is still ­artistic director at Chichester, where his term continues until September, and he has his own business to attend to, Jonathan Church Productions.

In recent weeks, he has had shows playing or about to open in Chichester, London, Melbourne and New York, including The Judas Kiss, ­directed by Neil Armfield, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Extra-curricular activities like these need to be carefully managed. It appeared to work for Blanchett and her film career but that may be because she and Upton already had a longstanding relationship with the company. They were family.

In Church’s case, managing the travel and other commitments proved to be unsustainable. STC executive director Patrick McIntyre says Church spent about half his time in Sydney; another source says he was expected to show greater commitment, with less jetting about.

But it’s not only about putting in hours at the office. New ­relationships, at a theatre company or elsewhere, take time to find their rhythm. It is easy to ­imagine the strain on a fly in, fly out director, and on staff, as they attempt to put a season of plays ­together.

Church had put about 60 per cent of the 2017 program in place, but left much work to be done, three months from program launch. One of his ideas, involving a prominent Australian director, was knocked back. But overall the board is said to be delighted with what Church has produced, and it’s a sign of goodwill that he has apparently offered to help see through the rest of the program. Church is not due to direct any plays himself next year.

STC has built its reputation over four decades with long-stay artistic directors, from Richard Wherrett to Wayne Harrison, Robyn Nevin and Blanchett and Upton. It is a tightly run company and an incident such as last week’s sudden departure of its star artistic director — no matter how carefully stage-managed — is an ­embarrassing slip. Its local and international partners and stakeholders will be watching developments with interest.

But STC should not be put off its mission. No other theatre company in Australia, in the words of one industry figure, has the guts or resources to attain the stature that STC has.

The board will wait until after the season launch in September before resuming the search for an artistic director. It should hire the most accomplished and ambitious theatre-maker it can find, from Australia or overseas. But the company must be careful to manage expectations of such high-­flyers and avoid a repeat performance of last week.

@matthewwestwood