4000 subscribers, 200 issues, and a new way for organisations to support this newsletter
Plus: Olivier Awards reaction, interviews with Rufus Norris and Rob Icke, and Danny Dyer discussing the Pinter Pause. All in this week's issue of Shouts and Murmurs.
Hello, and welcome to Shouts and Murmurs, a weekly round-up of theatre news, reviews, interviews and more from The Crush Bar, written by Fergus Morgan.
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Previously in The Crush Bar:
I’m back. Did I have a nice break? Yes, thanks. I hiked four-fifths of The Cumbria Way. I saw Cate Blanchett in The Seagull. I read Orbital.
What has happened since I was away? Well, the Olivier Awards were handed out on Sunday night, and I am happy to say that two former TCB interviewees were recognised: Maimuna Memon won Best Actress in a Supporting Role in a Musical for Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812, and Sam Grabiner’s play Boys On The Verge Of Tears won Best Production in an Affiliate Theatre. More on that below. Rufus Norris left the National Theatre after a decade in charge. The arts were ignored by Rachel Reeves again. ACE unexpectedly extended its National Portfolio Organisation scheme by a year. And Michael Sheen proved twice more that he is a total legend.
Most importantly, though, this newsletter reached 4000 subscribers. That’s right. 4000 subscribers. The first issue of The Crush Bar, sent on New Year’s Day 2021, was sent to 283 inboxes. This issue has been sent to 4011. It has been received by enough people to fill the West End’s Gielgud Theatre for four nights in a row, which is more than Opening Night could manage last year. Ivo Van Hove eat your heart out!
That’s not all. At some point in the last few months, The Crush Bar reached another milestone. I have lost count of exactly how many issues of this newsletter I have published since 2021. It is complicated by the fact that I introduced Shouts and Murmurs, this weekly bit for paid supporters, last January: do I include them or not?!
Either way, I have now pressed send on over 200 issues of The Crush Bar. Say each one, at a conservative estimate, was 1500 words long. That’s 300,000 words, which is about the length of Anna Karenina. Hmm. I’m not sure I like that. Mind you, how many Substack subscribers did Tolstoy have? That’s right. Not a single one. Pathetic.
Across those 200 issues, this newsletter has featured more than 120 different performers, playwrights, directors, designers, companies and venues. It has shouted about hundreds of different shows at the Edinburgh Fringe and elsewhere. And it has, I am reliably informed, facilitated dozens of connections and collaborations.
I would like to keep writing, editing and publishing The Crush Bar. I would like to reach 8000 subscribers and 400 issues one day. To do that, though, I need some help. Yes, that’s right. I am about to segue into a plea for more support, but if you can’t use a celebratory milestone to squeeze out some extra cash, then when can you?
The Crush Bar currently has just over 100 paid supporters, all of whom I appreciate very much indeed. This newsletter is - although I appreciate it doesn’t always seem like it - a professional endeavour, though, and for it to make real financial sense, considering the hours I put into it, I need to make a bit more money from it, frankly.
And so, I am introducing a new way to support this newsletter. It is, essentially, a higher-tier annual subscription of £250+/year and it comes with all the benefits of being a paid supporter, plus, thrillingly, the option of having your name or your organisation’s name featured on a dedicated page on The Crush Bar’s Substack website and in a footer at the bottom of every Friday issue of The Crush Bar.
I have called this a “champion” subscription for no particular reason and I am pitching it generally at organisations. I will not stop any individuals signing up as champions of The Crush Bar - feel free! - but I am particularly hoping that some of the theatres, companies and agencies whose work regularly features in The Crush Bar might be willing to find some cash in their marketing budget to help keep it going.
So, do you work at a theatre that has featured in The Crush Bar? Has your company promoted a show that has been spotlighted in this newsletter? Does your agency represent an artist that I have profiled? Do you want this newsletter to thrive? Do you want your organisation’s public support for independent theatre journalism to be broadcast to thousands of inboxes every week? Then you know what to do.
In other news: Brixton House, the Bush Theatre, Wales Millennium Centre, the King’s Head Theatre and the Royal Court all revealed new seasons; A Man For All Seasons, Punch, and Burlesque will transfer to the West End; Let The Right One In and Inside No. 9: Stage/Fright will tour; a load more Edinburgh Fringe shows are on sale, including the three winners of the Untapped Award; 17.1 million people went to a West End show in 2024, which is 5 million more than went to a Broadway show and 2.5 million more than went to a Premier League game; support for a tourist tax in London is growing; sadly, so too is opposition to a crack down on dynamic pricing; the BBC will broadcast a bunch of musicals and introduce a new radio drama slot.