Theatre goers still refer to the period from 1987 to 1991 as the years of darkness at Oxford Playhouse. For they were the painful times when the famous old theatre had to shut its doors for want of funding required for essential refurbishment work.


It was actually a fire at Bradford City’s football stadium that led indirectly to the closure back then. For it was a visit by fire officers carrying out a routine check into the theatre’s plans to open a 60-seater restaurant on the second floor that led to the realisation that the building did not measure up to the stricter public safety regulations introduced after the Bradford disaster.
That discovery was to mean that instead of launching its 1985 and 1986 season with a new restaurant, fresh decor and improved toilets, the year began with a temporary wall across the foyer — and, most worryingly, a very bleak and uncertain future.
The demand of fire officers for a new staircase saw Oxford University jibbing at having to pour even more money into a loss-making enterprise and the Playhouse closed, only reopening in 1991 after a brilliantly-run public appeal, which attracted support from the likes of Ned Sherrin, Dame Judi Dench, Sir Ian McKellen and hundreds of local theatre lovers.
Memories of those days come flooding back with news that the Playhouse is now anxiously awaiting the outcome of its bid to the Arts Council for £487,000, a sum altogether larger than the amount that had led to the Playhouse closure 27 years ago. Thankfully, the Playhouse’s financial position is altogether happier and more professionally run than it was back then.
And crucially, the huge refurbishment scheme, to take place over three years, suggests sensible long-term planning, with the work — and presumably cost — being spread, also allowing closures to be kept to an absolute minimum.
The worry will be if the news from the Arts Council, expected in July, turns out to be bad. The increasing shabbiness of the Playhouse would then worsen, with the conditions of the seats particularly off-putting.

At present the Playhouse is not involved in any race against time to meet safety regulations or anything of that kind.
But the new chief executive, whenever he or she is appointed, would certainly do well to revisit events in the late 1980s when a simple refurbishment project so nearly led to the loss of this wonderful theatre.
The key will be phased investment and recognition that the Oxford theatre-going public should be kept fully informed and involved throughout, long before the prospect of any dramatic turn suddenly demands another late rescue act at the Playhouse.