Pop-up theatre plan gains funding

A pop-up theatre project that promises a festival feel for the central city with performances by actors, musicians and dancers has won funding from the Christchurch City Council.

The Little Andromeda project is an initiative led by theatre producer Michael Bell. Mr Bell has previously put forward a proposal for a permanent multi-use theatre complex marketed as Andromeda for the Performing Arts Precinct.

Two actors from upcoming play "The Lifestyle", Jo Ghastly and Craig Westerberg, pose near the site for the planned Little Andromeda theatre.

His latest pop-up theatre proposal has been awarded $14,970 from the Council's Enliven Places Projects Fund, which supports temporary projects to make vacant spaces more vibrant and appealing.

If it is granted necessary resource consents and approval for a six-week run, the Little Andromeda project will see a pop-up 300-seat festival tent installed on a Gloucester Street site near the Dance-O-Mat between October and November. 

Mr Bell says the funding is a huge vote of confidence in the project.

“We’re really stoked.”

He says a diverse group of 58 local groups, including actors, musicians, circus companies and dancers are keen to perform and hold other public events at the theatre.

Mr Bell hopes five festivals will also use the theatre throughout its run, including the Big Band Festival and FESTA (a public festival of architecture, design and food), the Halloween-inspired Festival of the (Un)dead, and Latino Week.

He is also planning to host visiting performers from as far away as New York.

The cost of attending a show would mostly range from free to $20, and the venue would take a proportion of the ticket sales with about 75 per cent going to the artists.

Mr Bell says Little Andromeda will operate as a joint venture with the artists, making performing space, promotion, and ticketing more accessible.

“It’s about making performing arts part of the public atmosphere.”

Carolyn Ingles, the Council's Head of Urban Design, Regeneration and Heritage, says if the Little Andromeda project is able to gain necessary resource consents and approval it could become a dynamic, temporary hub that would draw people into the central city and support a broad range of the performing arts community.

“We think this pop-up project could bring a diverse group of people into the central city and create a really lively, festival-type atmosphere that people will enjoy and will bring a new flavour to Christchurch. It would also complement the other developments in the Performing Arts Precinct.”

A website for Little Andromeda will be launched in early September when bookings for upcoming shows will become available, subject to the project gaining consent.