Festwal has character of its own

Press, 27 January 1988, Page 19

Festwal has character of its own

The audience, gathered for the announcement of the 1988 New Zealand International Festival of the Arts programme, hushed as director Michael Maxwell paused before naming the festival’s guest "superstar.” Two festival staff pulled out an almost lifesize poster of dancer Rudolf Nureyev. The entire room gasped. That’s the way Maxwell tells it. He is more than happy that he got the desired drama from the announcement at the Beehive last April. And he is happy also with the lead-in to the second festival in Wellington featuring several overseas stars. The festival atmosphere in the capital city is building nicely, he says. From the time the bookings for the two Nureyev performances opened in July, ticket sales have escalated. Nureyev sold out, even at top tickets of $2OO, Sarah Vaughn sold out, other concerts are heavily booked on the point of selling out. Maxwell says that, second time round, the festival has a momentum, a life of its own. People booked ear ( ly for events.

“We have good early bookings for virtually everything. Obviously there are still seats at most things and some of the events are those which we expect to sell most tickets to during the festival as word gets around.” Ticket sales are the key. Two thirds or more of the festival’s $3 million budget must be met by the box office. Whether the festival works is with the people of Wellington and New Zealand.

“We have sponsorship, sure, and the support of the councils but the bulk of the money comes from ticket sales, from whether we have got the events right and people want to go,” Maxwell says. Sponsorship accounted for about $430,000, the Wellington City Council kicked in $250,000, and the Wellington Regional Council another $150,000. Some money came from Government with the Department of Internal Affairs ($7500) and Foreign Affairs ($10,000), the Literary Fund and the Lottery Board contributing.

The support has enabled the festival organisers to keep ticket pgjces down, the director says.

Down? At $2OO a ticket? “That was for the top Nureyev seats and, I think, that was justified. We had no complaints at all about the price.” He goes on to list events at "the other end of the spectrum” that involve two Canadian groups in free family concerts in the streets.

This year a special young people’s event has been included with young Wellington musicians and actors under the direction of a British director producing their own operetta. Young dancers from throughout the country will dance for Nureyev at the festival. “We wanted an event for them and by them not just something for them to watch.” The second week of the festival is Young People's Week with events planned for schools and in schools.

Emphasis has also been given to regional activities with a programme centred in Lower Hutt.

“We received an admonition from the Wellington Regional Council about the lack of regional activities last time.” Michael Maxwell cites the number of New Zea-

Famous dancer Rudolf Nureyev offered to dance a third performance at the New Zealand International Festival of the Arts in March — but the extra concert could not be fitted into the programme. The director, Michael Maxwell, said Nureyev’s response to the selling out of tickets for his two scheduled shows was to do a third. However, an extra con-

land artists involved in the programme. He fields the familiar criticism of the festival aiming to cater for an arts elite only with the comment that elite means excellence and that is exactly what the festival is striving for. But, he adds, he believes there are events in the programme for everyone. Two years ago Maxwell predicted he would be around for the 1988 festival but probably not after that. With thoughts already directed to 1990, he is talking to the festival organisation about staying as director for 1990.

"The thing has a character of its own now and tharfs an attraction to

cert could not be timetabled as the Michael Fowler Centre venue was already booked for other festival events.

“And we could not stretch the sponsorship to cover three concerts so the ticket prices would have been very high indeed.” Festival organisers, reluctantly but realistically, turned down the offer, Maxwell said.

stay,” he says. He has been in touch with Commonwealth Games organisers in Auckland to check the 1990 festival and the Games arts festival will not duplicate. “The Games festival is more of a pageant with a heavy Pacific flavour — not festival at all. So people coming to New Zealand for the Games in January will come into Wellington for the festival.”

As in 1986, very few of the acts for the festival will play elsewhere in the country. The Trestle Theatre Company of London will do a season in Christchurch but so far that is the only one.