Why the Theatre by the Lake has been the best stage of my life
Last updated 11:29, Tuesday, 05 February 2008
But it was while he was working for Theatre Clwyd in Wales that he played cricket for a local club side who asked if he could help out with their juniors.
“There was this little 10 year old built like a whippet, and who could run faster than anything you’ve ever seen on two legs,” explains Patric.
That was the young Michael Owen, later of England football fame. Owen played cricket with Patric’s Haywarden Park club until he broke his thumb.
“At that point Liverpool stepped in and wouldn’t let him come any more,” says Patric. “He was good at all sports; football, golf, cricket, you name it.”
Patric Gilchrist has worked for the Cumbria Theatre Trust since August, 1998, initially on project management of the construction, fitting out and equipping of the Theatre by the Lake.
This prestigious £6.2m scheme has had the backing of many leading figures in the theatre world, notably Dame Judi Dench and her late husband Michael Williams.
Since the opening of the lakeside theatre in August, 1999, he has been responsible for the planning, funding, development, staffing and management of England’s newest regional production theatre.
These days Keswick’s reputation for quality theatre has spread far beyond the boundaries of Cumbria.
When Patric arrived in Keswick, all he could see was a 20 foot hole in the ground containing six feet of water.
He recalls: “There I was sitting in a Portakabin, which was the remnants of the old Blue Box theatre, in the car park.
“On the third week I was here the water finally cascaded through the roof and turned the contents of my desk into papier mache.”
Patric’s brief was to open a new theatre in 12 months.
“It was below ground – and sinking fast,” he says. “There were architect’s plans and a business plan, that had gone to the Arts Council, but it didn’t add up.”
By now the Century Theatre company had moved to become the English Touring Theatre, and the Keswick summer season had found a temporary home in the Rawnsley Hall, Keswick.
It was March of the following year when Patric commented to a surveyor that nothing seemed to be happening. He was assured that building projects are like that and all would come right on the night.
The night in question was August 19, and Patric recalls: “If it had not been for Armstrongs and Peter Marsh, their site agent, it probably wouldn’t have got finished on time.
“By Easter we had to start selling tickets from a little kiosk at the back of the Moot Hall for a shortened season. “There was lots of steel work which looked like Meccano on site and I suppose we went ahead with a spirit of naive optimism because we needed the income to survive.”
The theatre received the keys with four days to spare before curtain up. A host of volunteers poured into the building to clear up the mess.
Before the first night Patric invited the building site workers and their families to a special dress rehearsal, and remembers: “It galvanised them to get the job finished.”
The original business plan, which everyone thought highly optimistic, was for annual audiences of 60,000.
Last year the figure topped 124,000 and work now taking place in the Studio will slightly increase capacity for the 2008 season.
That means development of in-house productions, the programme of visiting work and festivals, and work which the theatre does with communities in West Cumbria.
The theatre is the second largest employer in Keswick with 50 year round jobs and another 40 or so seasonal opportunities.
Patric, 60, from Worcestershire, attended grammar school and did a degree in drama and English at Birmingham, but admits that after a couple of terms teaching, a visiting schools inspector hinted he might be best to find a different outlet for his talents.
Education’s loss was theatre’s gain. At the age of 16 he was planning to write plays and wrote to the BBC’s Midland region.
Eight months later there was no sign of his play being broadcast, but they did ask him to read scripts.
After an offer of stage management, Patric went to work at theatres in North Wales and Salisbury.
In 1996 he joined North West Arts Board as director of performing arts.
He might have chosen a career as a cricketer if Worcestershire had not already discovered a leg spinner, but Patric still turns out once a year for his old team, Malvern Ramblers, a club he helped to set up 40 years ago.
He was a long distance road runner until the move to Keswick prompted him to take to the hills and become a fell runner at 50.
When he arrived in Keswick one of the local athletic club stalwarts Steve Harwood was clerk of works at the theatre building and he persuaded Patric to join.
Patric is a member of the boards of the Octagon Theatre in Bolton, Soundwave and the Keswick Area Partnership.
So what’s the secret of running a theatre as successful as Theatre by the Lake?
“I suppose it’s having the luck to change things before they stop working, knowing what needs to be tweaked and changed,” he says.
As Patric looks forward to the Keswick theatre’s 10th anniversary in 2009, he gains support from wife Barbara, who teaches at St Benedict’s School in Whitehaven.
One of their sons, Mark, trained as a theatre technician and works as technical manager for schools theatre in Dartford. The other son, Jonathan, is in the marketing department at the Lowry in Manchester.
“I’ve tried to keep them on the straight and narrow,” says Patric.
“But despite all my efforts they have both gone into the theatre.”
