The PTC creates and tours original musicals that it aims to make accessible to all. In addition, the company offers free information and educational resources for young people and aspiring artists, conducts research into the benefit of live arts and lobbies to promote arts in early years and in education.
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We know that time is precious so we're keeping this short with just two brief sections:
1. A bit about us.
2. What we want to do with your support.
A Bit About Us
For over twenty years The People's Theatre Company has been creating amazing, original new musicals for families. Every year we engage thousands of children in drama workshops and interactive play and provide new and aspiring theatre artists with free career development resources and opportunities to perform - like this lovely lot who started with us fifteen years ago and since then have gone on to achieve West End and International credits, start their own companies and, in one case, tour with Cliff Richard.
In 2007 we were granted the only Arts Council Funded Career Development Program in the UK and since then our Artistic Director has won a number of accolades for his commitment to supporting young people's development including the Eagle Radio Arts Hero award, an awards for developing a lexicon for children's theatre and a prize for promoting accessibility in theatre. Here's a photo of him with the big-wigs from Eagle Radio and that Arts Award.
We believe in the transformational power of live performance and are committed to making the enormous benefits of theatre affordable, accessible and fun for all people - it's why we're called The People's Theatre Company.
(And Santa will tell you that we've definitely been good this year.)
What We Want To Do With Your Support
The arts, and particularly arts in education, have suffered tremendous funding cuts since 2010 despite the perception being that the arts provides children with a creative outlet to explore and express their emotions that can help to build resilience and develop social skills.
When it comes to the value of the arts we often see quotes such as these:
"Theatre can transform a child's life, just as an early cultural experience whether with opera, ballet, music or art is a wonderful thing because it opens the door to a life-long experience, a life-long enjoyment." - Michael Morpurgo
"Theatre for children fires the imagination, it gives our children the skills and the creativity necessary to face the world, to understand it and perhaps to change it too." - Lyn Gardner
“Through drama, students become a part of the learning process rather than mere observers or inactive receptacles of the rich experience of learning; in this way, their learning is deeper, more sustained, and infinitely more complex” - Jeffrey D. Wilhelm
"You don’t have innovation if you don’t have arts. It’s as simple as that." - Anne-Marie Imafidon, CEO of Stemettes which encourages girls to pursue careers in science and technology
And these quotes probably reflect thoughts which many of us have had ourselves, so it's strange that no one has yet conducted research into the benefits of theatre on childhood development.
We want to change that. We want to work with Dr Sharma, Professor of Psychology at The University of Hertfordshire, to prove the benefits of live performance on the development of children and once we have the evidence we want to promote it widely so that we can lobby governments and schools and education authorities to ensure that our children have access to the drama activities and opportunities to participate in and see live performance that they need in order to have happy, healthy and fulfilling lives.
And that's it.
I told you it would be short.
Which only leaves me to ask one short question...
Can you help?