The anarchist who became an accidental theatre boss

Arnold is something of a punk producer/director now. “I’m often drawn to a title,” he says, speaking faster than a spotlight change, his Essex accent not entirely softened.

“It goes back to my Arches days (the Glasgow theatre he once ran) when I saw a title by playwright Jimmy Cartwright (Slag’s Deodorant). I thought ‘I’m having that!’ And it turned out to be a beautiful play, about a prostitute and her client. We ended up taking it to the National Theatre in Sweden, representing Scotland.”

Lie and loves: Andy Arnold

It’s quite astonishing, given Arnold didn’t produce a play until he was thirty. He didn’t come up through the acting ranks and had never directed. Yet, how does a man from Southend (“the cultural capital of Essex” he jokes) come to be staging ground-breaking, award-winning arts theatre in Scotland and presenting it at international level?

How can he storm venues in China and Russia, on top of making sure the Tron has an exciting and eclectic programme that packs bums onto seats? Arnold’s story, it transpires, is one of anarchism lite, a little acting, lots of community work - and cartoons.

He has always loved theatre, he says. “I’d spend a lot of my time up in the gods (the cheap seats) in the Palace Theatre in Southend every week. But you want to escape from Southend as soon as you can.”

He didn’t see himself as an actor, although he has acted over the years, from school to professional productions. And parental pressure saw him arrive at Dundee University where he studied Social Sciences. “There weren’t a lot of people going to Dundee to study at that time,” he recalls, smiling. “You could get in with low A’Level grades. So you had me and a lot of thick English public school kids going up there. But I had a great time.”

The teenager joined the drama society, but gave up when he realised it was run by ex-public schoolboys. “I’d hang around with Brian Wilson (the future MP) and Jim Innes who ran the student newspaper and I did the cartoons. I almost ran off with them to form the West Highland Free Press.”

Arnold knew he loved Scotland. But not what to do about a career. “I did teacher training, and had some idea of starting up a free school, and meantime I was very much involved in the International Socialist movement. Life was more about doing something different, making a mark, not conforming.”

Lie and loves: Andy Arnold

Work came to involve part-time teaching, freelance cartooning, and some writing. But a light bulb moment appeared when he found himself teaching in Cambridgeshire and sharing a house with Tony Grey, who was part of a performance group called The Alberts. This was a group so anarchic they were deemed too dangerous for television. When Arnold watched their Electric Element show he reckoned it to be “Totally absurdist, ridiculous nonsense.” And he loved it. “Then I thought ‘How do I do something like this?’”

You just do it. Arnold morphed into Skidmark (later named by a punk magazine as the nation’s Number One punk poet) and with a puppeteer pal took a show on the road, playing in between bands.

More part-time teaching followed, and he moved to Leeds. But he still hadn’t quite found his world. “I remember getting to the age of thirty and not being happy with my life.” How to change? He “chucked it all in” with a view to writing a play. “I also pitched an idea to Yorkshire Television and they were keen on making a pilot.”

But in 1980, a job ad appeared which was to change his life. The Theatre Workshop in Edinburgh, a venue for small scale touring companies, was looking for a coordinator. “I was now commissioning people to put on plays, but I thought ‘I could do better than that.’ Suddenly I was paid to being in a rehearsal room, creating theatre, and it was fantastic. I hadn’t trained as a director, of course, but that didn’t matter.”

Arnold made a real impact. An unlikely collaborator was Jimmy Boyle. “Jimmy, who was in prison at the time, called me up. We had lunch, even though he was still inside, and we got on really well. He had written Pain of Confinement at this time we decided to adapt it together as The Nutcracker Suite for the Royal Lyceum.”

Lie and loves: Andy Arnold

The next move was to London’s Bloomsbury Theatre it didn’t feel right, culturally. The five hundred seater a little too vast.

In 1990, Arnold however had a hankering to return to Scotland, and took his chance with street theatre. “Then I signed on for the first time in my life. But I really wanted to stay in Glasgow. I thought about running a pub theatre, which the city didn’t have. I liked the idea of something small. Then I thought of the Arches (a dilapidated former railway siding) which was owned by British Rail. I had a plan to run it for Mayfest 1991.”

And he did. But fortune kicked in when a Council error saw him granted a license for a whole year. Arnold leapt with joy. “Building control came in to inspect (and throw him out) but I had the license on the wall. The bloke was raging. But then I thought ‘How can we keep going?’ I got Glasgow Development Agency to pay the rent for a year and meantime set up the nightclub part of it. Then we were approached by a swimming pool attendant and his mate to run an Alien Spaceship idea. And I said ‘Why not?’”

It seems ‘Why not’ is Arnold’s maxim in life. And thanks to the Aliens, the bar, the night club takings and some great theatre programming (David Mamet, Joe Orton plays which tapped into Glasgow’s love for great writing, the Arches was a massive success.

His dream of small, intimate, audience-connected theatre had come true. But it’s almost perverse, you suggest. “I know,” he suggests. “I love the idea of the actors and the audience in a room together. I’ve done some big productions on big stages, such as The Tempest last year in a 1,000 seater in China, but even here some of the most enjoyable stuff I’ve done has been in the small studio theatre. I’m not interested in set, or decoration, really. It’s about connection.”

Arnold planned to leave The Arches before it closed. “It was time.” It was about decluttering, from the club side etc. But was there a trepidation in coming to the Tron with its powerful legacy? “No, there was no fear. Instead of cycling towards The Arches every morning I’d reach Eglinton Toll and just come here.”

Lie and loves: Andy Arnold

His saddle bag contained the same maverick ideas; bold plays, cheeky titles. But he admits nothing has ever been planned. “I always get frightened when people ask me about my vision because I haven’t what a clue what it is,” he says, smiling. “I like to do absurdist pieces, I like to do new plays, contemporary classics like The Mother****** With The Hat. What I tried to do initially however was appeal to the Tron’s older audience. But over the years I reckoned I’ve got to do what I want to do, and hope there is an audience for it.”

He’s usually on the money, but it frustrates the 230-seater Tron can’t really make money even if it’s packed. The producer who loves intimate could do with another 150 seats.

“With the Arches you could have twenty people in the audience and it didn’t really matter because it was supported by the club nights and the bar. Here, the Brothers Karamazov sold out and still lost money. The cheapest production we did was Cock, with four actors, and no set, and it cost us money. The panto just about covers itself now. If we had 400 seats it would make us £100k a year.”

Thankfully, subsidy allows for Arnold to give Glasgow the plays it laps up. “What I love about Glasgow is it’s a city in which the audiences are prepared to take a risk. Look at the Citizens’, for example which has a programme you’d never find in the West Yorkshire Playhouse or wherever.

“I think this is because Glasgow has a population which is second or third generation Irish, and Ireland has such a powerful theatrical and literary tradition. If you put on good writing people will come and see it. And they’ll come see work they don’t know.”

The Tron however relies upon Arnold’s anarchic outlook, his youthful energy. How old is he anyway? “I keep it quiet,” he says, grinning. “ I think maybe people think I’m younger and don’t want to be seen as ‘That old git.’ But I don’t feel old. I cycle and still play tennis.” (He was once a junior doubles champion with John Lloyd). But he’s old enough to have two partners and four children, two of them grown up.

Arnold’s wife Muireann is an actress whom he occasionally employs. Is that problematic?“Highly problematic,” he says, laughing. “But no, it’s great. She always delivers a great performance. The slight problems is I like to switch off at night from work and she can keep going.”

There’s little doubt the producer director loves his world. He’s never felt an anti-English bias and “wouldn’t dream of living anywhere else in the UK.”

Lie and loves: Andy Arnold

But you don’t believe him when he says life has happened to him. His imagination, his effort, has allowed it to happen. Regardless, the idealist has found himself in a near-perfect world.

“The sense of privilege has never left me,” he maintains. “And I’m glad I didn’t train, because with that training would have come great expectation. But I’ve never felt that. What I do feel is a great hunger to keep on doing the work.”

To make theatre that surprises?

“Always,” he says, smiling.