It turned out that he was merely hiring the show He is the eternal populist, the putter-on of "good shows" no matter how august the subject matter might be perceived by sniffy critics.So it comes as no surprise that Gubbay is to stand toe-to-toe against the opera establishment of the Royal Opera and English National Opera, by turning to the Savoy, a few yards away from both their houses on which he has flung his sometimes genial curses, sometimes less so.He will start off next spring - in partnership with the Savoy Theatre Group - with the perpetual crowd-pleasers, Figaro's story as told in the operas of Mozart and Rossini, with a triumvirate of artistic directors in the highly regarded Steven Pimlott, David Parry and Sarah Playfair, There are rumours that Deborah Warner and David Freeman will direct a production each. "They should privatise Covent Garden, give the subsidy to all the great little companies popping up now to make new work,'' he said. "Then the opera house would quickly find out how to run a national company commercially."All he ever wants, he has said, is to put on "a good show", and everything is levelled to that judgement. It turned out that he was merely hiring the show.The cost was a few pence short of £1m lost on the venture, entirely borne by Raymond Gubbay Productions, and with it went any serious regard Gubbay had had for the running of subsidised opera in this country. He shook me warmly by the hand and said, 'Good luck with your project'. My project! No question of our project, of partnership.'' Gubbay had fondly imagined that "co-production'' meant shared risk but to his cost he found that the Royal Opera was not in the business of risk-taking co-productions. La Traviata was lined up to follow."Just before we opened,'' he recalled five years later, "I went to see Jeremy Isaacs [then general director of the Royal Opera House]. The origins of the great war between Raymond Gubbay, showman of operatic production, and the publicly-financed opera establishment can be traced to his lavish and disastrous Wembley Arena production of Turandot in 1991. That opening night was festive, even if two-thirds of the 8,000 seats were empty, and he still smiles wryly at the crassness of having a champagne bar insisted on by the Royal Opera marketing department next to the one selling the more familiar Wembley fare of crisps and lager.It was, Gubbay believed, supposed to be an experimental co-production with the Royal Opera which would lead to a series of large-scale, relatively low-cost offerings. The group posted a pre-tax profit of £1.5m, up from just £20,000 a year earlier. Oakdene is believed to be looking to move up to AIM next spring.. Over on the unregulated Ofex market, Oakdene Homes rose 7p to 94.5p after a solid set of interim figures from the residential house builder. The placing is believed to have been oversubscribed while the stock closed at 35p on its maiden day.
The group raised £2m via a placing of stock at 25p by broker Christows. Non-executives Kevin D'Silva and Peter Holland each bought 100,000 shares at 27.5p. Incite Holding, which provides corporates with tailor-made mobile phone services, made its debut on AIM. It emerged yesterday that following the release of Thursday's news, directors had been busy buying up stock in the market. The German broker calculates that Premier trades at a 23 per cent discount to the company's net asset value. Surface Transforms lost 4.5p to 47.5p on profit taking after Thursday's stellar performance by the stock on the back of a contract win from the US navy. Also helping the stock higher were suggestions by Deutsche Bank that the group is vulnerable to a bid at current levels. There was also director selling at Bakery Services, down 0.25p to 1.25p. Richard Worthington, the group's chairman, sold 500,000 shares at 1.3p. Autologic lost 35p to 295p after announcing the collapse of bid talks. Earlier this month the fleet management group said it had received a 350p-a-share cash bid from a private equity firm. Premier Oil gained 5p to 355p after the oil explorer completed a 10 for 1 share consolidation. |
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