Mr. Declan Conlon:

The notion of a training school might be served by what we were discussing. This letter was written by Maureen McGlynn and Ms Clíóna Dukes with very little input from me so I cannot take credit for it. I simply delivered it. Regarding the relationship we mentioned in the letter involving the casting department and the nurturing of young talent, regardless of where it is trained such as in the Lir Academy or the Gaiety School of Acting, there is a significant problem because there is no connection between people coming out of drama schools and the national theatre. It seems that the only way one can get access to the national theatre is by forming a company. This notion is very odd. The Abbey's own company began a very long time ago. Under the change model, everybody would be a freelancer and nobody would have any security of tenure in the arts. The community adapted to that over the years. What we have now is a situation where the system has recently changed with the new direction for the Abbey. As far as I am aware, no artist was consulted about this new direction. It was obviously discussed by the board of the Abbey and the Arts Council without any consultation with any of the 409 people who have written this letter. The outcome of this is that freelancers are now being deprived in work in the Abbey because they are freelancers. If someone does not set up or is not a member of a small company, he or she will not have access to the Abbey Theatre. The way we used to have access was when a variety of independent freelance directors were employed by the Abbey Theatre, who then employed a wide variety of individual freelance actors because that is how the net was spread. A wide, or wider, variety of people was employed. This has shut down completely. Another side effect is that we have a very limited creative vision as a result. We said this in the letter. One man is directing the major funded productions on the main stage of the national theatre - one vision. As for two of the plays that were mentioned,"Come On Home", which I was very pleased to be a part of, and "On Raftery's Hill", "the latter had ten performances. This was less than two weeks.