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Seems like yesterday...


Circa Theatre’s 1979 production of Decayed Decade starred Ginette McDonald, Susan Wilson and Peter Hayden.
Circa Theatre’s 1979 production of Decayed Decade starred Ginette McDonald, Susan Wilson and Peter Hayden.
CIRCA Theatre was born at a dinner party in Miramar. A group of actors bemoaning the state of Wellington theatre decided it was time to start a second professional theatre in the city.
“We wanted to make a space for artists,” founding Circa member, Sue Wilson, says.  “We wanted artists to have control of the theatre so actors and designers would actually be running the theatre.”
Circa was an experiment. Theatre had become top heavy, with management and administration devouring the money so there was often little left for the performers. The new theatre would be different. It would operate as a co-operative with all money going into the performance partnerships that were to put on the actual plays. It was an experiment that worked and 35 years on Circa continues to operate as a co-operative. A core committee administers the theatre, with shows being mounted by individual co-operatives who manage their own finances and production requirements.
Since Circa’s first production, David Hare’s Knuckle in April 1976, Circa has presented over 500 productions, of which at least one-third have been New Zealand plays.
“Our first huge success was Roger Hall’s Glide Time  in 1976’’ Wilson recalls. “It became too big for our small Harris Street theatre so we moved it to the Opera House.”
Circa’s first base in Harris Street soon became too small for all the theatre’s productions.  In 1994 Circa moved into its existing home on Taranaki Street, with two theatre spaces and a café and restaurant.
For 35 years Circa has brought  theatre to Wellington covering many New Zealand works, international plays, classics, dramas, musicals and comedies. Upcoming productions include Roger Hall’s Four Flat Whites in Italy and Hone Kouka’s I, George Nepia.
“We read over 100 plays each year looking for the best of the world and the best of New Zealand,” Wilson says. “We also commission our own plays, the most recent the sold-out season of The Motor Camp.”
Wilson says it’s hard to believe so many years have gone by since that dinner party in Miramar.
“It has been a success. We really didn’t think it would last 35 years.”
Circa celebrates its 35th birthday with a production of the multi-prize winning American play August: Osage County.  In Circa 2 Sir Jon Trimmer returns with Fairy Stories.

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