It's a chilly Monday morning in early August and Daniel Stoddart is alone in his office on the top floor of Very Popular Theatre Company's headquarters on Fern Street, Islington. Login or signup to continue reading The space heater is doing its best, and Daniel's wearing a snug jumper. He closes the door to keep the heat in, but the black brick walls in the space atop a converted warehouse are signalling that warmth is a stranger.
Our conversation is brisk, like the morning air, covering the history of his theatre business (Hunter Drama, The Very Popular Theatre Company, Oz Theatrics and Stoddart Entertainment Group) and the details of his latest production, Mary Poppins , which opens at the Civic Theatre in October. I've been briefed that Stoddart's budget for the Mary Poppins production is over a million dollars, and I finally pose the question, "Doesn't risk alarm you?". Stoddart's response is off the cuff.
"It's a fraught business," he says. "I don't know if I'm cut out for it. I don't know if I should be doing it.
I don't know if I'm the right person who should be taking these horrible risks. "Just this morning I was saying to [his wife] Hayley, 'I don't think I want to do this any more' because we just did School of Rock two weeks ago and that show lost us $70,000, which is horrible. Superstars , which we did at the Civic Theatre earlier this year, that lost us $40,000.
Billy Elliot last year lost us $40,000 to $50,000. And it's just getting so stressful. "Riding these .