Statement from Brett Debritz, savetheregent.com webmaster:
Febraury 25, 2007:
When I went on Spencer Howson's 612ABC breakfast program this morning, I was wrong-footed. I thought I would be congratulating Queensland Premier Anna Bligh over her bold plan to save the Regent theatre.
In fact, as I listened to Ms Bligh, I realised she didn't have a plan at all, just a sense that many voters cared about the Regent and that she should be seen to be doing something about it.
It took Anna Bligh almost two weeks to say what thousands of other Queenslanders felt instinctively and immediately: that the Regent must be saved.
But in that time, she didn't come up with a strategy, other than that she might be able to invoke some secret government powers to ensure "one or two" cinemas remained at a redeveloped Regent office tower.
This is despite the fact that the international trend in cinemas is towards huge suburban complexes with 16 or more screens. One or two screen complexes are not viable.
Ms Bligh dismissed the suggestion that the Regent could become a live-theatre venue - even though, as the recent experience in Melbourne has shown, old theatres can be restored and they can attract big Broadway blockbusters in their Australian premieres. Melbourne and Sydney have done very well out of these shows, such as Billy Elliott, Spamalot and the upcoming Wicked. Locals love them and tourists travel to see them, making hoteliers and airlines very happy indeed.
Brisbane has the very good Queensland Performing Arts Centre, but it is not able to host open-ended season of a big show because its Lyric Theatre is committed to seasons of opera and touring productions of only some of the afore-mentioned big shows.
Anna Bligh has said Brisbane needs more office towers, and suggested that that's what CBDs are there for. Has she never travelled to London, New York or Melbourne and seen that offices and theatres can live together in harmony?
Yes the owners of the Regent have a right to capitalised on their investment. But they don't have the right to destroy a Brisbane cultural icon, and it's Ms Bligh's job to find a compromise.
Even the developer's own research shows that building over the foyer of the Regent would come with a risk of collapse. Ooops, sorry; best demolish it all now.
Even if they do manage to build a tower over the foyer (and, hopefully, a restored theatre), what happens in 30 or 50 years' time when that tower has outlived its usefulness? Will the next developer save the Regent?
I think not. But I suppose Anna Bligh will be long gone from office then, and it won't be her concern. I suspect, though, that at least some cultural historians will join the dots back to her (and, of course, to Joh Bjelke-Petersen under whose reign the original desecration of the Regent's auditorium occurred).
I think Ms Bligh and her team owe it to the people of Queensland to look at all the options - and especially this one:
Why not buy the building, compenstate the developer and fast-track permission for them to build their tower elsewhere, and restore the Regent as a 2000- to 2500-seat venue capable of hosting large theatre and concert events, as well as special-event cinema (like the opening and closing of the Brisbane International Film Festival?
I even have a suggestion as to the first musical that could be mounted in the restored Regent: Pyjamas in Paradise, a new show by Dusty and Shout! co-writer John-Michael Howson and Brisbane's Peter Pinne.
The musical, which has a rehearsed reading at the Metro Arts Theatre a few years ago is set in Queensland - and it's partly a parody of a white-shoe-wearing politician and developer who wants to build big tall towers all over the place.
How appropriate!
Brett Debritz
February 26 update: Thanks to Rebecca, who pointed out that the Melbourne Regent and the Plaza Ballroom were restored in a deal that allowed the developer to build a hotel on another site nearby. As I was getting at above, the state government and council should look at a similar deal to see the Brisbane Regent restored as a theatre, and allow the developers to build their office tower somewhere else. This would be a win-win situation: a new tower block provides more office space for the city, and the theatre is retained and restored.
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