Iain Mackintosh (born 1937) is a British practitioner of theatre combining four interwoven careers as theatre producer, theatre space designer, curator of theatre painting and architecture exhibitions, and author and lecturer on both modern and eighteenth century theatre. He has campaigned for the retention and restoration of historic theatres as working homes for live performance. From 1975 he curated or contributed to several exhibitions of theatre paintings and architecture.
Early life Iain Mackintosh was born in Bristol, England, in 1937, and brought up in Bristol, Cornwall and Edinburgh, Scotland. Two years National Service in Hong Kong as a subaltern in the Royal Artillery, was followed by three years at Worcester College, Oxford where he took the Worcester College Buskins to the Kenton Theatre, Henley on Thames during the regatta with a review entitled "One Over The Eight". He graduated in 1960 and immediately became resident stage manager (technical director) at the Oxford Playhouse. In 1961 he co-founded the Prospect Theatre Company with Elizabeth Sweeting, manager of the Playhouse.
Mackintosh joined Theatre Projects Consultants in 1973 as a designer of theatre space and in collaboration with many architects in the UK, USA, and Canada, and with colleagues at Theatre Projects designed many significant new and restored theatre spaces.
Theatre producer, 1961–1973
In 1962 Sweeting and Mackintosh were joined on the board of Prospect by Richard Cottrell, who was associate director from 1964 to 1969, and by Toby Robertson, who became artistic director in 1964, following his production of The Provoked Wife with Eileen Atkins. Prospect was in Cambridge from 1964 and in London from 1966. Between 1963 and 1976 Prospect toured 75 productions in 125 theatres in 21 countries. In 1973 Mackintosh resigned as administrative director but remained on the Prospect board. In these first twelve years eight productions were presented at the Edinburgh International Festival, including the Lila Kedrova Cherry Orchard (1967) and Ian McKellen's double presentation of Edward II and Richard II (1968–70). These and many other Prospect productions, such as Timothy West's King Lear (1972/73), transferred to successful seasons in London West End theatres. Three productions were televised.Edward II and Richard II for the BBC; The Beggar's Opera for London Weekend Television.
In 1961 Mackintosh designed settings and costumes for two special productions at the Oxford Playhouse: the Oxford University Opera production of Benjamin Britten's The Turn of the Screw (only the second production anywhere of this opera), and Prospect's first production, the premiere of Whiteman by Michael Picardie with Brian Blessed and Prunella Scales (refer Note 1). This stage design experience was to feed back into his later career. Thereafter Mackintosh concentrated on his role as producer for Prospect. He secured international festival engagements for Prospect in Vienna, Austria; Venice, Italy and Adelaide, Australia, as well as arranging many tours Prospect overseas tours with the British Council. Touring Prospect productions and seeing the same show succeed in some theatres and fail in others led Mackintosh to concentrate on the influence of theatre architecture on performance.
Theatre space designer
After working as theatre design consultant to architect Graham Law on the Eden Court Theatre, Inverness, Mackintosh started his second career in 1973 as a designer of theatre space, joining Richard Pilbrow at Theatre Projects Consultants. He retired from Theatre Projects in 2006.
His first project at Theatre Projects was the Cottesloe Theatre at the National Theatre, London. The National Theatre building on London's Thames Southbank, designed by architect Sir Denys Lasdun, was then under construction as the new home for the National (which had been founded at the Old Vic in 1964). The Cottesloe was the third and smallest theatre, holding up to 400 people. It was located in an abandoned space under the rear of the Olivier Theatre stage. In 1973 this was a cavernous empty shell served by a partially complete foyer designed for only 200.
While the National's Olivier and Lyttleton Theatres are fixed-format, the Cottesloe can be recast into many arrangements to suit the production design. The simple design of the Cottesloe, with two galleries of audience seating surrounding three sides of the room, was ground-breaking. In 2013, on the 50th anniversary of the National, Director Nicholas Hytner wrote: ‘What Iain Mackintosh did when he was asked to make a theatre inside that big black empty box had a touch of improvisatory genius.’2. The Stage, October 17, 2013. ‘Hytner on the Cottesloe’. The Cottesloe reopens in 2014 as the Dorfman Theatre, named after the principal donor for the refurbishment.
In November 1973, when presenting the design concept to the National's Director, Peter Hall and John Bury, head of design, Mackintosh coined the phrase ‘courtyard theatre’. He later wrote ‘Courtyard, Cockpit or whatever … [it] should be particularly useful for experiment in non-scenic theatre … outdoor Fortune or indoor Blackfriars … or for the more formal expression of Grotowski or anyone else who has explored the notion of a ritual gathering of onlookers … The finish should be simple and workmanlike – it is designed to be unfinished in the sense that actor, designer and designer must ‘fill’ the whole space, and the audience complete the furnishings as wallpaper does a room’.3. The Stage, March 1977, an article by Mackintosh in a souvenir for the opening of the Cottesloe. Reproduced in I Mackintosh, ‘Found Space in a New Building’, The Cottesloe at the National, Infinite Riches in a Little Room, R Mulrynne and M Shewring, Mulryne and Shewring Ltd and National Theatre, Statford-upon-Avon, 1999, pp 24–31.
The Cottesloe was received enthusiastically by the theatre industry and audiences. As explained by The Theatres Trust Theatres Database entry for the Royal National Theatre: ‘It owes more in terms of inspiration to Mackintosh and Theatre Projects Consultants than to Lasdun. It was, in point of time, the second,4. The first to open, although not referred to as a courtyard at the time, was the school theatre at Christ's Hospital School of 1974 designed by architect Bill Howell who was tragically killed in a car accident a few weeks later at the age of 52. but certainly the most influential of the modern ‘courtyard’ theatres, with something of the character of an urban barn fit-up. Its extremely simple, rectangular form, with the audience on three shallow tiers, can be readily adapted to proscenium, end stage, thrust, in-the-round, traverse or promenade form.’5. The Theatres Trust Theatres Database entry for the Royal National Theatre (3149) http://www.theatrestrust.org.uk/resources/theatres/show/3149-royal-national-theatre, accessed 5 February 2014. In his review of Setting the Scene: Perspectives on Twentieth-Century Theatre Architecture, edited by Alistair Fair, Richard Pilbrow noted ‘It's interesting to reflect that in our National Theatre the two architect-designed theatres have attracted not one single imitator, whereas the theatre-designed Cottesloe has prompted perhaps more than fifty successful clones around the world. Bringing human beings together in lively juxtaposition simply works. Sightline: Journal of Theatre Technology and Design, Autumn 2015
This project led to other rectangular galleried playhouses, such as The Tricycle (1980) with architect Tim Foster, which was constructed out of builders’ scaffolding within an existing volume. The Founders’ Theatre (2001) at Lenox Massachusetts, developed with architect George Marsh of Boston, is likewise a scaffolded courtyard in an extended hut. Mackintosh's smallest galleried space is also his only theatre-in-the-round, the 185 seat Orange Tree Theatre in Richmond, London (1991).
Mackintosh developed two other forms of flexible theatre spaces, each holding around 450 patrons with three levels of seats around the edges enveloping the central audience area, which can be reconfigured for different stagings. Examples of the square form include Wilde Theatre, South Hill Park, Bracknell (1984), with architects Levitt Bernstein, and the Lawrence Batley Theatre, Huddersfield (1994) with the Kirklees local authority architects. The Guardian opera critic Andrew Clements wrote ‘The design is the work of Iain Mackintosh… and he has done a seamless job in creating a 400 plus theatre, beautifully proportioned with a handy adjustable pit.’6. A Clement, The Guardian, 19 November 1994.
The first apsidal room (parallel sides with semi-circular galleries facing the stage) was the Martha Cohen Theatre, Calgary (1985), with architect Joel Barrett, later repeated in the Quays Theatre (2000) at The Lowry, Salford, with architect Michael Wilford. More architecturally refined examples were the Westminster School Theatre, Connecticut (1989), with architect Graham Gund, and the Vanburgh Theatre (2000) at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, in London, in collaboration with architect Bryan Avery.
Replacement of failed modern auditoria by returning to a traditional multilevel intimate house include the Bluma Appell Theatre at the St. Laurence Centre for the Arts, Toronto, Canada (1983) and the Enschede Schouwburg Netherlands with Dutch architect, Onno Greiner (1988).
The epitome of Mackintosh's horseshoe, galleried auditorium concepts was the Glyndebourne Opera (1994). It was undertaken for Theatre Projects Consultants in a team led by architect Michael Hopkins. Executive chairman Sir George Christie said ‘It was Mackintosh who convinced everybody that the horseshoe was the best shape. It happened remarkably quickly. We all felt intimacy would be most easily achieved with the people in the audience wrapped round like wallpaper. That's something that neither the fan shape nor the shoebox does.’7. Glyndebourne, Building a Vision, M Binney and R Runciman, Thames and Hudson, London, 1994, pp 95–96. Architectural critic Jonathan Glancy wrote ‘Inside the auditorium the project makes near perfect sense. Mackintosh and Hopkins have produced a big but intimate space. It has as near as one can get to a timeless quality’.8. J Glancy, The Guardian, 1 February 1994.
Glyndebourne was the first of the new horseshoe opera houses such as Toronto, Dallas and Copenhagen (designed by others). Before Glyndebourne, ‘modern’ opera houses had all the seats pointing cinema-like at the stage. This format is good for audience sightlines but does not support a rich theatrical experience. Mackintosh's theatre forms were based on strict geometry, generally ad quadratum (ascending concentric circles within successive squares). In 2004 he contributed to the design for the second space at The Sage Gateshead, with architects Foster and Partners. Hall Two holds 450 patrons for all types of musical performance, with three encircling galleries and options of performing in the centre or on a platform stage along three of the ten sides. Mackintosh believed it to be the only performance space in the world with pentagonal geometry.9. I Mackintosh, ‘A Five Sided Notebook: 1996- 2001’, Sightline, Winter 2005, the quarterly journal of the Association of British Theatre Technicians.
In 2009 Mackintosh worked with architect Robin Snell (also a contributor to Glyndebourne), on the design of the Opera Pavilion at Garsington Opera, which opened in 2011 and won many awards.
New Life for Historic theatres
As well as working on new theatres Mackintosh has advocated for the retention and renovation of old theatres. These include the Festival Theatre, Edinburgh (1994), formerly the Milburn Brothers’ Empire Theatre of 1928 which he designed with architect Colin Ross of Law and Dunbar-Nasmith, the Theatre Royal, Nottingham (1976-1978) with Renton Howard Wood Levin Architects and the Lyceum Theatre, London.