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Subscriber Stories is an exclusive archive of content created just for our monthly newsletter readers. These stories can range from behind-the-scenes videos of our cast and creatives, to fascinating research pieces based on the work we put on stage, and lots more!
So grab a cuppa and enjoy…
Community Connector Rev Sullivan
Meet our brilliant Community Connector Rev Sullivan.
This month’s Subscriber Story is an insight into a brilliant team member at the Royal Exchange Theatre, Community Connector Rev Sullivan. Find out what it means to be a Community Connector below:
What does the role of a Community Connector entail?
My role is such a wonderful opportunity to embed myself further into my local community and help to connect all the amazing groups, organisations and networks together to create a gorgeous creative web. I get to meet all the brilliant local organisations, groups, and residents who are doing impactful work in Tameside, and offer them resources from the Royal Exchange Theatre in order to flourish.
Building relationships and long-term partnerships is so important to my role and Local Exchange as a whole. It ensures that our presence within our communities isn’t fleeting and is in touch with the needs and wants of the community.
How did you get into your role?
I got into my role through engaging with Local Exchange Tameside in its first iteration. While I was in college, I started as an Ambassador on Local Exchange. I worked on some amazing projects in the run-up to the Den Festival. I worked on the community allotment in Dukinfield, on the This Is Tameside poem, and volunteered around the Den. It was an amazing opportunity for me and also helped me get into my first choice of university. While I was at university, I got asked back to perform at the studio in No Such Thing As Ordinary, which felt so surreal to be able to perform at the Royal Exchange Theatre. I remember being 20 and getting a dressing room for the day, and I felt like such a star!
While at university, I studied theatre and did a Community theatre course that felt like the next step in my creative community practice. Returning back to Tameside with my theatre degree and all of my new experiences, it was so serendipitous that Local Exchange’s second residence in Tameside was beginning its second iteration. Now here we are, with the second Tameside Den Festival launching this weekend (Fri 9 May)!
Tell us a bit about yourself and your passions.
Outside of my work as a Community Connector I’m a filmmaker, DJ and performer! I’m part of a queer collective called Queer Boots who run not-for-profit dance nights where we raise money for various causes, local and international. It was through this collective that I started DJ’ing and have now played various venues across the North West. One of my favourite DJ gigs has been Disco Neurotico, which is a rave experience catered towards neuro-divergent audiences. As a performer, I do drag and cabaret performances which border on the satirical and silly! As a filmmaker, I’ve been working on experimental short films and ambient soundscapes. I’ve also been so lucky to see my film, Maskuline, get into various film festivals including the Scottish Queer International Film Festival, which was such a blast to attend.
What’s your favourite part about your work?
My favourite part is providing the opportunities in Tameside that I wish I could have had when I was younger. We recently ran two training courses for NEET (not in education, employment, or training) Young People in Tameside that were invaluable gateways to getting into the creative industries. I benefited so much from my engagement with Local Exchange, and I love being able to be a part of providing that for other people now. It’s so beautiful to see ambassadors from the previous residency go on to do amazing creative things, and even find employment here at the Royal Exchange Theatre!
Can you tell us a bit about The Den festival in Tameside?
The Den Festival is an amazing 4 weekend long creative arts festival happening in the heart of Tameside. We have worked closely with over 30 local residents, our Ambassadors and Champions, to programme a festival that is sure to have something for everyone. We have a huge variety from dance to music, theatre to circus skills, and so much more. It has been at the core of our work to highlight Tameside talent, so we have worked with amazing local organisations like Phantasmagoria, Global Grooves, and Sarah England Dance!
Every day of the festival has super interesting workshops, events and shows programmed with so much happening in a beautiful civic space. I encourage everyone to come down and check it out, even just to see the magic of Local Exchange in action!
Are there any key events at the festival you’d like to highlight?
I would love to highlight the Global Grooves workshops and performances. There is such a beautiful story tracing from the last Den Festival to now. Four years ago when Global Grooves last performed, lots of the children who were in the show are now Ambassadors. Also, one of these young people who got involved now works for Global Grooves, and will be part of their professional performing team at the Den..
Opening this Fri 9 May, The Den Festival will take over Stalybridge Civic Hall for four weekends of fun! Find out more here.
Sound Designer Nicola T. Chang
Hear from ESCAPED ALONE and WHAT IF IF ONLY Sound Designer Nicola T. Chang.
This month’s Subscriber Story is a special long read from ESCAPED ALONE and WHAT IF IF ONLY Sound Designer Nicola T. Chang. Recently nominated for a WhatsOnStage award for Best Sound Design for MINORITY REPORT, Nicola chats to us about her sound design techniques, career progression, and in the spirit of the play – futurology!
How did you get into your role as a Sound Designer?
Sound design for theatre wasn’t on my cards growing up but I fell into it and fell in love with it. It’s a discipline that keeps growing quickly and changing technically. I look after the audience’s entire audio journey, and that includes placing speakers in appropriate places, mic positions, and the content you hear.
My theatrical career started in performing and then eventually moved to design. I moved to the UK 10 years ago on a one-way ticket from Hong Kong with every hope to launch a career in the arts and also to perform in a show called STOMP (I watched the video when I was 7 years old in music class and was enraptured!). I eventually auditioned for the show in London and performed in the West End and World Tour productions of STOMP for 2 years, but a stage injury then cut my performing career short.
I then began to pursue my other passion – writing music and designing sound. I started my sound design career at the fringe and in pub theatres working as a sound designer/composer on various theatre productions in London, as well as at the VAULT Festival and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and since have had many brilliant and beautiful opportunities to grow my network, develop skills and hone my craft. Occasionally I take on the role of a musical director and I still perform in musical theatre productions. Recently as a keys player I performed in FANTASTICALLY GREAT WOMEN WHO CHANGED THE WORLD at The Lowry. At the moment, I spend about 90% of my working year composing/sound designing for stage and screen, and 10% of the year performing either as a stage musician or a musical director.
Are there any other creative team roles that you work closely with and how does that relationship work?
Theatre and design are really about people and negotiation! I work very closely with every member of the creative team – the director, the lighting designer, the set and costume designers, and other designers/choreographers/movement directors, and also the team from the venue. A lot of design is about compromise and parameters – artistic and technical.
With the director we set up the world and the sound design language – what sort of instruments, or the rhythm of the design, for example. What is the show about, how can we achieve that together? With the set and costume designer I make sure that the visual aspects of my design fit into their vision: can I put a speaker here, or will that interfere with the set? The actors have mics in their wigs, is that alright? With the lighting designer we work together to punctuate theatrical moments, highlight beats and focus attention. With choreographers/movement directors it’s about timing – how many seconds does this transition take? How can the music/sound design fit into the tempo of the movement onstage? With the venue team, I place speakers at locations which serve both the audience and the play; and the team knows the venue best so it’s a great opportunity to learn and expand upon my own design ideas.
Creatively, designers work closely with the director (for overall vision), other designers (to achieve said vision together across all elements, such as lighting, set, projection), venue technicians and production sound engineers (to create and solidify a design best tailored to a particular space), cast (to work towards vision of production and understand whether the design is helping or hindering them), stage management and crew (to execute said design and vision in a most predictable and efficient manner across all performances), and many, many more people.
How is sound used to heighten moments in ESCAPED ALONE & WHAT IF IF ONLY?
The sound design for ESCAPED ALONE is “hard” – it’s all rhythm, pulse, apocalyptic soundscapes and drums; WHAT IF IF ONLY is “softer” – all music, melody, harmony and temperature. In both, I also control the level of naturalistic atmosphere: birdsong, dogs, cars, ambulances etc., to jolt audiences back into reality. I think sound design works best when there’s contrast: silence can only exist in opposition to dense and loud sound, naturalism in opposition to organised music, rhythm in opposition to gentle warm soundscapes.
I use rhythm quite a lot in ESCAPED ALONE. Deep pulses, tom-tom rolls, and drum-hits located outside the module punctuate monologues and add a sense of rhythm and urgency. In Mrs Jarett’s monologues, all the underscore is elemental – earth-based soundscapes for an earthquake-theme one, water drops for a water-themed one etc. We also use tinnitus to foreshadow Mrs Jarett’s “terrible rage” monologue and our characters’ inner monologues – you’ll hear wisps of it throughout the show. Ultimately, her “terrible rage” monologue needs to sonically be the loudest part of the show, so everything builds towards that.
The sound design of WHAT IF IF ONLY is one huge musical score in the key to the opening track HELLO STRANGER by Barbara Lewis. Tension is created by detuning and controlling the dynamics of the soundscape, and the sound design reaches the most expansive part when the featured Elders arrive. This is all flipped when the characters Present (played by Lamin Touray) and Child (played by Bea Glancy) enter, in which I then re-introduce naturalistic sounds to break the dream.
ESCAPED ALONE challenges audiences to think about the future and the world around them, in what way does the play use the present to interrogate the future?
I think ESCAPED ALONE is as much about the past and present as it is about the future. There are a lot of relatable current events in ESCAPED ALONE – in every one of Mrs. Jarett’s monologues there’s an inkling and a glimpse of a world event that happened in the past or recently. It’s sometimes satirical, yet so astoundingly believable as we as a society seem quite capable of mutual destruction and survival. If you look at the monologues as a forewarning, it’s also a prompt into humanity, human behaviour and collective reactions to events. We’ve all seen or dreamt of some form of that apocalypse – I hope that we will have the empathy and collective power to reverse and stop any human atrocity in the future.
How is sound design for theatre different from design for film or TV?
I work across theatre, film, TV and audio drama so this is an interesting question for me. Theatre is live and unpredictable: actors drop lines, people might not be able to perform, a swing is called up… all of those might happen in any given show, and therefore my job as a sound design is to ensure that anything I design is still replicable despite uncertain factors. While this might sometimes mean design constraints, it also allows for more abstract design ideas to be used in a show.
The timeline of theatre is also different from that of film. In theatre, you tend to be in a room with your whole production team for a few weeks, working closely together to produce a piece of work, whereas in film/TV you often work independently after receiving a final edit/final cut. This is a big factor to consider when thinking about how you want to work and what schedule you’d like to follow in your career!
What are some of the ways you can get started as a sound designer?
On an everyday basis, practice intelligent listening. Listen out for how music and sound makes you feel in your favourite TV shows, films, theatre shows, and in different environments. On a fundamental level, sound designers understand the power of sound and music to aid storytelling and to immerse audiences in environments. To find out whether this might be for you, reach out to sound designers whose work you admire and ask whether you might be able to shadow them on a job, or even have a coffee if they have the time/capacity.
To find collaborators, network with directors, producers and theatre companies – they are the ones looking for sound designers, and your careers will grow together! Join various networking platforms to find gigs, and make sure you have an audio portfolio ready to go. If something you made doesn’t get used in a show, shelve it – you never know when it’s useful for another show down the line.
Training – there are many schools that offer courses in sound design and technical theatre. Find the one that’s right for you: find out whether they let you design student productions and whether there are any external freelancers who mentor students. Networking and having a portfolio of work is always crucial.
Join mentorship and apprenticeship schemes – various theatres have a version of these, such as the National Theatre to Jermyn Street Theatre.
In what ways can sound design be radical and political?
I think sound is a very efficient design language that brings in the outside world and situates us within the politics of a piece. Audio footage, historical recordings, verbatim theatre, and live streaming are great examples of techniques that one can use. One of the greatest things sound design can do is magnify the politics onstage – a protest can be made a thousand-people strong or an altercation made a thousand-times more horrific – by choosing what audiences hear.
What is one thing you wish you knew when you were making your first steps into a design career?
One piece of advice is to “find your crowd” – find the people you want to work with, find a community that has your back, and find artists whose work you admire and reach out to them, so you can all grow together. I wish I knew more business skills when I was starting out – how to position myself in the industry, how to grow a brand, basic accounting and finance skills, joining a union, and how to continuously adapt to a changing market.
An Elders’ Love Story
Meet Elders' Company members Helen and Tracy and hear the story of how they met, to the lead up to their wedding day at the Royal Exchange Theatre.
After meeting in the 2022-2023 Elders’ Company, Helen and Tracy (now Elders Graduates), tied the knot on Saturday 5 October 2024 in the theatre’s Exchange Suite.
This followed a fun-filled week of EldersFest, celebrating 10 radical years of creative ageing, which included a performance of ACTS OF LOVE in which Helen performed a scene about meeting Tracy.
The day started with Helen and Tracy getting ready in their very own dressing rooms. Then, they had an intimate ceremony in the Exchange Suite with 20 of their friends and family, as well as Andy Barry, Elders Programme Producer, who they asked to sign their wedding certificate as a witness.
The ceremony was followed by a sit-down meal, and then an evening reception in Rivals Cafe and Bar, which all current Elders’ Company members and Elders’ Graduates were invited to, and included open-mic performances from the guests. Helen and Tracy even sang a duet! There was a buffet spread of party food, a close-up magician, and even a light-up dance floor!
“We loved using the Rivals for our reception, as it meant we got to show the Great Hall to our guests and to decorate it so beautifully. It was the perfect historical venue for the day, and the disco balls especially were fab – we had so much fun!”
“The Hires and Events team have been wonderful with helping us to plan our wedding, and the staff on the day made us feel like nothing was too much trouble. Everybody wanted us to have a great day and that shone through everything they did – we were made to feel very special. It meant so much to us to get married in the place that we met, and it was an absolutely perfect day. Thank you so much.”
If you’d like to host your wedding or private event at the Royal Exchange Theatre, please enquire at hires@royalexchange.co.uk.
Instead of receiving physical gifts on their wedding day, Helen and Tracy chose to ask their guests to donate to Arts Pot, which is the Royal Exchange Theatre’s bursary fund that supports course fees, travel costs and access provisions for participants who may not otherwise be able to engage with our programmes.
“We chose to ask guests to donate to Arts Pot because we recognised how useful it was in providing people with opportunities to get involved with the Royal Exchange Theatre’s programmes, and after having such a wonderful time in the Elders’ Company, we wanted other people to have that experience too.”
A whopping £500 was raised for Arts Pot thanks to Helen and Tracy!
If you’d like to find out more about Arts Pot please see here.
If you’d like to make new friends and join a community of Elders in Manchester, take a look at our Elders Programme here Elders – Royal Exchange Theatre.
Hear all about Melanin Markets
Catch up with Melanin Markets Co-Founder and CEO Bianca Danielle who talks about the mission behind Melanin Markets ahead of their next event this Sunday 8 Dec.
Can you talk us through the mission behind Melanin Markets?
Melanin Markets was created to elevate Black-owned businesses and reshape the narrative of Black entrepreneurship in Britain. Our mission is to break down stigma, barriers and misconceptions, creating space for our own stories to flourish. We’re driven by the goal of seeing Black businesses woven into the everyday fabric of our vibrant, diverse nation – not as a “first” or a “token” or only for Black History Month, but as an essential part of British culture year-round.
Intentional spending is at the heart of what we do. We encourage everyone from all communities to be mindful of where and how they spend their money, recognising that investing in Black-owned businesses is an investment in socio-economic balance and in a community that contributes so much to our culture and cities. Our goal is to inspire everyone to take pride in supporting businesses that reflect this richness, resilience and creativity. This mission takes everyone, we don’t operate in silo.
How does someone make the most out of their day at Melanin Markets?
There’s no right or wrong way to enjoy the experience – just arrive with an open mind and let the day lead you! Each visitor will leave with something new, whether it’s a discovery, a taste, a sound or a meaningful connection.
To truly soak it in, I’d recommend arriving early, while it’s less busy, and slowly making your way around. Take the time to chat with stall owners, hear their stories and learn about their products and services. Grab business cards, snap photos of contact details and bookmark websites for future shopping. Then treat yourself to some of the delicious drink blends, cuisines or sweet treats, enjoy the live music and performances, and finally, circle back to pick up the items you loved the most.
What’s your favourite thing about Melanin Markets?
I love the sense of catharsis and community. Being in a space surrounded by so many talented, passionate people who choose to come together and celebrate our culture is a truly special experience. There’s a warmth and openness that fills the room. I often hear stories of resilience, heritage and deep self-reflection from our traders – many have turned personal journeys and family traditions into thriving businesses, whether it’s authentic shea skincare or handcrafted African accessories reminding them of home or giving back to home.
At Melanin Markets, we invite people to come just as they are. There’s no pressure to buy anything or fit into a mould. It’s simply a space to enjoy Black excellence, joy and culture in all its forms.
With Melanin Markets returning back to the Royal Exchange Theatre on Sunday 8 Dec, are there any unique or new Traders that you’re particularly excited about?
Yes! I’m excited to introduce some incredible new traders, with half of the 48 being first-timers at Melanin Markets
For the fashionistas, we have Kinis, a London-based brand creating stunning crocheted hats and bikinis, Neon Afrique from Newcastle with high-quality African garments crafted from 100% authentic African fabric, and Cocoloves from Liverpool, offering beautiful silk kaftans and kimonos. Their tagline, “Made with love, to be worn with love. One of a kind, just like you,” really speaks to the softie in me.
Food lovers can look forward to brands like ARMR, a Manchester favourite for beloved Caribbean dishes who are good friends and super inspirational to me as they do so much in and for the community. Culture Box will be joining us for the first time, also Manchester-based, they bring a unique fusion of African, Caribbean, and British flavours inspired by their Ghanaian and Jamaican heritage.
For wellness enthusiasts like me, there are brands promoting inner and outer health, including Simply Seamoss, Body Soul and Seamoss, Iysha Ltd with a vegan makeup line, and M’ṣará Botanicals for plant-based body care.
Do you have any Traders who are not from Manchester?
Absolutely. Platforming Manchester’s own business will always be a priority as that’s home turf, but I always feel really lucky that Melanin Markets attracts traders from all across the UK year after year. For Winter Wonders, we’ll have stalls from Liverpool, Leeds, Birmingham, London, and more. This is essential for creating a space where businesses can network, learn from each other, and gain exposure outside their local areas.
You have live performances too, can you tell us more about them?
We’ll have a few performances that I’ll be announcing soon on Melanin Markets’ social channels. I can share that we’re welcoming back our popular steelpan soloist, Zolatec, whose renditions of R&B, hip-hop, and trap on the pans are always a crowd-pleaser!
Plus, I’m excited to introduce Raised Profiles, a duo I discovered by chance. I was walking past Primark when I heard a saxophone and trumpet playing the most beautiful tunes. I looked over to see two older gentlemen performing right there on the street – it was magical. I knew they’d be perfect for the event.
More information about Melanin Markets.
Follow on social media @MelaninMarkets
Spend Spend Spend Choreographer & Intimacy Director Lucy Hind
This exclusive Q&A with Lucy Hind talks about her journey into Choreography and Intimacy Direction, and how our Christmas musical Spend Spend Spend moves through the decades.
How did you get into your role as a Choreographer and Intimacy Director?
I actually trained in South Africa. I did a psychology and drama degree and thought I wanted to be a dancer. When I moved to the UK, I started doing movement on plays rather than dance shows and began to grow into the role, which I didn’t even know existed at the time. I choreographed small dance bits and loved making scene changes and doing character work with actors. I also joined a company called Slung Low based in Leeds, it’s really where I met my community and began my career. I didn’t go to drama school or know anyone in the industry here, which goes to show you can pave your own way.
During the pandemic, I began training as an Intimacy Director. I feel like it’s the perfect meeting of my movement training and psychology degree and I really love it. It’s a fast-growing and vital part of our industry and I’m learning so much on every job I do.
What does the role of an Intimacy Director entail?
Working closely with the director, I am there to create a consent-led room and advocate for the actors. I help actors find clarity on their personal boundaries, give a voice to those, and then choreograph the intimate moments like they are a dance.
What is it like to choreograph a revival like Spend Spend Spend?
It’s been an absolute joy. There are so many classic styles as well as the naturalistic, characterful storytelling moments. It’s such an amazing story with so many ups and downs and I feel like the music and movement allow us to really feel that.
Spend Spend Spend moves through various eras, what’s it like to choreograph across the decades?
It’s wonderfully fun. There are a few very particular dance styles, but dance itself also continues to influence styles as time goes on. And so many of the styles that we still do today originated many decades ago. I hope I’ve found ways to pay tribute to some famous styles and moments in dance history. We have a wonderful MGM Busby Berkeley style number and some very different, more stylised pieces. I hope I’ve also put my own personal stamp on it!
If you had one piece of advice for someone starting out in the industry what would it be?
See as many different types of work as you can, find out what makes you excited and what kinds of stories you want to tell. Find a community of like-minded artists and make something. Don’t wait until you feel ready, just do it.
Meet The Elder, Graham Gillis
After celebrating ten radical years of creative ageing with our EldersFest, we wanted to share a special story from a founding member of the Royal Exchange's Elders Company.
Graham was a founding member of the Elders Company. From 2011 he had been
attending Between the Lines – our playreading group – and was a Friend of the
Theatre. After attending a Taster session in 2014, Graham was invited to join the pilot
for the Company of Elders and has been an active member ever since…
What is your most-treasured memory?
Almost certainly it’s taking part in MOMENTS THAT CHANGED OUR WORLD – for so many reasons; forming bonds and friendships – which still endure, taking part in a full company experience – from story board to improvisation to intensive rehearsals, as well as involvement in the technical process, having a say in the events, being able to tell my own story, performing to an enthusiastic response and touring to external venues. We didn’t get to Japan because of Covid but it’s a joy to know that we were cordially invited.
What have you learnt from taking part in
The Elders?
That I can try anything. Give it a go and if it’s no good it doesn’t matter. Being part of the Elders has taught me that not trying is much worse than failure.
How has the Elders been important to you?
Retirement can be such a desert for many people especially if you have experienced demanding and fulfilling years in your working career. It’s life affirming to know that you can still contribute positively to the world, that your life-learned skills are not withering on the vine and that your voice can still be heard. I think I was a slow burner. I wasn’t sure at first if I fitted in or if my contributions were of any value. I think that one day it just clicked in, and I realised that I was at least as good as anyone else.
What are your hopes for the Elders?
I hope the Elders continues to grow. There seems to be a never-ending demand for it and there is a constant incoming of new blood. As we age our contributions may differ but I hope that, I suspect like many others, I will be able to participate as fully as I can and for as long as I can. There is probably an age gap of 30 years or more between the eldest and the youngest members of the Company. In that sense it becomes inter generational and a reminder that we can all learn something from each other. I hope that the Elders continues to stretch further – not just to the outer reaches of Greater Manchester but further afield – maybe nationally or better yet, internationally.
What would you say to anyone who is thinking about getting involved?
Have a go. What have you got to lose? Listen to the stories of current or past members of the Company – there are so many different pathways and outcomes but 99% are all fabulously positive.
In conversation Nathan Queeley-Dennis
Winner of the 2022 Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting 2022.
Are you excited to bring this play back to the Royal Exchange after
winning the Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting 2022?
I’m thrilled to bring BULLRING TECHNO MAKEOUT JAMZ back! Our journey began here with the Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting in 2022. Though I’m not from Manchester, this feels like a homecoming for the play. An extract was performed at the ceremony, and the feeling in the room was electric, you could really feel it living in the space. I’ll never forget that moment or feeling, and I can’t wait to bring that electricity back to that room, bringing the 0121 to the 0161.
What do you hope audiences will feel after watching this play?
After watching BULLRING TECHNO MAKEOUT JAMZ, I want the audience to come out as if they’ve been on a rollercoaster or as if you’ve been taken to a space where you’ve experienced a whole spectrum of emotions. I hope the play leaves them with a sense of closure, for the story but also for themselves, having enjoyed the journey it offers while also feeling prepared to tackle whatever they need to in their own lives. I want the audience to come away from it feeling enriched and ready to face their own challenges.
With the 20th anniversary of the Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting coming up – how did the experience of winning effect your life?
Winning the Bruntwood Prize for Playwriting really changed the whole trajectory of my life and I’m forever thankful for that. If I was known by anyone it was for my acting, and now to be in a position where I’ve been able to have ownership over my creativity has been the most liberating experience, and I think it’s something I’ve always needed. I could have never imagined the rooms and opportunities that have come from the prize. When we open at the Royal Exchange it’ll be nearly two years since I was announced as the winner, and if you told me then how drastically different my life would be I’d have never believed you.
With submissions of the next prize opening on 9 September 2024 – what would you say to someone who is thinking about submitting
their play?
I think everyone says it, but just do it. Genuinely, I submitted mine purely hoping to get some feedback, to see if the play was interesting to other people as no one had read a full version of the script at that point. It wasn’t a “complete” version of the script by any stretch, and I applied on the day of the deadline on a whim! I remember applying and thinking I should maybe wait… but I’m so glad I didn’t. So yeah, if you’ve got a story to tell, you should apply because you never know what other people see in you that you don’t see.
Lucky Numbers by Andy Murray
Inspired by our cracking 2024 Christmas musical Spend Spend Spend which brings to life the story of Viv Nicholson, winner of a Football Pools fortune.
This fascinating piece is written by journalist Andy Murray, you might recognise him from the wonderful content he writes for our programmes, it tells us about the history of the pools, for some this might feel nostalgic, to others perhaps something a bit new. It’s all inspired by our cracking Christmas musical Spend Spend Spend which brings to life the story of Viv Nicholson, winner of a Football Pools fortune.
It’s Thursday evening, Top of the Pops is about to start and suddenly your household is gripped by a mild panic. Purses and wallets are mined for loose change and a flimsy spreadsheet-style form with a carbon paper section is being filled in. Soon, there’s a knock at the door, and there stands a figure with a satchel and an expectant look: the Pools Man is here.
This weekly ritual, or variations on it, will probably be familiar to those of a certain age. It’s estimated that, by the 1980s, as many as one in four people in the UK were ‘doing the pools’. And yet, by the following decade the institution was dealt a devastating blow that almost – but not quite – killed it off completely.
It all dates back to the early 1920s, when a Birmingham man, John Jervis Barnard, devised a system of distributing coupons with which punters could bet on the results of football matches. It circumvented Britain’s strict betting laws – or at least, bent them slightly – and offered weekly winners a portion of the ‘pool’ of money paid in (and this at a time of widespread economic depression).
Barnard never quite made his idea fly, but it was picked up by John Moores, Colin Askham and Bill Hughes, three enterprising young friends in Manchester. One Saturday afternoon in February 1923, they distributed 4000 pools coupons they’d had printed to the crowd outside Manchester United’s Old Trafford ground. It was vital that the three worked anonymously or else their day jobs could have been at risk. Askham had been orphaned as a baby and his surname changed from ‘Littlewood’, so the group christened their company ‘Littlewood Football Pool’.
They each put in £50 seed money, a not inconsiderable sum at the time, and set up a small company office in Liverpool. But the whole scheme stood or fell on the willingness of punters to join in and return their completed coupons, and the first couple of years proved to be a serious struggle. In 1925 Hughes and Askham elected to bail, but Eccles-born Moores, who had a long-standing entrepreneurial streak, bought them out. His gamble paid off: by 1930 the football pools had caught on and Moores had become a millionaire.
The success of Littlewoods spawned a number of imitators: Vernons Pools, also based in Liverpool, was founded in 1925, and Zetters was founded in London in 1933. They remained the big three UK pools companies, but there were others, and indeed the idea was taken up all over the world. As for Moores, off the back of his pools success, he established a hugely popular mail order firm, followed by a string of shops across the country. His industry saw him awarded a CBE in 1972, then knighted in 1980, by which point Littlewoods had grown to become the largest private company in Europe.
Clearly, Moores was one of the real winners of the football pools. But in a way, so too was Liverpool: processing and checking the vast numbers of weekly coupons was a colossal operation, and Littlewoods became one of the city’s major employers. After a succession of bigger and bigger premises, in 1938 the company opened a large, bespoke Art Deco building on Edge Lane as its HQ – though during World War II staff switched over to making parachutes, the coupon printing machines being repurposed for manufacturing call-up papers. In later years, Littlewoods became pioneers in terms of technology, using the first high-speed optical scanners in its checking centres in 1961 and becoming the first company in the UK to install an optical character reading machine to identify client coupons in 1967,
The pools experience was by no means identical across the board: many people submitted their coupons direct to Liverpool via post, but in time they could choose doorstep collection by a neighbourhood agent (or ‘pools man’). Large companies would often have their own in-house pools agent or operate a staff syndicate.
Down the decades Littlewoods offered players a whole variety of games, including the Penny Points, Spot the Ball and even a ‘ladies’ coupon’ (details of which seem to be lost to the mists of time, possibly for the best). After the war, Littlewoods introduced perhaps the most iconic game, the Treble Chance, in which players selected eight fixtures from a list as possible score draws. Some punters worked on a system of closely studying the matches in question before coming to a decision, but just as many kept a worn and tattered coupon template marked up with significant numbers – ages, birthdays, house numbers – and copied them over every week with fingers firmly crossed. Whatever the chosen method, it ended up the same way: feverishly scanning football match results on a Saturday early evening – initially via a hot-off-the-press copy of the Pink Paper, later from radio reports or Grandstand on TV, with a ‘pools panel’ of experts deciding on results of any postponed matches – to find out if fortune had smiled that week.
It certainly smiled on Keith and Viv Nicholson when they won £152,300, 18 shillings and eight pence in a Littlewoods Treble Chance game in September 1961 (and were duly presented a cheque at a special ceremony by Bruce Forsyth). Viv’s exploits made her famous, but back in 1957, Stockport widow Nellie had bagged £205,235 (cheque presented by Norman Wisdom) on a Treble Chance, only to spend the money in less headline-grabbing fashion. On the other hand, the following year Wally and Kath Brockwell won £206,028, hired a coach to London and took 40 members of their family to Grosvenor House for a vast slap-up feast.
Over the decades, bigger and bigger pools wins were recorded – over half a million, over one million, over two million – until 19 November 1994, when a 24-strong syndicate regulars at Worsley’s Yew Tree Inn won a total of £2,924,622 (cheque presented by Michael Barrymore). With heavy irony, though, the same day saw the launch of the heavily-hyped National Lottery, which offered fans of a flutter convenience and simplicity – plus big money: the seven winners of the first week’s Lottery jackpot shared £5,874,778.
At the age of 97, John Moores had died just a few months previously, in September 1993, with a fortune said to be over £1 billion. Coupled with changes to UK gambling restrictions and the gradual rise of online betting, the National Lottery dealt a severe blow to the football pools industry, faced with a big, modern, all-singing, all-dancing way to win life-changing amounts of money. The industry survived, but only by adapting. In 2000, UK-based online gambling firm Sportech bought up Littlewood Pools, going on to acquire Zetters in 2002 and Vernons in 2007, finally uniting all three as ‘The New Football Pools’. In turn, this was sold on to private equity firm OpCapita in 2017 for £83 million, and today it still offers variations on the classic pools games, mostly now online.(Incidentally, the Littlewoods Football Pools Collection, which documents the history of the pools, is held by the National Football Museum, just a stone’s throw from the Royal Exchange.)
Even during its heyday, the pools divided opinion. Labour leader Ramsay MacDonald dubbed it “a disease which spread downwards to the industrious poor from the idle rich”. On the other hand, Robert James, senior lecturer in history at Portsmouth University, has said: “The pools was significant because it gave the working class a sense of identity and community and of aspiration to something better by winning something”. Either way, there’s no denying its reach and significance. A win on the pools could change your life in an instant – though it couldn’t promise a fairy tale ending.
Andy Murray