It is hard enough to believe that Indhu Rubasingham, the artistic director, would squander such a world-famous brand as the Tricycle, but for the trustees to support her without doing proper research and then to ignore everyone’s love for the very theatre that these people are supposed to protect, turns disbelief into anger. It makes no commercial sense, it flies in the face of the Charity Commission’s code of conduct and it makes a mockery of community engagement.
You’d think if thousands of your supporters and donors express heartfelt outrage then restoring the name is a no-brainer. It would have been the responsible thing to do. I honestly believed that those in charge would be impressed by the degree of affection demonstrated by previously loyal supporters of the Tricycle. Thousands have made their feelings known through emails, letters, petitions and demonstrations. Clearly, the name change was a terrible error of judgment but instead of listening to us, we were dismissed, seen as a nuisance and fed dishonest statements about non-existent support. To maintain the stone wall, we were misled by Kiln Theatre about consultations and patronised by “astroturfed” social media coverage.
Please sign up to our mailing list. Our primary aim is to restore the name of the Tricycle in some meaningful way. You may have seen some of more than 50 news articles we’ve succeeded in generating since the renaming announcement on 11 April, including five in Private Eye. We are very active but to be clear, our protests have nothing to do with the artistic direction of the theatre. We are not calling for a boycott or anybody’s resignation. We just want the name back.
Of course, it’s not just a name. The Tricycle stood for something and grew in reputation to become Kilburn’s crown jewel. It put Kilburn on the map internationally and made people feel they had a friend on the High Road. In contrast, the name change and the manner of its imposition is deeply resented. It is clear from the near-unanimous reaction of thousands of people that Kilburn feels betrayed and bereaved.