The Lyric Theatre

Speaker Ciarán McAuley, Chief Operating Officer at the Lyric Theatre, spoke to the Club Monday 30 January highlighting the theatre's financial well-being, the return on investments made and how it connects with the local Community in everything it does. He pointed out that the Lyric makes a unique and vital contribution to the community as it is unusual in that it produces new plays on local topics not normally importing others' plays and employs some of NI's finest actors. 

Noting that at £11m the Arts Council Budget is only a tiny slice of NI Income and the creative industries account for 5% of total employment in NI (more than agriculture) he pointed out there is a £20 return for every £1 invested in the arts with a £1.95m total benefit to NI businesses.

He stressed that cultural tourism is the key to attracting visitors to NI and highlighted that 75% of professionals work in the West End (contributing £0.5billion to the UK production) but they learn their craft in subsidised theatres around the UK. Ciarán also outlined their outreach programmes.