The money set aside in the Dunedin City Council’s 2021-31 long-term plan for development of a mid-sized theatre was absent from the 2025-34 draft plan, upsetting various groups.
They have called for the capital spend to be reinstated, but have also been embroiled in a disagreement among themselves.
An explosive submission to the council from professional theatre advocacy group Stage South included a withering assault on the Mayfair Theatre.
"Any consideration of further investment into the Mayfair is mistaken," Stage South Charitable Trust spokeswoman Karen Elliot said in the submission on the council’s 2025-34 draft long-term plan.
"It is fundamentally unfit as a 21st century performing arts venue."
She described the Mayfair as having a small, inflexible stage, European proscenium arch, "poor acoustics for spoken word, inadequate access, poor sightlines, inevitably high running costs and multiple technical design limitations".
"It’s inherently unworkable for modern theatre and with its strong colonial flavour and lack of community space actively excludes Māori and Pasifika performance," she said.
"Representatives are unwilling to accept or discuss its limits and have been notably absent in meetings between Stage South, the Regent, the Playhouse and the Athenaeum over the last 12 months."
The Mayfair, Playhouse and Athenaeum buildings had been jointly pitched for a refurbishment programme, but the Mayfair’s status has lately been in question and this has seemed to coincide with input from Stage South, which has advocated for a new build.
Mayfair Theatre Charitable Trust chairman Geoff Patton said the theatre existed because of a small team of volunteers.
"We realise the theatre is old, some of its facilities are not the best and it needs money spent on it, but that was the whole point of the exercise undertaken with the Playhouse and Athenaeum."
The only meeting of significance he missed was one called with 13 hours’ notice and the invitation was sent at 11.15pm, he said.
Mr Patton said much of the criticism of the Mayfair appeared to relate to professional, non-musical theatre.
"We have to remember that the theatre was transformed into a live venue for, and by, the Dunedin Opera Company," he said.
"The majority of its hires are for musical events.
"The Mayfair has been the city’s 400-seat theatre for 60 years, and if the proponents of the new build can’t raise $30m, it will continue to be for many years yet."
Dunedin Repertory Society stressed the urgency of work needed to improve the Playhouse Theatre.
It had previously been agreed among theatre partners the Playhouse should be first, "being the smallest, cheapest, easiest and fastest project to deliver".
Athenaeum building owner Lawrie Forbes said his complex was under-used and had potential to deliver an "unparalleled, edgy, multi-use events centre".
Neither Mr Forbes nor repertory society representative Brent Caldwell was critical of the Mayfair.
