Leaf Arbuthnot and Igor Toronyi-Lalic

Culture is going underground: meet the rebel army

The longer actors and others in the arts are deprived of their livelihoods, the more clandestine activity will spread

The art of disobedience: Oliver Bennett, co-founder of HUNCHtheatre, as Pechorin in his tour-de-force Lermontov adaptation. Photo: Greg Goodale 
issue 04 July 2020
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Among the first to arrive was a Labour grandee. Then others drifted over: academics, musicians, writers, a nurse. They came from different directions, some looking shifty, others excited. The secret meeting point was an inconspicuous pub in north London. Queueing shoppers nearby assumed the growing crowd was waiting to get into the supermarket.

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