Angus MacKechnie

A poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Angus is the Creative Director and CEO of Imagineer Productions in Coventry. He was previously Director of OutdoorArtsUK for eight years and prior to that he worked at the National Theatre in London for over thirty years, serving under five different directorships and running a wide variety of projects, largely related to audience engagement. He became Producer and Programmer of two National Theatre departments: the Watch This Space Festival of Outdoor Arts and entertainment and the Platform programme of talks, debates, playreadings and interviews.

The annual Watch This Space Festival was a free summer-long celebration of outdoor theatre, music, circus and dance, which was replaced in 2015 by the River Stage festival. Watch This Space featured events for all ages, including workshops and classes for children and adults, club nights, film programmes and an open-air ballroom. The festival had strong national and international relationships with leading and emerging companies and was frequently funded by the European Commission. During Angus’ time as Festival Producer, significant collaborators and regular visitors included Teatr Biuro Podróży, The Whalley Range All Stars, Home Live Art, Addictive TV, Upswing, Circus Space (National Centre for Circus Arts), Les Grooms, StopGAP Dance Theatre, metro-boulot-dodo, The Gandinis, Abi Collins, The World Famous, Ida Barr (Christopher Green), Strong Lady Productions, Motionhouse, Mat Ricardo, Los2Play, The Insect Circus, Bängditos Theater, Mimbre, WildWorks, Bash Street Theatre, Markeliñe, The Chipolatas, The Caravan Gallery, Sienta la Cabeza, Theatre Tuig, Producciones Imperdibles and Mario Queen of the Circus.

Angus created and produced the NT2000 project, which charted 100 years of English-speaking theatre, the NT50 series, marking the theatre’s fiftieth anniversary and wrote and co-produced the gala for Laurence Olivier’s centenary. As an interviewer, he chaired events with, amongst others, Judi Dench, Alan Bennett, Fiona Shaw, Nicholas Hytner, Frances de la Tour and Marianne Elliott. In 2004 he received the Rayne Award for his services to the company. He undertook the Performing Arts Consortium Fellowship on the Clore Cultural Leadership Programme in 2014, including a secondment with People United with mentoring by David Lan and Genista McIntosh.

He is a Life Coach, having qualified with Relational Dynamics in 2015. He previously ran a small-scale touring theatre company and worked as an actor, director and writer, after training on the Professional Acting course at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. He worked as director on two pieces with the circus/dance company Joli Vyann and has served on the boards of Mimbre and Upswing.