Coliseum David’s last curtain call

FAREWELL . . . David Rustidge, house manager at Oldham Coliseum

OLDHAM Coliseum Theatre will bid farewell to its longest running member of staff this month.

After 34 years as house manager David Rustidge (70) has decided to finally hang up his familiar bow tie on March 31.

David, nominated twice for a Pride In Oldham award for his dedication to the theatre, first went to watch a play in the mid-1950s when he was 15.

He originally began his career as a teacher at schools in Middleton and Shaw and started volunteering with Playgoers, a group formed to help raise money for the Coliseum, in 1979 before being offered a job front of house.

“I think it must be in the blood,” he says. “My grandfather and grandmother used to go to the theatre every Tuesday afternoon when his shop was closed, and as a lad. I started to go to the theatre myself, and that’s really the way it’s continued, all these many years.

“It was a way into the theatre that probably wouldn’t happen today,” David said.

“I was just around at the time, there were no adverts in the paper, no need to fill in a 12-page application form, so I suppose you’d say I was lucky.”

Throughout his career David has met stars including Sir Kenneth Branagh and Sir Ian McKellen, but despite this says his personal highlights have been special events organised by his colleagues to mark his own contribution. “People seem to have appreciated things I’ve done for them,” he says.

Although retiring, David will continue giving talks to community groups on the theatre and join the theatre’s artistic director, Kevin Shaw, on stage for its free season launch events.