Takeover is a great project. Growing up in York, the Theatre Royal was my local and although I studied at Central School of Speech and Drama in London, I made sure I kept my links here. Last year, I was the assistant to the last Takeover Festival artistic director Charlotte George; even though I only had a small part to play, I massively enjoyed myself. So when I finished at Central this summer, it seemed a great thing to get my teeth into.

The selection process was quite formal: an application form and an interview with the theatre’s artistic director Damian Cruden, in which I had to explain my vision. But I think that added real value to the project. It showed this wasn’t just about allowing a load of young people to run amok. The festival is by young people but for everyone, and co-artistic director Rhiannon Jackson and I wanted to make it as diverse as possible: a selection box of things you wouldn’t normally get to see at this venue, like spoken word artist Polarbear.

The senior team was appointed in April and the first month was spent getting to know each other. We only really started programming in June. It’s been a challenge. Most artistic directors have inboxes full of messages from people wanting to perform at their venues. We’ve had to do it the other way, approaching companies and saying, “Look, what we’re doing”. Age can actually be a positive when you’re selling the idea. Even if companies can’t come on board, they respect that we’re all under 26, trying to build new audiences and show existing York audiences new work.

Getting to grips with the facts and figures has been hard – that exposure to the business side of theatre. It’s phenomenal the work that went into planning the opening week – and it’s only a week! Full-time artistic directors are planning whole years at a time. It’s been great to have the Theatre Royal staff. At first, we were asking things as basic as, “How does this work?” Now we’re learning to do the deals ourselves, it’s reassuring to hear that the difficulties we’re going through are the same ones they face. You think you have a show and then you lose it, but Damian has been great, saying, “That’s the way it goes”. Every day is a process of re-planning.

Rhiannon and I have a healthy relationship — we disagree on some things but we always hammer it out in the end. You need a certain level of artistic conflict, I think, or there’s a danger of event itself becoming a bit dull. The fact that it’s the first time we’ve done this lends a real energy to the project, as does our focus on new work. Because we’re forging our own careers, we know how difficult it can be for others to get their break. That’s why we’re running Hatch in the studio space: a chance to open our doors to companies producing their first piece of work. We first encountered these shows on paper and now we’ve given them the opportunity to grow into full pieces. It’s exciting.

If there’s one thing I wish I knew at the start, it’s that things would be all right in the end. There are times when you come home stressed and tired, thinking, will we ever get this finished? But our main aim was to produce a programme that people talked about — before and after the shows — and I think we’ve achieved that.

Tom Bellerby was talking to Nancy Groves.

The next Takeover Festival will take place between 14 to 26 March 2011. York Theatre Royal will soon be accepting applications for the new artistic team.

Image courtesy of Sam King.