Tragedy and farce

The Royal Shakespeare Company is becoming a national embarrassment. The departure this week of its managing director Chris Foy is being presented by the chairman, Lord Alexander, as a step towards recovery. But the absence of any published strategy, or outward appearance of confidence, suggests that the RSC still has some way to fall before it can rise again, if at all.

Foy was, with Adrian Noble, responsible for the incomprehensible decisions to give up the RSC's Barbican base with its £1m City subsidy and, for good measure, to demolish its Stratford theatre.

Noble's successor as artistic director, Michael Boyd, has been trying for months to repair the damage and find the company a suitable home. Foy's resignation appears to confirm rumours of internal dissension on the direction the RSC should take in the immediate future - if it has one.

The need for a dedicated Shakespeare company is no longer as obvious as it was in Peter Hall's 1950s heyday. The longer the wrangling goes on, the more miserable the company looks in comparison to its direct competitor, the resurgent National Theatre.