London’s West End:

When asked what she would need to feel comfortable making a trip down to the West End, Lior Mass replied, “The only thing it would take for me to go is for theatres to be open.”

Mass, a 22-year-old government employee from Israel, started a two-year placement in London in June of 2020 and has yet to see the city in all its glory. While Mass went to galleries and ate outside at restaurants last summer, she acknowledged that going out and experiencing the culture is “a major part of the experience” that isn’t available right now.

With Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s announcement on February 22 outlining a roadmap to reopening that includes all lockdown restrictions in England ending by June 21, the hospitality and entertainment sectors finally have a somewhat more certain goal to work toward. 

April 12 is the current preliminary date for some major areas of business to reopen, including outdoor settings such as beer gardens, with indoor hospitality and hotels to open a month later on May 17.

Asif Mahammad, founder and chief executive of specialist consultancy Main Course Associates, which advises about 70 mainly West End restaurants, has confidence in the restaurants that have made it through the last year.

“If you remain standing at the end of COVID, you’ll live to fight another day. But if you don’t, then you’re not in the game to fight anymore,” he said.

Relying primarily on office workers and tourists attending the theatre, West End restaurants have suffered drastically as a result of COVID. They have been forced to close, then reopen, then close again. Theatres have had to do the same. 

While we may see the return of office workers soon – though research from YouGov suggests that only 7 percent of workers want to return to their offices full time – tourism will take much longer to return to pre-COVID levels. 

But restaurants, Mahammad explained, are one of the most adaptable industries. Unlike others, such as hotels or even tourism, the hospitality sector can be up and running and generating a profit that benefits the economy in a matter of days. This could explain the government’s back and forth decisions on whether or not to allow restaurants to remain open over the past year.

Over the last few years, the restaurant industry has overcome a series of difficulties, many of which have been due to drops in travel and tourism, but Mahammad noted this is a new low, saying “Brexit, no Brexit, general election, no general election, terrorism, no terrorism, this is just a different level.”

It has now been a year since most of us have eaten inside at a restaurant, or been to a gallery, cinema or theater, and it’s hard to imagine a time where that will be normal again. But, as Mahammad explained, that transition back to pre-COVID life might be easier than we expect. He stressed the important role that restaurants play in all our lives.

“We've got to understand that that's where life happens. We don't just love them; I think we depend on them. We have business meetings; we celebrate key moments. This is a place where you actually sit down to make memories,” he said.

The past December, several West End shows reopened. Performances were socially distanced, with smaller, masked audiences. Weeks later, however, London moved into tier three and all theatres went dark once again.

In a statement for Official London Theatre, Sonia Freedman, producer of The Comeback at the Noel Coward Theatre, wrote that “London going into Tier Three is yet another blow for British theatre – one it simply cannot afford after a brutal year, and one that both could and should have been avoided.”

However, it seems like audiences are keen to return. Mass simply said, “I would go to theatres as soon as possible.” Let’s hope that enough people feel the same way, and that we’ll see the lights turned on in the West End soon.