Really Useful Theatres Group
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| Private company | |
| Industry | Media |
| Genre |
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| Founded | 1977 |
| Founder | Andrew Lloyd Webber |
| Headquarters | London, England Sydney, Australia |
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Key people
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Andrew Lloyd Webber (Chairman) |
| Owner | Andrew Lloyd Webber |
| Divisions | See below |
| Website | reallyuseful |
The Really Useful Group Ltd. (RUG) is an international company set up in 1977 by Andrew Lloyd Webber. It is involved in theatre, film, television, video and concert productions, merchandising, magazine publishing, records and music publishing. The name is inspired by a phrase from the children's book series The Railway Series in which Thomas the Tank Engine and other locomotives are referred to as "Really Useful Engines".
The company was set up in 1977 when Lloyd Webber, frustrated with the terms of his contract with the impresario Robert Stigwood, decided to take greater control over the management of his creative works. All Lloyd Webber compositions and productions created from that point have been owned by the company.
The Really Useful Group was floated on the stock market in 1986. Four years later, Lloyd Webber took it back into private ownership, selling 30% to film and music group PolyGram to fund the cost of buying back shares. In 1995, PolyGram was bought by Canadian conglomerate Seagram, with the Really Useful stake being passed to its own film and music subsidiary, Universal. In 1999, Lloyd Webber paid $75m for Universal's 30% stake, giving the Really Useful Group 100% ownership of all the composer's works.
The Really Useful Theatre Company produces and manages plays and musicals, mainly, but not limited to those written by Andrew Lloyd Webber. It is also responsible for licensing its productions worldwide. In the 1990s, RUT mainly produced shows on its own, but more recently has again developed partnerships with other producers and production companies, notably Bill Kenwright, to produce its works, as it had done in the 1980s with Cameron Mackintosh.
Among its productions and co-productions are:
Really Useful Films is responsible for the production of film versions of Andrew Lloyd Webber's catalogue. Until recently, these had consisted of lower budget straight-to-video versions of the shows (notably Cats, Jesus Christ Superstar and Joseph), but 2004 saw Really Useful Films complete the major motion picture The Phantom of the Opera, directed by Joel Schumacher and starring Gerard Butler and Emmy Rossum, which was nominated for three Academy Awards and three Golden Globes. The film was a commercial success.
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Wikipedia