In February 2000 a small group of Black practioners and administrators were invited to Nottingham Playhouse to discuss ways of developing the profile of national and regional Black theatre. It was recognised that there were very few companies producing Black work for middle scale touring venues outside London.

Theatres were being urged to programme more culturally diverse work on their main stages, but one of the problems was a lack of Black work of sufficient quality and range to cater for this need.

The discussion was very fruitful and Nottingham Playhouse, in collaboration with the Arts Council England’s Black Regional Initiative in Theatre (BRIT), put forward a proposal for an initial three year period that involved setting up a middle-scale touring theatre company, linked to a consortium of three regional producing theatres - Nottingham Playhouse, Bristol Old Vic, and the New Wolsey Theatre in Ipswich. In 2003 Birmingham Rep took over from the Bristol Old Vic.

Each of these theatres would, in turn, lead on one production a year before touring the play nationally to a larger consortium of receiving theatres across the country.

In January 2002 Eclipse Theatre was born and Steven Luckie was appointed as Producer.

Eclipse has produced several plays to date:

	2003 Moon on a Rainbow Shawl by Errol John Directed by Paulette Randall
	2004 Mother Courage and her Children by Bertholt Brecht Directed by Josette Bushell - Mingo
	2005 The World Premiere of Little Sweet Thing by Roy Williams Directed by Michael Buffong

For more information visit the Eclipse website.