Earlier this year, I went to see Brighton Festival director Nick Dodd, who is also in charge of the newly re-opened Dome.

I wonder how he's getting on? I must give him a ring.

I remember him telling me it had been estimated the so-called cultural segment of the city's activities provides about 15,000 jobs. Just dig below the surface of the Brighton and Hove scene and there's something for everybody every day of the week.

A good production at the Theatre Royal will sometimes play to a half-empty house.

Chichester Festival Theatre is in decline and needs a further bail-out. This is traditional theatre, the sort frequented by a declining band of 68-year-olds like myself. But things aren't much better for many of the innovative theatre companies that have sprung up everywhere. New works often premiere to a handful of enthusiasts and touring companies would not survive without subsidy.

Last week, I went to see Peter Mantle and his wife Elizabeth Turner at their office in Little Western Street. Theirs is a brave venture. They have set up the BrightonHove Theatre Company with the intention bringing a professional repertory to the city.

Mr Mantle was previously a successful actor and also a playwright. His new play, The King of the Beach, was staged at the Old Market Centre in Hove earlier this year. In many ways, it was a success and Peter told me there was every chance the production would go on tour.

In the autumn, BrightonHove Theatre Company will stage two more plays, Entertaining Mr Sloane by Joe Orton and Educating Rita by Willie Russell. It would be nice to think the venture will succeed and, for a modest price of about £10 a ticket, one could be sure of an entertaining evening.

We need such affordable live theatre and I wish the company well.

But times change and I doubt Peter and his team will be able to rely on old favourites to fill their theatre. They need to keep the best of the past but mix it with the new and experimental. Before the last war, my uncle, Cecil Parker, was leading man at the repertory Theatre on the Palace Pier. Part of the deal was that he had a decent room at the Royal Albion and a full English breakfast.

He told me that he could never quite get over the strange feeling of walking down the pier to work with seagulls for company. In 1969, Cecil returned to Brighton's West Pier to appear in Joan Littlewood's ground-breaking film, Oh, What A Lovely War.