Theatre Royal, Plymouth, is a theatre venue in

Plymouth Plymouth () is a port city status in the United Kingdom, city and unitary authority in South West England. It is located on the south coast of Devon, approximately south-west of Exeter and south-west of London. It is bordered by Cornwall to ...

Devon Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devo ...

. It consists of a 1,300-seat main auditorium, The Lyric, which regularly hosts large-scale

musicals Musical theatre is a form of theatrical performance that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance. The story and emotional content of a musical – humor, pathos, love, anger – are communicated through words, music, movemen ...

, opera and ballet; a 200-seat studio, The Drum; and a 50-seat studio, The Lab. On a separate site, Theatre Royal Plymouth also has a production and learning centre, TR2, featuring rehearsal studios and workshops for the production of set and costumes. The theatre is a National Portfolio Organisation, receiving regular funding from

Arts Council England Arts Council England is an arm's length non-departmental public body of the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. It is also a registered charity. It was formed in 1994 when the Arts Council of Great Britain was divided into three s ...

. A £7 million Regeneration Project was completed in September 2013 with a renovated front of house area and community performance space called The Lab. A bronze sculpture depicting a crouching female actor called ''

Messenger ''MESSENGER'' was a NASA robotic space probe that orbited the planet Mercury between 2011 and 2015, studying Mercury's chemical composition, geology, and magnetic field. The name is a backronym for "Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochem ...

'' was unveiled in front of the theatre, in 2019.

History

In 1758 a theatre was built at the top of George Street in

. Originally known as the Theatre, Frankfort-Gate, it adopted the name Theatre Royal after King George III and his family visited it in 1789. Royal Hotel Plymouth

In 1810 Plymouth Corporation held a competition for the design of a new theatre, hotel and assembly rooms at the bottom of George Street. The competition was won by

John Foulston John Foulston (1772 – 30 December 1841) was an English architect who was a pupil of Thomas Hardwick and set up a practice in London in 1796.Peter Leach, ''Foulston, John (1772–1841)'', rev., Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford Un ...

, who built a neo-classical block of buildings between 1811 and 1813. The new Theatre Royal opened in 1813 and could seat 1,192. Foulston's buildings formed a frontage of facing George's Place that was dominated by a

portico A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cul ...

with -high ionic columns. The theatre was on the west side of this portico, with the hotel and assembly rooms on the east. Foulston used thick walls to separate the auditorium from the foyer, corridors and the hotel next door to minimise the risk of fire damage. The whole inner structure was built of cast iron for the same purpose, and Foulston believed it was the only fireproof theatre in the country. Despite these precautions, the theatre suffered a disastrous interior fire in June 1878; by January 1879 it had been repaired and reopened. The decline in theatre-going caused by the rise in cinema attendance resulted in the building being demolished in 1937. It was replaced by the 2,400-seat Royal Cinema, which opened the following year. The cinema survived the

Plymouth Blitz The Plymouth Blitz was a series of bombing raids carried out by the Nazi German ''Luftwaffe'' on the English city of Plymouth in the Second World War. The bombings launched on numerous British cities were known as the Blitz. The royal d ...

during the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

, which destroyed the adjoining hotel and assembly rooms. By 1954 the decline in cinema-going caused by the rise of television led to the cinema's being partly converted back to a theatre and rechristened as the Theatre Royal Cinema. In 1958 it was renamed the ABC Plymouth. It was converted to a triple-screen ABC which opened on 5 May 1977. ABC Cinemas passed to the Cannon Group, then to MGM from 22 May 1992. A management buy-out brought the name ABC back again in the mid-1990s. From 1 August 2006 it was operated by the independent Reel Cinemas chain. The Reel Plymouth Cinema finally closed its doors on Thursday 28 February 2019. On a different site, the current Theatre Royal was designed in 1977 by the Peter Moro Partnership, which had already designed a number of new theatres around the country. Building started in 1979 and the theatre was officially opened on 5 May 1982 by

Princess Margaret Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon, (Margaret Rose; 21 August 1930 – 9 February 2002) was the younger daughter of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, and the younger sister and only sibling of Queen Elizabeth ...

The Lyric (the main auditorium)

The Lyric seats 1,315 but has a unique ability to compress the auditorium, creating a more intimate performance space of 787. It has a steep auditorium with two galleries and very large

proscenium arch A proscenium ( grc-gre, προσκήνιον, ) is the metaphorical vertical plane of space in a theatre, usually surrounded on the top and sides by a physical proscenium arch (whether or not truly "arched") and on the bottom by the stage floor ...

. The range of work presented and produced is extensive and includes major touring drama and musical productions, as well as leading opera and dance companies (including the Birmingham Royal Ballet, the Rambert Dance Company, Glyndebourne on Tour and the Welsh National Opera). In 2019, The SpongeBob Musical was filmed for television in front of a live audience at the Theatre Royal Plymouth. The Lyric also produces its own drama and musical productions each year, usually with commercial or subsidised partners.

The Drum

The Drum (capacity – 200) specialises in the production of new plays and has a good reputation for its innovative programme. It won the

Peter Brook Peter Stephen Paul Brook (21 March 1925 – 2 July 2022) was an English theatre and film director. He worked first in England, from 1945 at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre, from 1947 at the Royal Opera House, and from 1962 for the Royal Sha ...

Empty Space Award in 2007. It often collaborates with other subsidised companies and venues such as the Royal Court, ATC, the Lyric Hammersmith, the Bush Theatre, Frantic Assembly, Hampstead Theatre, Paines Plough, the Traverse Theatre and the Tron Glasgow.

The Production and Learning Centre, TR2

The Production and Learning Centre, TR2, is on the bank of the River Plym designed by Ian Ritchie Architects. It contains set, costume, prop-making and rehearsal facilities. TR2 provides one of the biggest education and outreach programmes for a regional venue in the UK.

References

External links

Official Website
{{coord, 50.3699, -4.1451, type:landmark_region:GB-PLY, display=title Theatres in Devon Buildings and structures in Plymouth, Devon Theatres in England Theatres completed in 1982 1982 establishments in England