Piccadilly Theatre
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For the Piccadilly Theatre in Beirut, check Beirut's Piccadilly Theatre
The Piccadilly Theatre is a West End theatre located at 16 Denman Street, behind Piccadilly Circus and adjacent to the Regents Palace Hotel, in the City of Westminster.
Built by Bertie Crewe and Edward A. Stone for Edward Laurillard, its simple facade conceals a grandiose Art Deco interior designed by Marc-Henri Levy and Gaston Laverdet, with a 1232-seat auditorium decorated in shades of pink. Gold and green are the dominant colours in the bars and foyer, which include the original light fittings. Upon its opening on April 27, 1928, the theatre's souvenir brochure claimed, "If all the bricks used in the building were laid in a straight line, they would stretch from London to Paris." The opening production, Jerome Kern's musical Blue Eyes, starred Evelyn Laye, one of the most acclaimed actresses of the period.
In its early days, the Piccadilly operated as a cinema and premièred the first talking picture to be shown in Great Britain, The Singing Fool with Al Jolson.
Following a conversion into a cabaret restaurant, the theatre reopened in April 1936 as The London Casino, which became noted for its lavish stage shows. The building sustained considerable damage when it was hit by a stray German bomb during World War II. After renovations in the early 1950s, it returned to its original name and became a venue for plays, revues, and musicals.
In the 1960s and 1970s, it improved its reputation with a series of successful transfers from Broadway – both Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and A Streetcar Named Desire made their London debuts here. The 1990s witnessed an expansion in ballet and dance, notably the most successful commercial ballet season ever to play in the West End, with Matthew Bourne's acclaimed production of Swan Lake.
In 1986, the venue was the setting for ITV's popular sunday evening variety show, Live From the Piccadilly, hosted by Jimmy Tarbuck.
The Piccadilly has played host to such renowned stars as Henry Fonda, Ian McKellen, Judi Dench, Michael Pennington, Barbara Dickson, Lynn Redgrave, Julia McKenzie, Eric Sykes, and Dame Edna. Its productions have run the gamut from Wish You Were Here to Edward II to Spend Spend Spend to Noises Off to Blues in the Night to a season of plays directed by Sir Peter Hall.
Currently, the Piccadilly is one of twenty-four venues owned by the Ambassador Theatre Group (ATG). Its most recent occupant was the Donmar Warehouse production of Guys and Dolls which ran from 19 May 2005 - 14 April 2007. This is to be followed by David Ian's new production of Grease which will open on 8 August 2007, following previews from 24 July.
