Early years Built by
Sefton Henry Parry as the
Royal Avenue Theatre, it opened on 11 March 1882 with 1,200 seats. The first production at the theatre was
Jacques Offenbach's
Madame Favart. In its early seasons, the theatre hosted
comic operas,
burlesques and farces for several years. For much of this time, the low comedian
Arthur Roberts, a popular star of the
music halls, starred at the theatre. By the 1890s, the theatre was presenting drama, and in 1894
Annie Horniman, the tea heiress, anonymously sponsored the actress
Florence Farr in a season of plays at the theatre. Farr's first production was unsuccessful, and so she prevailed upon her friend,
George Bernard Shaw, to hurry and make his
West End début at the theatre with
Arms and the Man in 1894. It was successful enough to allow him to discontinue music criticism to focus full-time on play writing. The actress
Gladys Cooper managed the theatre for some years. The theatre was rebuilt in 1905 to the designs of Blow and Billerey. During the work, part of the roof of the adjacent
Charing Cross railway station collapsed. The roof and girders fell across the train lines but part of the station's western wall also fell and crashed through the roof and wall of the theatre. This resulted in the deaths of three people in the station, and three workmen on the theatre site and injuries to many more. The theatre was repaired and re-opened as
The Playhouse on 28 January 1907 with a one-act play called
The Drums of Oudh and a play called
Toddles, by
Tristan Bernard and Andre Godferneaux. Shaw wrote a sketch entitled
The Interlude at the Playhouse for the occasion. The new theatre had a smaller
seating capacity of 679.
W. Somerset Maugham's
Home and Beauty premièred at the Playhouse on 30 August 1919, running for 235 performances, and
Henry Daniell appeared here in February 1926 as the Prince of Karaslavia in
Mr. Abdulla.
Nigel Bruce appeared in February 1927 as Robert Crosbie in Somerset Maugham's
The Letter, and again in May 1930 as Robert Brennan in
Dishonoured Lady.
Alec Guinness made his stage début here in Ward Dorane's play
Libel! on 2 April 1934. Daniell returned in November that year as Paul Miller in
Hurricane.
BBC studio In 1951 it was taken over by the
BBC as a recording studio for live performances.
The Goon Show and the radio versions of ''
Hancock's Half Hour and Steptoe and Son'' were recorded here, although at least the first two shows were also recorded at other venues during their runs. The stage also hosted live performances by
Kiss,
Queen,
Led Zeppelin,
The Who,
The Beatles and
The Rolling Stones. On 3 April 1967, a live
Pink Floyd concert was broadcast from the theatre. When the BBC left around 1976, the theatre went dark and was in danger of demolition.
Other uses In 1986, rock band
Queen used the Playhouse Theatre as the set for their "
A Kind of Magic" music video.
1987 return to theatre usage The theatre was restored to its 1907 design by impresario Robin Gonshaw with the help of
Iain Mackintosh of theatre consultants Theatre Projects, opening again in October 1987 with the musical
Girlfriends. A commercial building, Aria House, was erected above the theatre. In 1988, novelist and politician
Jeffrey Archer bought the Playhouse for just over £1 million. The following year, the theatre was offered commercial sponsorship by a financial services' company, and for a while it was known as the MI Group Playhouse. In 1991, the Playhouse became home to the
Peter Hall Company, and a number of critically and commercially successful plays were performed there, including
Tennessee Williams'
The Rose Tattoo (1991), starring
Julie Walters and
Moliere's
Tartuffe (1991), starring
Paul Eddington and
Felicity Kendal. Around this time the basement bar area of the theatre was converted into a private restaurant, Shaws, but the enterprise was unsuccessful and the space was later converted back into a bar/cafe. In 1992, Archer sold the Playhouse to the writer and impresario
Ray Cooney for just over £2 million. That year Cooney staged the West End premiere of his latest farce
It Runs in the Family at the Playhouse. This was followed by
Jane Eyre (1993), adapted by
Fay Weldon and starring
Tim Pigott-Smith;
Frederick Lonsdale's
On Approval, (1994), starring
Simon Ward,
Martin Jarvis and
Anna Carteret; and
Ray Cooney's
Funny Money in 1995. In 1996, Cooney sold the Playhouse to American investment banker Patrick Sulaiman Cole, whose first production was a critically acclaimed revival of
Henrik Ibsen's ''
A Doll's House'' in 1996, directed by Anthony Page and starring
Janet McTeer. Later that year, the theatre was closed for complete refurbishment under the direction of
English Heritage, with the auditorium luxuriously decorated, with grandiose murals,
caryatids, golden pillars, carved
balustrades, and shining gold decoration. The theatre reopened in 1997 with Sulaiman Cole's production and the West End première of
Anton Chekhov's
The Wood Demon. This was followed by Sulaiman Cole's production of a first ever West End
Snoo Wilson premiere, "HRH", directed by
Simon Callow, about the
British royal family's
Duke and
Duchess of Windsor, which opened the day after the death of
Diana, Princess of Wales. The play was harshly reviewed as anti-Royal. The theatre returned to life as a commercial
receiving house with several seasons of
Almeida Theatre and
Cheek by Jowl productions, including the premiere of David Hare's
The Judas Kiss. Successes at the Playhouse since the late 1990s have included
Naked (1998);
J. B. Priestley's
An Inspector Calls (2001) and ''Journey's End'', directed by David Grindley. American theatrical producers Ted and Norman Tulchin's Maidstone Productions purchased the theatre at the end of 2002, with the venue managed by
ATG Entertainment. The Playhouse hosted
Richard Eyre's 2003
Olivier Award-winning production of
Vincent in Brixton, starring
Clare Higgins; Eyre's 2005 production of
Hedda Gabler, starring
Eve Best; and
Megan Dodds in a transfer of
My Name Is Rachel Corrie by
Alan Rickman and
Katharine Viner in 2006. More recent successes include the musical
Dancing in the Streets,
The Adventures of Tintin based on the famous comic-book detective,
The Harder They Come, and
La Cage Aux Folles. In December 2013, ATG had acquired 100 percent ownership of the Playhouse. From December 2019, it was announced that
The Jamie Lloyd Company would take up residence with a series of revivals, beginning with
Cyrano de Bergerac starring
James McAvoy,
The Seagull starring
Emilia Clarke and ''
A Doll's House starring Jessica Chastain. The Seagull
and A Doll's House'' were cancelled due to the
COVID-19 pandemic. Following renovations to the theatre during the pandemic, the theatre re-opened as the Kit Kat Club to house a new revival of
Cabaret starring
Eddie Redmayne and
Jessie Buckley which began previews on 15 November 2021. The renovations included converting the theatre into an
in-the-round layout and reducing the capacity to 550. ==Recent and present productions==