Piccadilly Theatre

Piccadilly Theatre, West End theatre, situated on Denman Street, London. Built for the Piccadilly Theatre Company on the site of an old stable block, the theatre was designed with a three-tier auditorium and a seating capacity of approximately 1,200. It opened in April 1928 with a musical called Blue Eyes by Jerome Kern. However, having premiered the first talking picture to be shown in Britain, The Singing Fool with Al Jolson, it was used as a cinema for most of that first year. In 1929 it reverted to live theatre but for much of the next few years was used as a transfer venue for long runs at reduced prices. The theatre was closed when World War II broke out, but reopened in July 1941 with the London premiere of Blithe Spirit, by Noel Coward. It also had success with Macbeth starring John Gielgud, but towards the end of the war was damaged and closed. In 1945 it reopened with Appointment with Death by Agatha Christie, and since then has had a variety of successful productions, including Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf by Edward Albee and Vivat! Vivat Regina! by Robert Bolt.

In the late 1970s Royal Shakespeare Company productions of Richard II and Edward II, the latter starring Ian McKellen, were staged at the Piccadilly and in 1980 Educating Rita by Willy Russell was a big hit. The 1990s saw an increase in musicals and dance productions, including the most commercially successful ballet ever to play in the West End—Swan Lake, by the contemporary ballet company, Adventures in Motion Pictures. In 1998 the theatre housed the Peter Hall Company who put on an acclaimed production of Filumena, by Eduardo de Filippo, starring Judi Dench. Subsequently, the Piccadilly hosted the musicals Spend, Spend, Spend! (1999) and La Cava (2000), and the Michael Frayn farce Noises Off (2001).The theatre was bought from Associated Capital Theatres by the Ambassador Theatre Group in February 2000.