Savoy Theatre

Savoy Theatre, West End theatre, situated on the Strand, London. The Savoy, which opened in 1881, was designed by C. J. Phipps for Richard D’Oyly Carte, who used the proceeds from his earlier productions of the light operas by Gilbert and Sullivan to fund his project. It was purpose-built to showcase their work, and the first performance there was of Patience, in a production transferred from another London theatre. The theatre was among the first to be built with integral electric lighting, and this innovation received almost as much applause as the performance itself. Owing to the strong association of the theatre with Gilbert and Sullivan’s works, they soon became collectively known as the Savoy Operas.

Although there have been periodic revival seasons of the Savoy Operas at the theatre, it has not remained exclusively dedicated to the works of Gilbert and Sullivan. Harley Granville-Barker brought his company there in 1912, and produced a number of Shakespeare plays in an abstract style that seemed strikingly unorthodox to many. At the same time Herbert Beerbohm Tree was staging productions characterized by a splendid, but almost obsessive, attention to authentic detail. In 1929 it housed the premiere of the World War I play Journey’s End, by R. C. Sherriff. It then closed for major refurbishment carried out in an Art Deco style; the entrance was moved to stand closer to the Savoy Hotel (within its courtyard), and the rebuilt auditorium had a slightly increased capacity, seating 1,121.

The new building housed productions ranging from Othello (1930) starring Paul Robeson, to the Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman Broadway hit The Man Who Came to Dinner (1941), a musical by Noel Coward (Sail Away!, 1962), William Douglas Home’s long-running comedy The Secretary Bird (1968) starring Kenneth More, crime plays by Agatha Christie such as Murder at the Vicarage (1975), the backstage farce Noises Off! (1982) by Michael Frayn, as well as RSC productions of Man and Superman (1977) by George Bernard Shaw and the Cole Porter musical Kiss Me Kate (1988).

A fire severely damaged the theatre in 1990, but its Art Deco interior was restored, and it reopened in 1993. Since then it has staged Travesties (1994) by Tom Stoppard, Dead Funny (1995) by Terry Johnson, revivals of When We Are Married (1996) by J. B. Priestley and The Magistrate (1997) by Arthur Wing Pinero, and a musical version of Tess of the D’Urbervilles (1999) by Thomas Hardy.

The D’Oyly Carte Opera Company became insolvent and was wound up in 1982. However it was reborn in 1988 and resumed its national touring policy, although it was not until 2000 that it returned to its spiritual home, The Savoy, with a production of H.M.S. Pinafore and a record-breaking run of The Mikado. D’Oyly Carte also staged The Pirates of Penzance at the Savoy in 2001. A new opera company, the Savoy Opera, took up residence at the Savoy in 2004, staging popular operas aimed at the mainstream West End theatre market. Its first production was The Barber of Seville by Gioacchino Rossini.