Aldwych Theatre, West End theatre built in 1905 for Seymour Hicks, in association with Charles Frohman, and designed by the theatrical architect W. G. R. Sprague. It was designed as a companion to the nearby Strand Theatre; both seated over 1,000. Although the theatre originally opened with light musical entertainments, it soon became a venue for serious drama. It housed, among other productions, the English premieres of The Cherry Orchard by Anton Chekhov (1909) and A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams, starring Vivien Leigh (1949). During World War II it was used as a servicemen’s club for a time.

The Aldwych is best known for housing the popular “Aldwych farces” in the pre-war period (mostly written by Ben Travers), and for its long association with the Royal Shakespeare Company. In 1960 Peter Hall brought the then Shakespeare Memorial Theatre Company to the Aldwych, which became the company’s London base for 22 years. The RSC made various alterations to the stage and lighting rig, including converting the acting space to an apron stage. Among the highlights of the RSC’s productions during this time were The Wars of the Roses (1964); The Homecoming (1965) by Harold Pinter; Marat/Sade (1964) and A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1970) both directed by Peter Brook; and an epic eight-hour adaptation of Dickens’ Nicholas Nickleby (1980) directed by David Edgar.

Since the departure of the RSC to the Barbican in 1982, the Aldwych has played host to a wide variety of productions, including Hapgood (1988) by Tom Stoppard, with Felicity Kendal, Nigel Hawthorne, and Roger Rees; The Cherry Orchard (1989), starring Judi Dench; and a lavish revival of Private Lives (1990) by Noel Coward, starring Joan Collins. In 1991 the dance performance Tango Argentino played to packed houses, and in 1992 The Rise and Fall of Little Voice by Jim Cartwright transferred from the National. Other popular successes have included An Inspector Calls (1993) by J. B. Priestley; Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1996) by Edward Albee, starring David Suchet and Diana Rigg; and the musical Whistle Down the Wind (1998). The RSC returned in 2001 with a musical production of The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett.