Theatre Royal, Drury Lane
In Theatre Royal, Drury Lane once stood a landmark of London theatre life. The site first hosted a theatre in the 1660s, built at the behest of Thomas Killigrew, and was known initially as Theatre Royal in Bridges Street. A fire in 1672 led to a larger rebuild on the same plot, reopening as Theatre Royal in Drury Lane in 1674, and it would become one of London’s leading patent theatres under managers like Colley Cibber, David Garrick, and Richard Brinsley Sheridan, who once employed Joseph Grimaldi as resident Clown. In 1791, Sheridan oversaw demolition to make way for a bigger house, which opened in 1794; that building burned down in 1809. The present structure opened in 1812 and, after a career hosting stars such as Edmund Kean, Dan Leno, and Ivor Novello, shifted after the Second World War to long-running musicals like Oklahoma! and My Fair Lady. …
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