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Drury Lane Theatre

 
Music Encyclopedia: Drury Lane Theatre
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London theatre, properly the Theatre Royal. It is the fourth (opened 1812) on the site; the first opened in 1663. Many new English operas were given there in the late 18th and the 19th centuries as well as British premières of many German (including Wagner) and Russian operas up to 1919.


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Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: Drury Lane Theatre
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Oldest English theatre still in use. It was built in London by Thomas Killigrew for his acting company as the Theatre Royal (1663). It burned in 1672 and was rebuilt in 1674 with Christopher Wren as architect. It prospered under such actor-managers as Colley Cibber and later under David Garrick and Richard Brinsley Sheridan. An expanded "fireproof" theatre opened in 1794 and burned in 1809. Rebuilt in 1812 with over 2,000 seats, it declined in popularity from the 1840s, but it revived in the 1880s with melodramas and spectacles and was the scene of the acting triumphs of Henry Irving and Ellen Terry. More recently it has played host to many U.S. musicals.

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Music Encyclopedia. The Concise Grove Dictionary of Music. Copyright © 1994 by Oxford University Press, Inc.. All rights reserved.  Read more
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. © 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more