Royal Shakespeare Company

History of the ALbery Theatre

Originally known as the New Theatre, the Albery was built by Sir Charles and Mary Wyndham and opened on 12 March 1903.

In 1915 Dion Boucicault presented a Christmas revival of J M Barrie's Peter Pan, which was repeated every year until 1919 due to its popularity. The theatre has also staged a number of successful productions by other distinguished writers including Somerset Maugham, A A Milne, Noël Coward, Bernard Shaw, Dylan Thomas, T S Eliot and Tennessee Williams. The sixties were dominated by Lionel Bart's Oliver! which ran for 2618 performances.

A host of famous names have appeared on-stage at the theatre including Sir John Gielgud, Sybil Thorndike, Sir Laurence Olivier, Peggy Ashcroft and many more.

In 1973 the New Theatre was renamed the Albery in tribute to the late Sir Bronson Albery who had presided over its fortunes for many years.

The Albery has seen productions as diverse as Somerset Maugham's The Constant Wife, Children of a Lesser God by Mark Medoff, Tom Stoppard's Travesties and Willy Russell’s Blood Brothers.

The Albery's biggest ever hit was A Month in the Country with Helen Mirren and John Hurt. The work of Chekhov and Neil Simon has graced the same stage as Les Patterson and Eddie Izzard.

1998/9 saw The Almeida at The Albery season, which played to huge critical acclaim. Productions presented included Phaedre, Britannicus, Mr Puntila and His Man Matti, Vassa and Plenty. The Almeida returned to The Albery once again in 2000 with Cressida, starring Sir Michael Gambon.

Further successes also include Dawn French in A Midsummer Night's Dream and Lindsay Duncan in ATG’s co-production with the Royal Court of Kevin Elyot’s Mouth to Mouth.

Since then, the Albery has seen Private Lives (Alan Rickman and Lindsey Duncan, prior to the Broadway transfer), Shockheaded Peter, Rory Bremner with Bird & Fortune, Macbeth (Sean Bean and Samantha Bond), The Master Builder (Patrick Stewart and Sue Johnston) and most recently in 2004, Endgame which saw the return of Sir Michael Gambon, alongside Lee Evans.