The Cambridge Theatre, 5 Star Hotels in London City near The Cambridge Theatre, West End Theatres

The Cambridge Theatre

Seven Dials, 32-34 Earlham Street, City of London WC2 9HU

The Cambridge Theatre can be found on a corner site in Earlham Street Seven Dials in the London Borough of Camden. It has a capacity of 1275 seats with an auditorium on three levels. The theatre was designed by Wimperis, Simpson and Guthrie and built by Gee Walker Slater Ltd. It is renowned for its elegant and clean lines of design. It opened its doors to the public in London’s famous West End on the 4th September 1930. Several other theatres were to open in the same year. It is also a listed Grade ll venue.

At the time the Cambridge Theatre adopted a new “expressionist style” which was pioneered in the 1920s by Germany. It turned away from the design excesses of other theatres and opted for the Germanic modern forms of simple shapes, shiny steelwork and bright colour. In 1950 the theatre underwent extensive refurbishment where the original gold and silver décor was painted over in red and also added were candelabras and chandeliers.

Throughout the history of the Cambridge Theatre its productions were often short and success has on many occasions eluded it. The theatre has known bleak periods and was a venue for trade film shows in the late 1930s and a cinema in 1969. However, it did go on to produce again many short but successful plays. Its most notable productions throughout has included “Elizabeth of England” 1931, “A Night in Venice” 1944, “Billy Liar” 1960 and “Half a Sixpence” 1963. More recent successful productions were “Budgie” 1980 and the musical “Return To The Forbidden Planet” 1989 which ran for three years. Despite all the controversy “Jerry Springer The Opera” enjoyed a very successful run for over a year and a half. The theatre was to experience another success story with the famous “Chicago” musical which ran from 2006 to 2011.

In the mid-1980s the Cambridge theatre was closed for a while until it was purchased by Stoll Moss Theatres in 1986. The new owners took to renovating and restoring the interior of the theatre to its original 1930s splendour. This work was carried out by Carl Toms. Once again the theatre reopened its doors in November 1987 with a showing of “Peter Pan”.

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