There’s a brand new multi-million pound performance space in Dulwich.
The new Edward Alleyn building, at Alleyn’s School, is named after the local Elizabethan benefactor and founder of much of what we know in Dulwich today.
The building is home to the spectacular Michael Croft Theatre – a professional performance space with all the necessary supporting infrastructure. There are rehearsal studios, green rooms, a media studies lab, 95-seat lecture theatre, classrooms and offices. And even a café.
Designed by award-winning architects van Heyningen and Haward the new theatre is technically up to date with the latest sound and lighting technology and can seat 350 audience members. The total cost of the project was £12.5 million, the majority of which was funded by the Dulwich Estate and The Worshipful Company of Saddlers.
The space is going to be used by the school for their drama projects, but also by the National Youth Theatre, which was founded at Alleyn’s. In 1956 Michael Croft, who had previously been an English teacher at the school, was approached by a group of former students to seek his support in setting up a youth theatre group which would put on performances in the school holidays. 50 years later, the school and the NYT have launched many a dramatic career including Colin Farrell, Jude Law and Samuel West.
But this project has not forgotten the community. Local non-profit making community groups and organisations can also use the theatre and the Edward Alleyn building free of charge.
A gala event last week saw former pupils and NYT members returning to the school for a gala performance to mark the opening for the theatre. Famous faces were out in force.
How many former pupils turned celebrities can you spot in the crowd?
All photos, with many thanks to Yvonne Blume at YB Photographic.
2 Comments
What an incredible facility – for local people too. Cant see Jude Law in the photos, perhaps he is busy rehearsing Hamlet.
I am so pleased to read about this new building and theatre.
I was a teenager in the 1950′s and attended many of the Alleyn’s school productions.
I remember there would be Gilbert & Sullivan at Christmas, Shakespeare at Easter and a Bear Pit production, usually a comendy/farce at the end of the summer term.
I remember Simon Ward in Patience, marvellous. I had a friend who had a beautiful boy soprano voice who often sang the female lead in the Gilbert & Sullivan. Then his voice broke and he had a lovely baritone. He then took the Pirate Kings part in Pirates of Penzance.They were wonderful times