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Articles
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Articles |
Theatre in Eastern England: EssexEssex is - if my figures are not out of date! - the most populous of the East England counties and so, as you would expect, has the most theatrical venues. Brentwood has two, although the biggest - the Brentwood Centre - tends to concentrate on musical shows. It's a leisure centre and its International Hall holds 1936 people. By way of contrast, the Old House Arts and Community Centre has a very small performance space, the Recital Room, which holds just 60 people. In Chelmsford there are three venues: the Chancellor Hall, the Civic Theatre and the Crampborn Theatre. The Chancellor (309 seats) is a multi-use civic centre and its theatre involvement is mainly hire, whereas the Civic Theatre has a very clearly defined theatre/arts policy. From October to March the 518-seater venue presents professional rep and touring dance and opera, and from April to September there are concerts, amateur productions, chldren's theatre and tours. The third venue, the Crampborn Theatre, is a studio seating 146 and taking small-scale tours. Clacton-on-Sea, one of Britain's traditional seaside holiday towns, has two theatres. The Princes Theatre is a multi-purpose venue presenting a wide range of shows and other activities and seats 820. The West Cliff Theatre is a national touring house for most of the year, but has a three month professional summer season. It seats 590. It is in Colchester that the greatest concentration of theatre activity is to be found. The Charter Hall is a leisure complex seating 1216 and providing a varied programme, whilst the Colchester Arts Centre, less than a quarter of the size at 300 seats, is very much a community arts centre, presenting a wide range of productions, usually with a community focus. The Lakeside Theatre (217) is part of the University of Essex and presents student, professional and amateur theatre, as well as offering youth theatre workshops. The town, however, is best known for the Mercury Theatre, a producing house built in 1972. It is a four-weekly rep (a new show every four weeks), with occasional visiting companies and amateur productions. It also has a busy studio theatre programme. The main house seats 496 and the studio 65. In Felsted is Felsted School, one the Britain's public schools, and, like a number of other such schools, its theatre, the Hunt Theatre, is open to the public and provides a programme which shows "theatre in all its aspects." The Thameside Theatre in Grays is another with very precise programming: 10% professional, 10% film, 80% hire. It seats 303 whilst ThamesideTwo is a small proscenium arch theatre seating just 45 people. The much larger Thurrock City Hall (747 seats) is for hire only. Halstead's Empire Theatre only presents fifteen live shows a year, the rest of the time being given to cinema. Harlow has the Playhouse, a national touring theate, with a main house of 400 and a 120-seater studio. Finally there are two more well-known seaside resorts, Southend-on-Sea and Westcliff-on-Sea. Southend has been a traditional resort for Londoners for many years and its Cliffs Pavilion, being large (1630), is a national touring house accepting large- and mid-scale tours. Westcliff is considered slightly more "posh" and its Palace Theatre is a producing house, mainly a rep theatre but it does take some tours. It seats 603 in the main house and 100 in the studio.
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