Marrin's Bookshop

Synopsis

Topics include :productions season 1942-47 /photos of the mayor productions in the first four seasons 1942-1946. how it began, planning the building,work on the building-photos.costs,income,plans for the future and much more. introduction by sir barry jackson, the actor.

Item Description

Highbury Theatre is a non-professional theatre situated in the Royal Town of Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham, England. It is one of the oldest, established amateur theatres in the city and a founding member of the Little Theatre Guild of Great Britain. In 1937, they purchased the freehold site.Using this basic structure they built, almost entirely on their own, their own theatre. Members learnt new skills on site first hand, to build brick walls, plastering, joinery, electrics, metalwork and much more, pulling together to create a theatre of their own. They worked both night and day during the early years of the Second World War to complete it. When the war broke out in 1939 most of the work was undertaken by the female members. It was through dedication and without financial aid or patronage; that the theatre was constructed, along with its traditions which helped to lay the foundations of what it eventually became. The original theatre seats were donated to the theatre when the then newly refurbished Prince of Wales theatre in the City Centre was bombed during an air raid, some of the seats still proudly bore the bomb splinters. When building work was completed, the new building was christened; Highbury Little Theatre. spiral bound,wear to outside boards internally good 79 pp. 15 x 21 cm.