| Summary : The Royal National Theatre was built in 1969-76 by Sir Denys Lasdun. The theatre complex is of reinforced concrete construction with flat roofs and consists of three auditoria. These are the lower 895-seat Lyttelton Theatre, the 1165-seat Olivier Theatre and the 400-seat Cottesloe Theatre. The building's architectural form mainly derives from the Lyttelton Theatre and Olivier Theatre, their flytowers and foyers. The two are linked at the level of the river embankment by paired foyers the full height of the building, with exhibition spaces and restaurants on several layers leading on to outside walkways. Workshops, rehearsal spaces and dressing rooms are to the rear, with a separate entrance and foyer to the Cottesloe Theatre. |
More information : The Royal National Theatre was built in 1969-76 by Sir Denys Lasdun. The theatre complex is of reinforced concrete construction with flat roofs and consists of three auditoria. These are the lower 895-seat Lyttelton Theatre, the 1165-seat Olivier Theatre and the 400-seat Cottesloe Theatre. The Lyttelton Theatre and Olivier Theatre are linked at the level of the river embankment by paired foyers the full height of the building, with exhibition spaces and restaurants on several layers leading on to outside walkways. Workshops, rehearsal spaces and dressing rooms are to the rear, with a separate entrance and foyer to the Cottesloe theatre. (1)
Plans for a national theatre in London had been mooted for most of the 20th century with very little being done. It was not until the Labour Government of 1945-51that subsidised theatre began to look a realistic proposition. The South Bank, which had housed the Festival of Britain in 1951, was chosen as the site and immediately drew criticism. Bernard Shaw, amongst others, argued that siting a national theatre outside the West End would hinder its success. The site, a working class area of warehousing and docks, with in a state of terminal decline and the government saw the new theatre acting as a catalyst to the regeneration of the area. Denys Lasdun's original design included a new national opera house but when building work finally got underway in 1967 this element of the scheme had been removed leaving just the theatre.
The building's architectural form is derived from the Lyttelton Theatre and Olivier Theatre, their flytowers and foyers; the Cottesloe being an adaptable galleried space devised by Iain Mackintosh. (2-4)
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