The University of Bristol Theatre Collection was founded in 1951 to serve the University of Bristol Department of Drama. It is now one of the world's largest archives of British Theatre History. It is a fully accredited Archive and Museum and home to the Live Art Archive.
The Theatre Collection was established in 1951 following a symposium led by Glynne Wickham which called for Universities to endorse the policy of studying drama in the context of theatre. [1] Wickham instigated the purchase of its first acquisitions and laid the foundations for the Theatre Collection with funds awarded to the University of Bristol by the Rockefeller Foundation. [2] From the outset it was designed to be a working collection of theatre history, to serve scholars and practising theatre artists alike.
In 1969 the university made an award from its Appeal Fund to provide the Collection with adequate storage and access facilities within the department of drama. [2] The first official keeper of the Theatre Collection was Anne Brooke Barnett (died 2009) who managed the holdings from 1966 to 1989. [3] The Assistant Keeper from 1971 until Anne Brooke Barnett's retirement was Christopher Robinson (died 2003), who succeeded her and was Keeper until his own retirement in 1999. [4]
In 2010 the Theatre Collection received a funding allocation from The Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) to support it being accessible to the wider Higher Education community. Benefactors have also supported the work of the Theatre Collection.
Established in 1976, the Friends of the University of Bristol Theatre Collection supports the Theatre Collection in various ways. As well as financial support members also engage through volunteering and other activities and events, such as exhibition launches, talks, and visits. One of the Friends' most successful initiatives was raising £10,000 towards the archive of Oliver Messel, one of the foremost stage designers of the twentieth century. The Friends of the Theatre Collection is independent and voluntary. It helps strengthen links between the Theatre Collection and other cultural, theatrical and educational organisations. There are plans for the Theatre Collection to move into a new University of Bristol Library which has received planning permission. The Theatre Collection and other University of Bristol cultural collections will be much more visible and accessible with public exhibition spaces, activities and events.
In 2001 the University of Bristol Theatre Collection was awarded Registered museum status, followed in 2009 by full Accredited Museum status, by the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council, as recognised by the Arts Council of England. [5] In July 2017 it became the first university museum to receive Archive Service Accreditation from The National Archives. [6] [7] Their accreditation report concluded that:
“Bristol University Theatre Collection has an exceptionally strong grasp of its broad network of stakeholders, and their needs. This enables them to deliver impressive outcomes across the board, with outstanding academic delivery and a real capacity to support wider social outcomes. The service is notably innovative and impressive in its determination to grasp challenging issues and to share practice with the wider archives and museum world.” [6]
The University of Bristol Theatre Collection holds a wide range of material generated by or related to British Theatre, composed of documentation, designs, playbills, posters, promptscripts, playscripts, costumes, ephemera, artworks [8] (including photographs and magic lantern slides), and Audio-Visual material.
The collection holds nine of the approximately twenty surviving Bristol Old Vic silver tickets, tokens issued to shareholders who hepled fund construction of the theatre in 1766. [9] [10]
The catalogue [11] contains collections of:
Including: Dr Kathleen Barker (1925–1991), Richard Digby Day (b. 1941), George Rowell (d. 2001), Richard Southern (1903–1989) and Glynne Wickham (1922–2004)
Including: Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree (1852–1917), Honor Blackman (b. 1925), Stephanie Cole (b. 1941), Edward Gordon Craig (1872–1966), Cyril Fletcher (1913–2005), Rosalinde Fuller (1892–1982), Joyce Grenfell (1910–1979), Sir Henry Irving (1838–1905), Harry Brodribb Irving (1870–1919), Miriam Karlin (1925–2011), Hannah Murray (b. 1989), Leon Quartermaine (1876–1967), Arnold Ridley (1896–1984), Jack Shepherd (b. 1940), Ernest Thesiger (1879–1961), Margaret Tyzack (1931–2011), Hermann Vezin (1829–1910), Peggy Ann Wood (1912–1998), and Susannah York (1939–2011).
Including: Graham Barlow (d.2003), Deirdre Clancy, David Cockayne, Edward Gordon Craig (1872–1966), Frederick Crooke (1908–1991), John Elvery (1939–1997), Paul Farnsworth, Laurence Irving (1897–1988), Oliver Messel (1904–1978), Motley Theatre Design Group, Patrick Robertson (1922–2009) and Rosemary Vercoe (1917–2013), Owen Paul Smyth (1895–1979), Yolanda Sonnabend (1935–2015), Alan Tagg (1928–2002), Julia Trevelyan Oman (1930–2003) and David Walker (1934–2008).
Including: Norman Ayrton (1924–2017), John Percy Burrell (1910–1972), Hugh Hunt (1911–1993), John Moody (1906–1993), David Phethean (1918–2001), Alex Reeve, and Jules Wright (1948–2015).
Including: Bath Theatre Royal, Bristol Old Vic Company, Desperate Men, Old Vic (London), Shakespeare at the Tobacco Factory, Show of Strength Theatre Company, Theatre Roundabout, Welfare State International, Women's Playhouse Trust, The Critics' Circle, The Gallery First Nighters' Club, National Student Drama Festival, Royal Theatrical Fund, and the University of Bristol Department of Drama.
Including: Liane Aukin (1936–2016), Rosemary Davis (1926–2014), Kevin Elyot (1951–2014), Berta Freistadt (1942–2009), Margaret Macnamara (Margaret Mack) (1874–1950), Cecil Madden (1902–1987), George Frederic Norton (1869–1946), Sylvia Rayman (1923–1986), A.C.H. Smith (b. 1935), Phil Smith, Tom Vaughan (1911–1994), Fredrick Witney.
Collections from a wide range of people connected to the business of theatre are also represented, for example: producers, managers, agents, photographers, marketing and wardrobe professionals.
In December 2010 the theatre collection of the actors and historians Raymond Mander and Joe Mitchenson was legally transferred in its entirety to the University of Bristol Theatre Collection. [12] As an independent charity, the Mander and Mitchenson Theatrical Collection (MMTC) was already one of the three largest theatre history archives in the country. By incorporating the MMTC into its holdings, the University of Bristol Theatre Collection became one of the largest British theatre history archives in the world; in the UK second only to the Victoria and Albert Museum's Theatre & Performance Archive. [13]
The Live Art Archive holds physical information about existing Live Art / Performance Art materials, records and publications primarily in England and the UK. It includes the Record of Live Art Practice, the National Review of Live Art Archive, the Digital Performance Archive, the Arts Council England Live Art and Performance Archive, the Franko B Archive, Performance magazine Archive and the original tapes from the queerupnorth Video Archive, together with DVD copies for viewing.
The Theatre Collection has a reference library with over 25,000 books and more than 300 journal titles on all aspects of theatre. The catalogue can be viewed on the main University of Bristol Library site. Students, academics, and independent researchers can access the reference library and archival collections in the main reading room. Arranging an appointment in advance is highly recommended to facilitate object retrieval, particularly as some of the holdings are stored off-site.
The small exhibition area showcases aspects of the collections and is open to the general public.
Timothy Lancaster West, CBE is an English actor and presenter. He has appeared frequently on stage and television, including stints in both Coronation Street and EastEnders, and Not Going Out, as the original Geoffrey Adams. He is married to the actress Prunella Scales; from 2014 to 2019, they travelled together on UK and overseas canals in the Channel 4 series Great Canal Journeys.
The Old Vic is a 1,000-seat, not-for-profit producing theatre in Waterloo, London, England. Established in 1818 as the Royal Coburg Theatre, and renamed in 1833 the Royal Victoria Theatre. In 1871 it was rebuilt and reopened as the Royal Victoria Palace. It was taken over by Emma Cons in 1880 and formally named the Royal Victoria Hall, although by that time it was already known as the "Old Vic". In 1898, a niece of Cons, Lilian Baylis, assumed management and began a series of Shakespeare productions in 1914. The building was damaged in 1940 during air raids and it became a Grade II* listed building in 1951 after it reopened.
The Noël Coward Theatre, formerly known as the Albery Theatre, is a West End theatre in St. Martin's Lane in the City of Westminster, London. It opened on 12 March 1903 as the New Theatre and was built by Sir Charles Wyndham behind Wyndham's Theatre which was completed in 1899. The building was designed by the architect W. G. R. Sprague with an exterior in the classical style and an interior in the Rococo style.
Bristol Old Vic is a British theatre company based at the Theatre Royal, Bristol. The present company was established in 1946 as an offshoot of the Old Vic in London. It is associated with the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, which became a financially independent organisation in the 1990s. Bristol Old Vic runs a Young Company for those aged 7–25.
The Museum of English Rural Life, also known as The MERL, is a museum, library and archive dedicated to recording the changing face of farming and the countryside in England. The museum is run by the University of Reading, and is situated in Redlands Road to the rear of the institution's London Road Campus near to the centre of Reading in southern England. The location was formerly known as East Thorpe House and then St Andrew's Hall. It is an accredited museum and accredited archive as recognised by Arts Council England and the National Archives.
Bristol is a city in South West England. As the largest city in the region it is a centre for the arts and sport. The region has a distinct West Country dialect.
Oliver Hilary Sambourne Messel was an English artist and one of the foremost stage designers of the 20th century.
Amanda Whittington is an English dramatist who has written over 30 plays for theatre and radio. Her work is widely performed by companies across the UK, with recent productions at Hull Truck, Oldham Coliseum, New Vic Theatre and Nottingham Playhouse. Be My Baby is a popular GCSE and 'A' level choice in English Literature and Theatre Studies. She currently has two titles in Nick Hern Books' Top Ten Most Performed Plays. In 2017, she was awarded a Doctor of Philosophy by Publication at the University of Huddersfield.
Carl Toms OBE was a British set and costume designer who was known for his work in theatre, opera, ballet, and film.
Glynne William Gladstone Wickham was a British Shakespearean and theatre scholar.
The Conference of Drama Schools (CDS) was the organisation which represented the top 21 accredited UK drama schools in the United Kingdom from 1969 until 2012.
George Rowell was a British theatre historian, lecturer and authority on the 19th century. His specialisms included Victorian melodrama and the theatre of Henry Irving, W. S. Gilbert, Oscar Wilde and Arthur Wing Pinero.
ArenaPAL is a UK company, based in London, which specialises in the licensing of performing arts images, both in the UK and throughout the world. Its collection falls under the main categories of opera, theatre, classical and contemporary music, classical and contemporary dance, as well as educational imagery covering all categories.
Drama UK was an advocate for vocational drama training in the UK, as well as providing accreditation for vocational drama courses, from 2012 to 2016.
The Interlude of the Student and the Girl is one of the earliest known secular plays in English, first performed c. 1300. The text is written in vernacular English, in an East Midlands dialect that suggests either Lincoln or Beverley as its origin, although its title is given in Latin. The name of its playwright is unknown. Only two scenes, with a total of 84 lines of verse in rhyming couplets, are extant and survive in a manuscript held by the British Library, dated to either the late twelfth or very early thirteenth century. Glynne Wickham provides both the original text and a rendering in modern English in his English Moral Interludes (1976). In tone and form, the interlude seems to be the closest play in English to the contemporaneous French farces, such as The Boy and the Blind Man, and is related to later English farcical plays, such as the anonymous Calisto and Melibea and John Heywood's The Foure PP. It was most likely performed by itinerant players, possibly making use of a performing dog. In Early English Stages (1981), Wickham points to the existence of this play as evidence that the old-fashioned view that comedy began in England with Gammer Gurton's Needle and Ralph Roister Doister in the 1550s is mistaken, ignoring as it does a rich tradition of medieval comic drama. He argues that the play's "command of dramatic action and of comic mood and method is so deft as to make it well-nigh unbelievable" that it was the first of its kind in England.
The Federation of Drama Schools functions to facilitate vocational drama training in the UK. It was formed in June 2017.
Raymond Mander and Joe Mitchenson were theatre historians and joint founders of a large collection of theatrical memorabilia.