page_title: The Theatre, Leeds
section_title: Royal Theatre
hierarchical_section_title: The Theatre, Leeds / History / Royal Theatre
caption_attribution_description: 1868 Playbill for the Royal Theatre, Leeds, West Yorkshire, England.
context_page_description: The Theatre in Hunslet, Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, was a theatre for summer shows, built in 1771 by Tate Wilkinson and redeveloped in 1867. Mrs Siddons and Ching Lau Lauro appeared here in 1786 and 1834 respectively. It was the only drama theatre in Leeds until 1864, after which business was challenged by competition. It became shabby and was partially rebuilt in 1867 to create the smarter Royal Theatre, which was to burn down in 1875. No theatre was built again on this site, and its surviving Victorian successors are the Leeds City Varieties of 1865 and the Grand Theatre of 1878.
context_section_description: Coleman developed the New Royal Theatre and Opera House (later the Royal Theatre) from the remains of the partly demolished Theatre Royal (previously The Theatre) in 1867. Johnson's New Guide to Leeds was happy with this building; it was "replete with every modern appliance, both before and behind the curtain." It had a simple frontage "of the Italian Style," and the Leeds Times described it thus: 
  The box entrance is the central avenue; the foyer is lofty, spacious and well-lighted; the floor is inlaid with tesselated tiles; there is a large and handsome fireplace, with a radiating hearth-stove ... and over the magnificent marble mantelpiece is a large mirror; whilst exquisite statues line the niches on either hand. A large stone staircase leads to the grand tier. The ladies' saloon is a perfect boudoir, for here are ranged round luxurious settees of maplewood covered with silk velvet. Abutting upon the saloon is the lavatory, which is replete with every comfort and convenience requisite for a public place of amusement. Immediately adjacent are the gentlemen's saloons, coffee rooms etc., which are to be fitted up in a very elegant manner. The dress circle is estimated to seat one hundred, and the balcony one hundred persons; there are twenty private boxes, each of which will accommodate eight visitors, and these are provided with settees of silk velvet with spring cushions ... The pit is approached by a long and spacious corridor, and will provide ample accommodation for nearly eleven hundred spectators. The entrance to the gallery is from the back of the theatre, through Waterloo Street, and in this part of the house, seats have been provided for upwards of eleven hundred people ... The staircases are of stone, and, in the event of an alarm of fire ever taking place, there are several exits, so that the building can be cleared in an inconceivably short time. Every convenience has been provided for the accommodation of the visitors to the pit and gallery, each of which have their separate saloons, coffee-rooms etc.
  The decorations which are carried out by Mr Andrew Jackson, are of the most artistic and recherche description, Mr Coleman having been fortunate as to obtain them from designs of the decorations of the Palace of Versailles. The designs in terracotta, and the elaborate proscenium, are from the studio of Mr Walker, of this town. Messrs Singleton and Tennant have provided all the ornamental and other ironwork; the plumbers' work has been executed by Messrs Lindley and Johnson. Many other contracts have been carried out by other tradesmen in the town, and the whole building has been erected by Messrs Nicholson & Son, under the personal superintendence of the architect Thomas Angelo Moore, (of Thomas Moore & Son, Sunderland) . . .
  
  Complete as the building is in front, behind the stage it is really wonderful. There are upwards of twenty dressing and retiring rooms, in each of which hot and cold water has been laid on. The stage is simply marvellous. Every square inch of it takes up like the pieces of a child's puzzle. There are traps, slides, slotes, scruter work, counterweights and scores of other complicated arrangements which we do not understand, and cannot therefore attempt to describe. Suffice it that Mr Huby, the clever machinist, who has invented the stage, alleges that he can either draw up or sink down pieces of scenery thirty feet wide and thirty feet high. Hence, in pantomime time, we may expect to see groups of fairies floating about in mid air, descending from the heights above, or ascending from the abyss beneath. To add to effects of this kind, a magnificent gas apparatus has been laid on by Mr Smith, the celebrated gas engineer, from Birmingham, in addition to which an illuminating machine has been obtained in the shape of a new limelight apparatus, by means of which upwards of thirty different colours of lights can be thrown upon the stage at one time. Above the whole of the machinery is the lofty and commodious carpenter's shop. Over the roof of the pit, the large property store-room, and immedi
caption: Royal Theatre playbill for 1868. Confusingly it is still called the "Theatre Royal".
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