18 Facts About Royal National Theatre

Attention was aroused in 1879 when the Comedie-Francaise took a residency at the Gaiety Royal National Theatre, described in The Times as representing "the highest aristocracy of the theatre".

Shakespeare Memorial Theatre was opened in Stratford upon Avon on 23 April 1879, with the New Shakespeare Company ; then Herbert Beerbohm Tree founded an Academy of Dramatic Art at Her Majesty's Theatre in 1904.

The "National Theatre Company" opened on 22 October 1963 with Hamlet, starring Peter O'Toole in the title role.

Temporary Royal National Theatre, formerly called The Shed, was a 225-seat black box theatre which opened in April 2013 and featured new works; it closed in May 2016, following the refurbishment of the Dorfman Royal National Theatre.

Style of the National Theatre building was described by Mark Girouard as "an aesthetic of broken forms" at the time of opening.

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In November 2016, the National Theatre launched to service to UK primary schools, adding a number of new titles for Key Stage 2.

In 2018, the National Theatre reported that over half of UK state secondary schools have registered to use the service.

Public Acts is a community participation programme from the National Theatre working with theatres and community organisations across the UK to create large-scale new work.

In 2013 the National announced that there would be a small summer festival entitled 'August Outdoors' in Theatre Square.

Royal National Theatre was considered the foremost British film and stage actor of the period, and became the first director of the Chichester Festival Theatre – there forming the company that would unite with the Old Vic Company to form the National Theatre Company.

Royal National Theatre became a life peer in 1970, for his services to theatre, and stepped down in 1973.

Royal National Theatre's career included running the Arts Theatre between 1956 and 1959 – where he directed the English language premiere of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot.

Royal National Theatre went on to take over the Memorial Theatre at Stratford, and to create the permanent Royal Shakespeare Company, in 1960, establishing a new RSC base at the Aldwych Theatre for transfers to the West End.

Royal National Theatre was Artistic Director at the National Theatre between 1973 and 1988.

Royal National Theatre was noted for his series of collaborations with David Hare on the state of contemporary Britain.

Royal National Theatre came to the National from the RSC, having undertaken a major expansion of the company into the Swan, The Other Place and the Barbican Theatres.

Royal National Theatre previously worked as an associate director with the Royal Exchange Theatre and the National.

Royal National Theatre is the first person since Laurence Olivier to hold the post without being a University of Cambridge graduate.