Venue: Theatre Royal
Address: Royal Parade, Plymouth, Devon, PL1 2TR, England
Town: Plymouth, GB
Capacity: 1,320

Theatre Royal, Plymouth, is a theatre venue in Plymouth, Devon. It consists of a 1,300-seat main auditorium, The Lyric, which regularly hosts large-scale musicals, opera and ballet; a 200-seat studio, The Drum; and a 50-seat studio, The Lab. On a separate site, Theatre Royal Plymouth also has a production and learning centre, TR2, featuring rehearsal studios and workshops for the production of set and costumes. The theatre is a National Portfolio Organisation, receiving regular funding from Arts Council England. A £7 million Regeneration Project was completed in September 2013 with a renovated front of house area and community performance space called The Lab. A 7-metre-high (23 ft) bronze sculpture depicting a crouching female actor called Messenger was unveiled in front of the theatre, in 2019. In 1758 a theatre was built at the top of George Street in Plymouth. Originally known as the Theatre, Frankfort-Gate, it adopted the name Theatre Royal after King George III and his family visited it in 1789. In 1810 Plymouth Corporation held a competition for the design of a new theatre, hotel and assembly rooms at the bottom of George Street. The competition was won by John Foulston, who built a neo-classical block of buildings between 1811 and 1813. The new Theatre Royal opened in 1813 and could seat 1,192. Foulston's buildings formed a frontage of 268 feet (82 m) facing George's Place that was dominated by a portico with 30-foot (9.1 m)-high ionic columns. The theatre was on the west side of this portico, with the hotel and assembly rooms on the east. Foulston used thick walls to separate the auditorium from the foyer, corridors and the hotel next door to minimise the risk of fire damage. The whole inner structure was built of cast iron for the same purpose, and Foulston believed it was the only fireproof theatre in the country. Despite these precautions, the theatre suffered a disastrous interior fire in June 1878; by January 1879 it had been repaired and reopened. The