The New Wimbledon Theatre

Theatres are part of performing arts and mainly focus on live performances in drama, illusionary creations, acrobatic presentations, dance, and music, among others. Derived from its meaning, a theatre is a place that engages its occupants in seeing or watching acts of arts being performed. There are various types of theatres; a theatre can be professional or an amateur in nature, resident or producing, rental or presenting theatre, each category is usually designed to suit its purpose in relation to the environmental factors, the type of audience it targets and the types of arts to be performed in it. The main categories of theatre are drama, musical and comedy. When designing a theatre, there are special features that need to be put in place, the distribution of the chairs, the material to be used on the walls, the lighting system, the sound effect in the room, the height of the roof, the shape of the interior space and the effects on the walls are some of the important aspects that need to be considered (Urbersfeld, et al, 1999).
The content that is involved in the dramatic spaces can either be logical or subsets of binary functioning, which include objects and props paintings and characters assist in creating a certain theme to the theatre. Disjunctive functioning of the objects created in the theatre and the semanticised features which can be closed or open, circular or linear, continuous or broken, high or low in depth or surface, all contribute to the spacial features of theatre. However, one would argue how the spacial features of the theatre relate to the plays that are being performed. If examined from a critical point of view the theatre should only provide venue to perform the art and give comfort to the audience. The view that spacial features of a theatre create the prevailing culture among the audience and that they are a sign of spiritual elevation by giving a distinctive value to the arts that are performed within the theatre can only be supported if the said theatre is solely built to perform given the kind of art; for example, African finished theatre designed to host only African related themes. Apart from the interior design, special space also refers to the surrounding environment of the theatre; they are other recreational facilities within the vicinity. Factors like accessibility should be put into consideration to give a theatre a complete sense in terms of attracting customers and adding value to its existence .The external space will play a better role in promoting business than setting the theme of the arts to be performed (Urbersfeld et al, 1999). During the Second World War, the then Wimbledon theatre was destroyed including the statue that made the building a landmark. In the 1960s, the theatre was at the verge of closure due to its poor state. The closure was however blocked by local campaigners after the local council purchased the building from the Mulholland family. After intensive refurbishing of the theatre, it was re opened in November 1968 and was under the new management of the Merton Civic Theatre Trust. The stage has a depth of 40 ft, a width of 34 ft and a height of 52 ft. It is remembered for hosting the final London Show of Marlene Dietrich in 1975 (The Music Hall Theatre Site, 2009).The New Wimbledon Theatre in one of the renowned places in London, situated on the Broadway, the theatre has a capacity of 1700 seats based on three levels, the studio is made up of 50 -80 seats. The theatre was designed by Cecil Masey and Roy Young and opened its doors to the public in 1910. Previously the theatre was known as Wimbledon Theatre before being taken over by the Ambassador Theatre Group and renamed to the New Wimbledon Theatre.
The New Wimbledon Theatre has distinctive artistic and spacial elements in that the hall is made of Baroque features. This implies that the stage can be changed from the state of a romantic garden to that of a palace. This artistic feature is managed through the hiding of all unnecessary features that are currently not related to the act and the result is achieved through the use of ropes and pulleys that create an illusionary view when the acts are being performed. However, developing this illusionary effect has some negative aspect to it, although the unutilised sections are hidden from the audience, the entire procedure is quite taxing and at the same time expensive to operate. From an economist point of view, the hidden space would otherwise have been used to create more sitting spaces. On the other hand, an artist would see no disadvantage attached to the use of baroque features in the theatre.
The theatre is also characterised with Adamesque style that is a feature from the neo classical architecture. This style is composed of pilasters, complex colour scheme with flat and grotesque panels and is rich in Roman decorative motifs. The Adamesque is meant to give the audience a sense of the early neo classical era although this objective may not be accomplished because majority of the audience may not have an idea of what neoclassical means and thus fail to relate to the artistic features in the theatre. The objects created by the Adamesque can also be symbolic referring to historic accuracy that is relevant in the prevailing era. “The decor object can be referential; being iconic and indexical, an object refers us to history tor to painting…romantic staging seeks historical accuracy, and an object must conform to the spectacular convectional idea of a historical decor; the naturalistic object denotes a framework of everyday life” (Urbersfeld et al, 1999, p. 122). In addition, the objects created by Baroque and Adamesque can either create a symbolic by acting as metaphors to a given order of reality that can either be psychological or socio cultural. Alternatively, they can simply be drawings to create a sense of beauty and glamour without any symbolic value attached to them.
On the top of the theatre building is a golden statue of a Roman goddess of Gaiety that was enacted in 1910. This feature gives a sense of royalty and a religious aspect to the theatre; it is a symbol of celebration. However, the spiritual view of the golden statue lost some degree of religious aspect when it was destroyed during the Second World War. In addition, the mosque-like building is said to have a religious impact on the visitors to the theatre, however, this belief may not hold water as London as a city has very limited number of Muslims that would appreciate its value. This effect gives it a holistic view and implies that performances should be in one way religious and not pagan in nature as they would be going against the theme of the place. On the contrary, the current theatre industry rarely performs religious scripts or plays neither are pagan like pays done. The current market revolves around day to day activities with economic, social and political themes (Urbersfeld et al, 1999).
The interior is made up of an open air arena which is referred to as the pit or yard; it has a stage that has been raised from the ground and the seats slightly get into the pit. Thus, special effect objective would be to either give the audience a strong feeling of the performance taking place or to economically maximise the available space. It all depends on the person interpreting the artistic effect of the features. The theatre is composed of two strong pillars emerging at the front; these pillars give a longitudinal effect to the hall making it appear to be vast and huge and would on the other side act as supporting beams to the entire building and may have nothing to do with the artist effect of the theatre (The Music Hall Theatre Site, 2009).
The Theatre is made up of Georgian and Italian decorations that are made in cream and white, blue, gold, rose pink and brown in colour. This shade of the colours can give the room an ambience of variety to suit a number of scenarios, creating a confusing illusion to the audience or alternatively assisting with the lighting effect of the theatre. The entire lighting system of the theatre is warm so it gives the audience a feeling of warmth and comfort although not all the visitors to the place may appreciate the collection of colours used because they have some confusing effect on the interior side of the theatre.
The New Wimbledon theatre has undergone transformation since it was first built by the initial owners. The structural changes have led to the development of a world class entertainment theatre that has all the desired qualities of a modern theatre. It has unique features although they may give contradicting effects to audiences. The strategic location gives it an added advantage in terms of accessibility and sufficient alternative recreational facilities raise the value of the theatre (Leach, 2008).