39 Steps

Criterion Theatre - History

The Criterion Theatre is located on Piccadilly Circus in London’s City of Westminster. Its nearest underground station is Piccadilly Circus and its nearest train station is Charing Cross.

The Theatre was built on the land which sloped between Jermyn Street and Piccadilly Circus (known as Regent Circus). Caterers Spiers and Pond had decided to develop a concert hall complex with a large restaurant, a tavern and other public room on the site and held an architectural competition to find the designer. After fifteen entries, the winner was decided as Thomas Verity. He went on to design the complex with the restaurant, dining rooms, ballroom and a smoking room. On the first floor would be the dining and serving rooms taking up its entirety and the Piccadilly front on the second floor would be the grand hall. Behind this there would be another dining room, the supper room and the picture gallery. At the front, where the façade was for the restaurant, there was a French Renaissance style

It was when the actual construction of the complex began that the decision was made to make the concert hall in the basement into a theatre instead and a redesign took place after gaining permission from the Commissioners of Woods and Forests. As a result the Criterion Restaurant and dining rooms ended up above the theatre and a ballroom appeared on the top floor. The total cost of the project when the building was complete was over £80,000 in 1873.

The basement that the theatre was situated in caused some problems when Spiers and Pond applied for a license to operate the theatre. The room would have to be lit by gas lighting, which would present the risk of the audience becoming asphyxiated by toxic fumes. As a result, fresh air had to be pumped into the theatre. This was eventually completely remedied after 1881 with the introduction of electrical lighting.

Modern History
In recent years the Criterion Theatre has housed a number of plays and even a TV show. In the late nineties and early twenty first century the Reduced Shakespeare Company, The Complete Works Of William Shakespeare (Abridged) was at home at the theatre along with productions of The Complete History Of America and The Bible, The Complete Word Of God. After that there were further productions that include The Gruffalo, Otherwise Engaged, What The Butler Saw and Mack & Mabel

For television it was the theatre used in the second round of ITV’s Pop Idol where the first round of recalls took place. The successful auditioned contestants from the first round performed there in front of the judges.

More recently, The 39 Steps has been the production housed at the theatre, based on the novel by John Buchan and adapted into a movie in 1935 which was directed by Alfred Hitchcock.