Canberra Theatre Centre (CTC), also known as the Canberra Theatre, is the

Australian Capital Territory The Australian Capital Territory (commonly abbreviated as ACT), known as the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) until 1938, is a landlocked federal territory of Australia containing the national capital Canberra and some surrounding township#Aust ...

’s central

performing arts The performing arts are arts such as music, dance, and drama which are performed for an audience. They are different from the visual arts, which are the use of paint, canvas or various materials to create physical or static art objects. Perfo ...

venue and Australia’s first performing arts centre, the first

Australian Government The Australian Government, also known as the Commonwealth Government, is the national government of Australia, a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy. Like other Westminster-style systems of government, the Australian Governmen ...

initiated performing arts centre to be completed. It opened on 24 June 1965 with a gala performance by the Australian Ballet. The Centre is sited in the heart of Canberra city centre, beside the

ACT Legislative Assembly The Legislative Assembly for the Australian Capital Territory (known in short as the ACT Legislative Assembly) is the unicameral legislature of the Australian Capital Territory (ACT). It sits in the Legislative Assembly Building on Civic S ...

and backing onto City Hill, one of the apexes of the Parliamentary Triangle.

Centre history

Originally the complex was two separate buildings: the Canberra Theatre and The Playhouse, which were linked by a covered walkway. The Canberra Theatre was built as a 1,200 seat lyric

theatre Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The perfor ...

to house national and international touring companies; The Playhouse had 310 seats and was designed for local arts companies and for smaller scale touring companies. The Playhouse also contained a small visual art gallery, a meeting room and a restaurant, 1965: The Playhouse was officially opened on 18 August 1965 with a production of

Peter Ustinov Sir Peter Alexander Ustinov (born Peter Alexander Freiherr von Ustinov ; 16 April 192128 March 2004) was a British actor, filmmaker and writer. An internationally known raconteur, he was a fixture on television talk shows and lecture circuits ...

’s ''Romanoff and Juliet'', produced by th
Canberra Repertory Society
1971: The covered walkway linking the two venues was enclosed to create more foyer and function space for the Canberra Theatre and improved box office facilities. 1975: The Playhouse was given improved backstage storage space, wardrobe facilities and addition dressing rooms. 1982: The Courtyard Studio - a rehearsal room/cum 90-seat venue, administration offices, and a scene construction workshop including an electrically operated paint frame (used for painting stage set canvases), were completed. The Centre boasts one of the very few paint frames in Australia. 1988: The Canberra Theatre auditorium, foyer and link were extensively refurbished so that the facilities were comparable to those of other major performing arts centres throughout the country. 1998: The rebuilt Playhouse opened. 2006: A new library was built between the Canberra Theatre and the Playhouse, as well as a foyer linking the two theatres. 2007: The foyer and dressing rooms to the Courtyard Studio were refurbished. In addition lift access to the first floor Administration offices was installed

Refurbishment

From the mid-1990s a two-year consultation process occurred between the Canberra Theatre Centre staff and the architects leading to the demolition of The Playhouse and its rebuilding as a new venue. It had a 'soft' opening in April 1998. The official opening was 16 May 1998. Instead of a conventional fan shaped

auditorium An auditorium is a room built to enable an audience to hear and watch performances. For movie theatres, the number of auditoria (or auditoriums) is expressed as the number of screens. Auditoria can be found in entertainment venues, communit ...

and

proscenium arch A proscenium ( grc-gre, προσκήνιον, ) is the metaphorical vertical plane of space in a theatre, usually surrounded on the top and sides by a physical proscenium arch (whether or not truly "arched") and on the bottom by the stage floor ...

stage used in most Australian theatres built in the 20th century, the

design A design is a plan or specification for the construction of an object or system or for the implementation of an activity or process or the result of that plan or specification in the form of a prototype, product, or process. The verb ''to design' ...

has the form of a semi circular drum with seating in the stalls and two balconies, with 'boxes'. The capacity is 618 seats. The design is reminiscent of theatres in

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders wi ...

of antiquity and the

Elizabethan The Elizabethan era is the epoch in the Tudor period of the history of England during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558–1603). Historians often depict it as the golden age in English history. The symbol of Britannia (a female personific ...

theatres of the late 16th century. The theatre has dressing rooms on two levels, wardrobe, a green room, a reception room and the

foyer A lobby is a room in a building used for entry from the outside. Sometimes referred to as a foyer, reception area or an entrance hall, it is often a large room or complex of rooms (in a theatre, opera house, concert hall, showroom, cinema, etc. ...

(with

bar Bar or BAR may refer to: Food and drink * Bar (establishment), selling alcoholic beverages * Candy bar * Chocolate bar Science and technology * Bar (river morphology), a deposit of sediment * Bar (tropical cyclone), a layer of cloud * Bar ( ...

and

cafe A coffeehouse, coffee shop, or café is an establishment that primarily serves coffee of various types, notably espresso, latte, and cappuccino. Some coffeehouses may serve cold drinks, such as iced coffee and iced tea, as well as other non-c ...

), which wraps around the drum.

Notable performances

Canberra Theatre

Dame

Margot Fonteyn Dame Margaret Evelyn de Arias DBE (''née'' Hookham; 18 May 191921 February 1991), known by the stage name Margot Fonteyn, was an English ballerina. She spent her entire career as a dancer with the Royal Ballet (formerly the Sadler's Wells ...

performed with the Australian Ballet at the centre in October 1970. From the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s many international artists performed, including Dame

Joan Sutherland Dame Joan Alston Sutherland, (7 November 1926 – 10 October 2010) was an Australian dramatic coloratura soprano known for her contribution to the renaissance of the bel canto repertoire from the late 1950s through to the 1980s. She possesse ...

. Canberra Opera presented a full-scale production of ''

La Traviata ''La traviata'' (; ''The Fallen Woman'') is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi set to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave. It is based on '' La Dame aux camélias'' (1852), a play by Alexandre Dumas ''fils'' adapted from his ow ...

'' and the Canberra Theatre Trust presented a performance of

Gilbert and Sullivan Gilbert and Sullivan was a Victorian era, Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the dramatist W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) and the composer Arthur Sullivan (1842–1900), who jointly created fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which ...

's ''

HMS Pinafore ''H.M.S. Pinafore; or, The Lass That Loved a Sailor'' is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and a libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It opened at the Opera Comique in London, on 25 May 1878 and ran for 571 performances, which ...

''. Other performers during this time included the Bell Shakespeare Company, the Black Light Theatre of Prague and the

Dave Brubeck Quartet David Warren Brubeck (; December 6, 1920 – December 5, 2012) was an American jazz pianist and composer. Often regarded as a foremost exponent of cool jazz, Brubeck's work is characterized by unusual time signatures and superimposing contras ...

. The Whitlams used the theatre during their early Australian tours in the early 2000s, and the Aboriginal

Bangarra Dance Theatre Bangarra Dance Theatre is an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander dance company focused on contemporary dance. It was founded by African American dancer and choreographer Carole Y. Johnson, Gumbaynggirr man Rob Bryant, and South African-born C ...

performed here in 2006. In recent years, the Canberra Theatre has housed several successful productions by Canberra-based Free Rain Theatre Company. These pro-am musical productions include Canberra premiers of The Phantom of the Opera in 2013, Mary Poppins in 2015, and both The Little Mermaid and Wicked in 2016.

The Playhouse

Local companies to use the Playhouse have included Canberra Opera; Prompt Theatre;

choreographer Choreography is the art or practice of designing sequences of movements of physical bodies (or their depictions) in which motion or form or both are specified. ''Choreography'' may also refer to the design itself. A choreographer is one who c ...

Meryl Tankard Meryl Tankard is an Australian dancer and choreographer who has a wide national and international reputation. Early life and education Tankard's father served in the Royal Australian Air Force and the family moved to various bases during her ea ...

's Company; The Theatre Players; Canberra Dance Ensemble; National Music Theatre; Canberra Little Theatre; Canberra Children’s Theatre; Stage Craft for Singers; Canberra

Gang Show A Gang Show is a theatrical performance by members of Scouts and Guides. The shows are produced with the dual aims of providing a learning opportunity for young people in the performing arts, as well as contributing to the artistic and cultural ...

; Canberra Comedy Theatre Company; Jigsaw Theatre Company. For several years the Woden Valley Youth Choir presented their annual concert there. The Playhouse has been used for conventions, meetings, including

naturalisation Naturalization (or naturalisation) is the legal act or process by which a non-citizen of a country may acquire citizenship or nationality of that country. It may be done automatically by a statute, i.e., without any effort on the part of the in ...

ceremonies by the Department of Immigration. The Playhouse has also housed productions by visiting companies. These included ''

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead ''Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead'' is an absurdist, existential tragicomedy by Tom Stoppard, first staged at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1966. The play expands upon the exploits of two minor characters from Shakespeare's ''Ham ...

'' from the Old Tote Theatre Company; Dennis Olsen in ''Percy and Rose'';

David Williamson David Keith Williamson AO (born 24 February 1942) is an Australian dramatist and playwright. He has also written screenplays and teleplays. Early life David Williamson was born in Melbourne, Victoria, on 24 February 1942, and was brought ...

plays ''Travelling North'' and ''Sanctuary'';

Melbourne Theatre Company The Melbourne Theatre Company is a theatre company based in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Founded in 1953 as the Union Theatre Repertory Company at the Union Theatre at the University of Melbourne, it is the oldest professional theatre com ...

; chamber music concerts by Musica Viva and others;

Robyn Archer Robyn Archer, AO, CdOAL (born 1948) is an Australian singer, writer, stage director, artistic director, and public advocate of the arts, in Australia and internationally. Life Archer was born Robyn Smith in Prospect, South Australia. She beg ...

in ''A Star is Torn''; Pam Ayres;

Googie Withers Georgette Lizette Withers, CBE, AO (12 March 191715 July 2011), known professionally as Googie Withers, was an English entertainer who was a dancer and actress with a lengthy career spanning some nine decades in theatre, film, and television. ...

; productions by NIDA; various Bell Shakespeare Company performances ( John Bell); pianist

David Helfgott David Helfgott (born 19 May 1947) is an Australian concert pianist whose life inspired the Academy Award-winning film ''Shine'', in which he was portrayed by actors Geoffrey Rush, Noah Taylor and Alex Rafalowicz. Biography Early life Helfgott ...

; as well as various comedians and entertainers.Playhouse history
accessed 16 April 2007

The Courtyard Studio

The Courtyard Studio is Canberra Theatre Centre's boutique, studio performance space that doubles as a venue for rehearsals, entertaining, corporate functions / meetings, exhibition space, and as a performance space. The Courtyard Studio can seat up to 90 people comfortably for a performance. For entertaining it can seat 100 and for cocktail parties it has a capacity of 140 people.

References

{{Canberra landmarks Performing arts centres in Australia Theatres in the Australian Capital Territory Buildings and structures in Canberra Tourist attractions in Canberra