With its round amphitheater, The Globe is the most famous playhouse associated with William Shakespeare. But long before Shakespeare or his plays appeared at the Globe, another forgotten stage was the Bard’s temporary home.
It was here, in June 1594, that theater entrepreneur Philip Henslowe recorded the first known performances of the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, a theater troupe of which Shakespeare was a founding member, playwright, and actor. The company performed versions of “Hamlet,” “The Taming of the Shrew,” and “Titus Andronicus” over 11 days.
While Shakespeare’s plays were performed at smaller venues such as inns and courtyards (possibly as early as 1589), the Newington Butts shows were very likely to have been the first on a major Elizabethan stage constructed specifically for the kind of theater for which he was about to become famous. It soon vanished from history and was largely forgotten by Shakespeare scholars.
Shakespeare Detective
The Newington Butts playhouse was built in 1575 and continued operating until 1594. The playhouse would have had at least two tiers of seating around the perimeter to be financially viable, seating about 700 to 800 patrons. It was closed down when the new leaseholder Paul Buck agreed to convert it to some other purpose. It is likely he converted the building to tenement housing.One of the reasons the playhouse has been easy to forget, and difficult to locate, is that there are no maps from the period that show the junction there. From the perspective of the Elizabethan mapmaker, there was not much to see south of the Thames: London was located on the north side of the river, and the road to the south quickly ran into fields only pockmarked by the occasional dwelling place or church.
While early modern maps and panoramas have been very helpful in locating the more famous playhouses like the Globe on London’s Bankside, they provide no help in searching for the playhouse at Newington Butts.
So where did Shakespeare’s troupe go after Newington Butts? Their next known stopping point was in Marlborough. By the end of 1594, they ended up performing at the Theatre in Shoreditch, the first of the famed round theaters. In 1598, the theater was closed down, and the more famous Globe was built in 1599.