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Dramatic times on and off the stage at Little Theatre

Posted by Digital Editor on October 5, 2007 9:01 AM | Permalink

LAST week we took you through the first part of the history of Southport Little Theatre, from its beginnings in the late 1930s, through the Second World War and its success with musicals in the 1960s.
When the venue on Hoghton Street opened in 1937, the Southport Dramatic Club president was Sir Barry Jackson, who saw the group through its first 14 years at its new home.
From 1951, the celebrated Dame Flora Robson took on the role, which she held until her death in 1984 – there is a seat in the auditorium in her honour.
The Club went without a president for 12 years, before the current incumbent, international director and former SDC member, Ian Judge, took on the task.
Drama at the Little Theatre hasn’t always been on stage.
In the summer of 1974, a blaze ripped through the building the week before summer show The Fantasticks was due to open, with every single costume destroyed.
In a history of The Little Theatre, published in 1997, SDC’s then chairman, John Evans, remembered: “Although the Theatre stank for months with the acrid smell of charred timbers, the show went on in the best traditions of the SDC.
“It was one of the loveliest musicals we ever did with a very distinguished cast, most of whom, happily, are still active around the Theatre.”

Night On the Razzle, a special SDC production in 1989

On New Year’s Day 1987, a fire caused much more damage.
A major fundraising drive took place to reach the £50,000 required to get the Theatre back to its original working state.
That was duly achieved, and noted actor Cyril Luckham who had played there during the war (see last week’s LookBack) performed the opening ceremony.
The next problem to hit the SDC came in the autumn of 1995, when landlords the Victoria Friendly Society announced they were leaving the resort– potentially leaving The Little Theatre high and dry.
Unless, of course, the SDC bought the Theatre building.
And after the biggest fundraising drive in the Club’s history, that’s exactly what they did.

The Wizard of Oz at Southport Little Theatre in 1975

Its future secured, the Theatre, Southport Dramatic Club, and the many other performing groups which use the venue, continues to encourage young talent and nurture its existing members.
Past members, such as award-winning Southport- born actress Miranda Richardson and actor Andrew Lancel, now a regular on The Bill, have gone on to great success, and the coming years will no doubt produce more bright young stars.
The curtain doesn’t look set to fall on The Little Theatre for some time yet.