David & Pam Humphries
18 Mar 2019
The fields on which the Hippodrome now stands belonged to the Ince family who, in 1870, started to lease them out for housing: the National Trust’s Back to Backs are survivors of this. Brothers Henry & James Draysey demolished the houses opposite to build the Tower of Varieties modelled by architect F.W.Lloyd on a theatre with a tower topped by a minaret in Blackpool. It had a round stage for circuses with 3,000 surrounding seats. It opened on 9 October 1899 but was not a success. Lloyd redesigned it into a conventional proscenium theatre with 2,000 seats in orchestra, dress circle gallery and six boxes. It reopened on 20 August 1900 as the Tivoli Theatre of Varieties. It still had circus acts, often with a horse on the front of the programme, as the Drayseys were also bookmakers. Its manager was Harry Calver, during whose time Cora Turner performed at the theatre. She married, as his second wife, Harley Crippen who poisoned her and then fled on a liner to America. The captain became suspicious and radioed Scotland Yard (the first use of radio for this purpose). Crippen was executed in 1910. Another act was Chung Lin Soo, a Chinese magician (in fact an American), one of whose tricks was to shoot his wife. When performing subsequently in London he used a real bullet and his wife died.
In 1903 the theatre was bought by Thomas Barrasford who renamed it The Hippodrome, and made it famous as a music hall with twice nightly shows. As it was on a corner, audiences would enter from Hurst Street and leave in Ince Street; young boys would seek programmes from the departees and sell them for their own profit to those arriving. Barrasford’s great rival was the Stoll-Moss Company which owned the Empire Theatre and the Aston Hippodrome. Annette Kellerman, an Australian famous as a nude, appeared on 7 July 1913, and Dorothy & Shaun Ward (who lived to be 97 and 84 respectively) were frequently on stage. Marie Lloyd, George Robey, and W.C.Fields came, as did Fred Brice, ‘the black sheep of his family’, who was gay (then illegal); he committed suicide aged 53 when told he had only three months to live. Thomas Barrasford died in 1910.
The Hippodrome closed on 6 June 1914 and was taken over later that month by T.Alan Edwards who, using Bertie Crewe the architect (six of whose theatres survive, including Redditch), made major alterations. The gallery was removed and the dress circle enlarged with a central aisle; the seating remained at 2,000. The theatre did not reopen until 1917. Cinemas were growing more popular, especially after the introduction of ‘talkies’ in 1927. Oscar Deutsch’s Odeon opened at Perry Barr in 1930, the first of many such buildings. The Hippodrome had been bought by Stoll-Moss in 1924, who refurbished it. A Folies Bergere Revue was staged in August1929. George Formby and Gracie Fields each appeared in 1932 and Montovani in 1938.
During WWII performances were advanced so that audiences could start their journeys home before the black-out. In October 1944 the Empire Theatre was badly damaged by incendiary bombs; one also hit The Hippodrome but the theatre was saved by a fire-fighter. Stars who appeared after the war were Jewel & Wariss in 1945, Laurel & Hardy in 1949 (supported by Charlie Hall from Washwood Heath who went on to appear in 47 or their films), Vera Lynn in 1949 (and again in 1953) and Danny Kaye in 1949. The first pantomime, Jack and the Beanstalk, was produced in 1957 featuring Beryl Reid. Lonnie Donnegan appeared in 1959, Cliff Richard in 1961, and the Beatles at the bottom of the bill in March 1968 and at the top by the end of that year. My Fair Lady ran for six months in 1964.
Moss Empires closed the Theatre Royal in New Street, which was then demolished, to launch ATV in the 1960s. They removed the tower from The Hippodrome as it was unsafe, and provided a new foyer. It was renamed The Birmingham Theatre, but that decision was soon reversed. In 1970 Hair was produced and Danny La Rue appeared. Welsh National Opera first came in 1971.
Moss Empires sold the freehold of The Hippodrome to the City Council in 1979 and various enlargements were made over the years, eg the Mission Hall next door was bought and demolished, enabling the stage to be doubled in size to become the largest in the UK outside London. This enabled major companies to appear. Saddlers Wells even relocated to become the Birmingham Royal Ballet. This necessitated the rake of the stage to be removed and a slope inserted in the stalls to compensate. Glyndebourne and Opera North started to appear in the 1970s, as did Andrew Lloyd Webber’s company – Joseph & His Amazing Coloured Dreamcoat, Cats, and Jesus Christ Superstar were all played here. In June 1985 Lauren Bacall appeared in Tennesse Williams’ Sweet Bird of Youth which Richard Edwards, the Birmingham Post Theatre critic, had labelled as casual. He attended her press conference in the Midland Hotel with his umbrella, which she then snatched and used to beat him. The 1999 Royal Variety performance, attended by The Queen on 29 October, was one of the first to be held outside London. The Hippodrome does not produce any of its own shows, but contributes over £40m to the local economy and is the most visited theatre in the UK with 60,000 patrons each year.