The Crucible Studio theatre is no more. Sheffield Theatres have announced that its small space is being renamed as the Tanya Moiseiwitsch Playhouse in honour of the theatre designer who played an important part in the creation of the theatre complex.
“Tanya Moiseiwitsch was a pioneer. Innovative, imaginative and a ground breaker in her profession,” says Artistic Director Rob Hastie. “Tanya created radical theatre shapes now enshrined and cherished in theatre buildings all over the world. Without her vision, neither the Crucible nor the newly named Playhouse would exist in the forms they do. Hers is an incredible legacy.”
The new name also honours the original Sheffield Playhouse, that closed its doors in 1971 when the company moved to the new Crucible Theatre. “The Playhouse had a reputation for bold, adventurous, and revolutionary productions, under the leadership of inaugural Crucible Artistic Director, Colin George,” says Rob Hastie.
Over the 50-year history of the space, audiences have seen performances from hundreds of actors, from professional debuts to famous faces including Victoria Wood, Alan Rickman, Tracey Bennett, Shaun Parkes, Niamh Cusack, Richard Wilson, Stephanie Street, James Norton, Chetna Pandya and Rose Leslie.
The 400-seat Studio theatre (for drama and music). Image: BFF Architects
Tanya Moiseiwitsch by Francis Goodman. 1947. Image: NPG
Tanya Moiseiwitsch (1914-2003) was regarded as one of the foremost designers in twentieth-century theatre, an innovative designer of costumes, sets, and stages, responsible for over two hundred productions in England, Canada, and the United States.
She enjoyed long collaborations with director Tyrone Guthrie, beginning in 1945 at London’s Old Vic. When Guthrie was invited to Canada to establish the Shakespeare Festival Theatre in Stratford, Ontario, he asked Moiseiwitsch to join him. The stage conceived by Guthrie and Moiseiwitsch was made of wood, thrusting out into the audience, and fostering a sense of intimacy between actors and audience.
In Minneapolis, where she was the principal designer at the Guthrie Theater from 1963–1966, she again designed a thrusting stage like the one she had designed in Stratford.
Returning to England in the 1970s, she designed plays both for the National Theatre and the West End, as well as designing the stage for the Crucible Theatre.
“The shape of the Crucible’s thrust stage was Tanya’s creation, and the studio is a smaller version of that unique performing space,” says Lucy George, daughter of the Crucible’sinaugural Artistic Director, Colin George,
“Tanya was a beloved member of the company and an inspiration for so many designers and women in the performing arts. The Sheffield Playhouse, the predecessor of the Crucible, is still remembered fondly by so many of us. The naming of the Tanya Moiseiwitsch Playhouse clarifies the connection between the Playhouse and the Crucible and ties together 100 years of Sheffield theatre history, recognising Tanya’s long-lasting impact on theatre design. Naming a theatre after Tanya would have pleased Dad enormously.”
Tanya Moiseiwitsch and Colin George. Image: George Family Archive
Colin George, the actor and theatrical visionary who was the founding Artistic Director of the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, which opened in 1971 with its radical ‘thrust stage’.
He was one of the post-war generation of British directors who moved theatre on from fortnightly rep in “the provinces” to more adventurous productions that could compete with television drama and the West End stage.
George took over from Geoffrey Ost as Artistic Director of Sheffield Playhouse in 1965, and much to his astonishment, a year later, the city’s Labour council asked George where he wanted his new theatre. His meeting with Tyrone Guthrie, the American director, convinced him to make the Crucible as it is today.
George worked in turn at the State Theatre Company of South Australia and then the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts. In Australia, he gave Mel Gibson and Judy Davis their first stage roles as the leads in Romeo and Juliet.
Returning to Britain he devised his own one-man-show in the person of Shakespeare’s father and in 1994 joined the Royal Shakespeare Company. In the company was Daniel Evans, who later became Artistic Director of the Crucible. In 2011, in the theatre’s 40th anniversary production of Othello with Dominic West and Clarke Peters, Evans invited George back to play Desdemona’s aged father.
It was George’s last role, and in the theatre he loved. He died in 2016.
A new book, ‘Stirring Up Sheffield,’ written by Colin George, and his son, Tedd George, is published by Wordville Press this week.
Denounced by theatrical knight Bernard Miles, by councillors at public meetings and in the media, Colin George carried the day to build the Crucible Theatre, inspired by the legendary director Tyrone Guthrie, who died before he could direct the Crucible’s first play, Ibsen’s rarely-produced epic Peer Gynt.Photograph: Tenby Observer.
Here’s a book that will become a collectors item, and a must for those who appreciate Sheffield’s recent history. ‘Stirring Up Sheffield,’ a substantial book, is written by the Crucible Theatre’s first Artistic Director, Colin George, and his son, Tedd George, and will be published by Wordville Press on 9 November 2021.
This is the extraordinary story of a group of visionaries who came together to build the revolutionary thrust stage theatre. The radical design they proposed for the auditorium—which redefined the actor/audience relationship—aroused fierce opposition from Sheffield’s conservative quarters and several of the era’s theatrical luminaries. But it also galvanised a new generation of Britain’s actors, directors, designers and playwrights who launched a passionate defence of the thrust stage and its theatrical potential.
Colin George was the founding Artistic Director of the Crucible Theatre. Born in Pembroke Dock, Wales, in 1929, Colin read English at University College, Oxford, and was a founding member of the Oxford and Cambridge Players. After acting in the repertory companies of Coventry and Birmingham, Colin joined the Nottingham Playhouse in 1958 as Assistant Director to Val May. In 1962, he was appointed as Assistant Director at the Sheffield Playhouse, becoming Artistic Director in 1965. Colin played a leading role in the creation of the Crucible Theatre, which opened in November 1971, and was the Crucible’s Artistic Director from 1971 to 1974.
“My father was Artistic Director of the Playhouse and the previous year Sheffield City Council had agreed that the Playhouse should have a new theatre. Discussions on its design were already advanced, but my father was unhappy with the proposed stage and wanted to break free from the ‘picture box’ proscenium arch and bring the actors closer to the audience.” – Tedd George. Photograph: Wordville Press.
During his tenure Colin also established Sheffield Theatre Vanguard. This innovative scheme took theatre out of the Crucible to engage with the wider Sheffield community. Sheffield Theatres continues to build on his legacy with Sheffield People’s Theatre, a cross-generational community company which trains and nurtures the aspirations and skills of local people through special one-off projects and collaborations.
He later worked as Artistic Director of the Adelaide State Theatre Company (1976-1980), as Artistic Director of the Anglo-Chinese Chung Ying Theatre Company (1983-1985) and as Head of Drama at the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts (1985-1992). Colin joined the Royal Shakespeare Company as an actor (1994-96 & 1997-99).
The Crucible Theatre is today one of Britain’s major touring venues and a Producing House in its own right, and is also famous for being the home of the World Snooker Championship, screened on TVs all over the world every year. Image: Sheffield Theatres.
In 2011 Colin was invited by the Crucible’s Artistic Director, Daniel Evans, to join the Company for the 40th anniversary production of Othello. This was to be his last theatrical performance and, fittingly, it took place on the thrust stage he had created. Following Othello, Colin produced the first draft of this book, before his death in October 2016.
The introduction is by Sir Ian McKellen:
“Adventures need heroes and here its principal one is Colin George, the first artistic director of The Crucible Theatre, who in this memoir recalls in fascinating detail how, aided by others locally and internationally, a dream came true. Here, too, there are troublesome villains, who failed to share our hero’s imagination and determination.”
In 2011, in the theatre’s 40th anniversary production of Othello with Dominic West and Clarke Peters, Daniel Evans invited George back to play Desdemona’s aged father. It was George’s last role, in a theatre he loved and which was now garlanded with awards. And it was a full house. Photograph: The Guardian.
It is hard to believe that next year, the Crucible Theatre, Sheffield’s architectural upstart, will be fifty-years-old. It has been a long journey, with plenty of ups and downs, but survives with its reputation intact.
The Crucible Theatre was built as a replacement for the Sheffield Playhouse on Townhead Street, home to the Sheffield Repertory Company, whose origins went back to 1919.
Photograph of Sheffield Playhouse by Flying Pig
Colin George was appointed Artistic Director of Sheffield Playhouse in 1965, and did not grasp that its hand-to-mouth existence was going to be turned upside down.
“One sunny spring day in 1966, I was one of a deputation from the Playhouse Theatre who went to the Town Hall to ask the Council for a subsidy to run the theatre. We were ushered into the main Council Chamber, empty but for a formidable northern lady seated at one end, on her Lord Mayor’s throne – Alderman Grace Tebbutt. We sat in front of her, naughty schoolchildren in front of the headmistress. She looked at us for a minute and then dropped her thunderbolt. ‘Nah then. Where do you want your new theatre?’ To those of us working at the Playhouse it was quite unexpected. ‘You probably want an island site,’ she continued forcefully, and with a wave of her hand effortlessly destroyed Norfolk Street.”
A new Sheffield Theatre Trust and Building Committee was created, an architect was appointed, and plans were made to create a new conventional theatre with its proscenium arch and using a large forestage.
Had these plans progressed, the history of Sheffield theatre would have been quite different. The cat-amongst-the-pigeons was Sir William Tyrone Guthrie (1900-1971), an English director instrumental in founding the Stratford Festival theatre in Ontario and the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
In October 1967, Guthrie arrived in Sheffield to talk about theatre. Hearing of plans, he spoke to the Trust and excited them enough to send Colin George and David Brayshaw, a local solicitor appointed as administrative director, to visit America to see and report on thrust or promontory stages.
They spent ten days in Minneapolis, Stratford, Ontario, and New York, and reported back that Sheffield should have a thrust stage. The Trust agreed, and the cries of derision began.
Guthrie Theater, Minneapolis (top) and Stratford Festival, Ontario (below)
Denounced by theatrical knight Bernard Miles (“The theatre is a freak. It will be blacklisted by all reputable dramatists”), by councillors at public meetings (“I’m not going to pay to see Hamlet’s backside”), and in the media, the modernists won the day.
There was also the problem of giving the new theatre a name. The Star ran a competition and ‘The Adelphi’ won, named after the famous hotel and public house that had stood on the site, but in the end, Hilary Young, who worked at the Playhouse, suggested the Crucible, a nod to Sheffield’s industrial past.
Photograph of Colin George by The Guardian
The Crucible was designed by Renton Howard Wood Associates, the project architects being Nicholas Thompson and Robin Beynon.
However, we must not forget the part played by Tanya Moiseiwitsch (1914-2003), regarded as one of the foremost British designers in twentieth century theatre, an innovative designer of costumes, sets and stages, and responsible for the look of over two hundred productions in Britain, Canada and the United States.
Moiseiwitsch had worked closely with Sir Tyrone Guthrie and was the principal designer at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis from 1963–1966, and again designed a thrust stage like that she had designed (and in 1962 modified) in Stratford, Ontario.
Returning to England in the 1970s, she designed plays both for the National Theatre and the West End, but her last legacy was designing the stage for the Crucible Theatre. The whole of the stage (18ft wide-28ft deep) was mounted on steel stanchions and beams provided flexibility to adapt it for different productions.
Photograph by Sheffield Theatres
Photograph by Sheffield Star
Photograph by Sheffield Theatres
Construction started in October 1969, the work undertaken by Gleesons, and was completed in November 1971. It cost almost £1 million to build, £650,000 contributed by Sheffield City Council and the Arts Council, and £260,000 raised by the New Sheffield Theatre Trust as the public contribution to the theatre.
In Spring 1971, it was decided that Colin George would direct Peer Gynt to open the Crucible, followed by Sir Tyrone Guthrie’s Aeschylus Trilogy, The House of Atreus. However, in July news came through that Guthrie had died, and the opening schedule was hastily rearranged.
Photograph by Building Design
Photograph by Picture Sheffield
The Crucible Theatre, principally made of reinforced concrete, opened on November 9, 1971, with Fanfare, a production devised in three parts. The first was ‘Children’s Theatre’ in which 34 children were involved. The centre piece was Ian McKellen playing the Old Actor in Chekhov’s Swan Song and the last part was rumbustious Music Hall.
And so, the futuristic theatre with its twinkly ceiling lights, orange auditorium seats (provided by Race Furniture of London), and gaudy foyer carpets, started its journey.
Photograph by The British Newspaper Archive
Once deemed a ‘white elephant’ due to low audiences, it steadily gained a reputation, along with the Lyceum Theatre, as the best production theatre outside London. With far more full houses than not, the long list of success is remarkable – The Stirrings in Sheffield on a Saturday Night, Chicago (the European premiere, no less), The Wiz (British premiere), Funny Girl, Brassed Off, Fiddler on the Roof, Hamlet, Othello, Everybody’s Talking About Jamie… the list goes on, and it was once called the ‘National Theatre of the North’. And, of course, there is the snooker.
The Crucible Theatre was Grade II listed in 2007, considered of national importance in the history of theatre design, ahead of a £15 million refurbishment that included a new roof and the Adelphi Room extension to the front. Ironically, during the construction of the extension the cellars to the old Adelphi Hotel were discovered and some of its foundations used to support the new build.
Colin George left the Crucible Theatre in 1974, but returned to appear in a production of Othello with Dominic West and Clarke Peters in 2011. His ambition to write the history of the theatre was never fulfilled, but as one newspaper reported on his death in 2016, his legacy stands in Tudor Square.
Photograph by Hire Space
The Adelphi Hotel. Photograph by Picture Sheffield
Photograph by FDA DesignPhotograph by Our Favourite Places
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