Description of the attraction
The Globe Theater is one of the oldest London theaters, closely associated with the name of the great English playwright William Shakespeare. At the end of the 16th century, professional acting troupes appeared, turning from wandering booths into permanent operating theaters. The first special buildings are also being built - before that, performances were played at fairs, and in palace banquet halls, inns, and on grounds for baiting bears and cockfights. The first was James Burbage, who built a theater hall in 1576, which he called "The Theater". In 1598 it was dismantled and transported to a new location, and in 1599 the building of the Globus Theater was built.
The theater was owned by the actors of the Servants of the Lord Chamberlain troupe. The troupe included two sons of James Burbage - Richard and Cuthbert, as well as William Shakespeare. The theater may have opened with a production of Henry V, but the first documented production at the new theater was Ben Johnson's Every Man Without His Quirks (Every Man Out of His Temper). June 29, 1613 during the play "Henry VIII" in the theater happened
fire. A theater cannon shot set fire to the thatched roof and wooden walls. None of the spectators were hurt. Rebuilt in 1614, the theater was closed by the Puritans in 1642, like all other theaters in London. Two years later, the building was dismantled and tenement houses were built in its place.
The exact location of the theater was established during archaeological excavations in 1988-89. In particular, it turned out that the "Globe" building in the plan was not a circle, but a polygon with 20 sides. The stage rose one and a half meters above the floor, and a rectangular proscenium protruded into the stalls with standing places. There was a trapdoor in the floor of the stage, from where the ghosts appeared, and in the back there was a balcony, the so-called "upper stage". The stage did not have a curtain, the performances were played during the day, practically without decorations and props, there were a lot of "theatrical conventions" known to the public. For example, if a character changed into a different costume, then no one recognized him.
The modern theater called Shakespeare's Globe Theater was built in 1997 about 200 meters from where the old one was located. The new building was built according to the plans of that time and recreates the appearance of the Shakespeare theater as much as possible. Since 1666 - the Great London Fire - it is the first building allowed to be thatched. Performances run from May to October, and guided tours are available all year round.
