Coventry Hippodrome / Apollo / Theatre

Wow, this is fantastic again, Garlands, thank you so much! I'll get on with that a little later today.

Brilliant, sorted now! https://www.historiccoventry.co.uk/theatre/index.php?get_y=1954 And I've now realised why I'd missed out those shows (plus half a dozen others immediately following, which I've also now added!).... the previous year's Pantomime, Dick Whittington and his Cat, ran all the way from 23rd December 1953 until 27th March 1954 (impressive in itself!), and so I'm pretty sure that my thinking was "no point in looking for more shows to add until after the 27th March, when the panto has finished". How wrong I was! They still managed to insert a handful of concerts on the Sunday evenings while the panto was running. Of course, this means I now have to check all the other long running shows, in case the same happened in other years. No rest for the wicked, eh!

Oh no! Well I'd have assumed the same, as you say they must have squeezed them into the spare time slots. And wow! that is a Looooooong panto season! Thanks Rob!!!! Great to put programme images to the shows, brings 'em to life.

They add a much needed spot of colour and information to individual shows, so they're very much appreciated, thank you. I've also just added a "courtesy of" acknowledgement for you beneath each image, I hope that's OK? I can remove them if you'd rather not take the credit!

Yeah that's really nice of you Rob, feel famous now All good, thanks Will continue my hunt for more programmes to acquire! As an aside, I have a 1929 programme from Theatre Royal in Birmingham but sadly, unlike this fantastic site, I have nowhere to share it in a archive such as yours (that I can find anyways).

It's a pleasure, my thanks to you, credit should always be given where due. But please don't go spending money on programmes - there are so many thousands we could go for if we were millionaires, but the general public would never appreciate it enough to make it worth doing!

Garlands, I was stunned at the beauty of the Coventry Theatre at the top of this post, which also contained a great collection of playbills and posters. What a gorgeous Art Deco style building it was. I never appreciated that before but I guess I never stood back and looked at it - I was too busy trying to get in. We have a tile/brick in the wall in front of the theatre in memory of my parents, Don and Frances Mainwaring, and I always go there and have a few moments thinking about them but next time I'll step back and look at the building as well. Thankyou

Hi Rob, I went to the Herbert today and was just looking in the Coventry Theatre books for anything interesting to flesh out a couple of bits in the Theatre archive. I found a couple of charity events: •  One was part of the 1956 Birthday Show "Variety, with Jimmy Jewel, Tommy Cooper, Ken Dodd, Arthur Worsley, and others." Historic Coventry show archive 1956. On Friday, the 7th of December 1956 (2 days before end of showing), the Coventry Theatre had a "All- Star Midnight Matinee" from 11:30pm to 2:00AM in aid of raising money for the Hungarian relief fund (due to the after effects of the revolution). It was assumedly the same cast as the Birthday show. It's mentioned here in the Cov Telegraph Coventry Telegraph article, 24 MAR 2008 •  Another charity event (this one isn't listed on the Show archive) was on Nov 13th 1938 (in between "King Revel" & "Henry Hall and his Orchestra"). It was a "Grand Popular Concert" in aid of Coventry & Warwickshire hospital. Time: 7:45pm. Staring Patricia Rossborough, Jenny Howard, Beryl Orde, Collison + Dean (Comic duo) and Bobby Henshaw, amongst others. All stars, artists, staff, musicians and theatre workers gave their time for free and no charge for the use of the theatre was made. Historic Coventry show archive 1938. _____________ Just a couple of extra bits I saw (there's so much in these books hahaha) -In 1966, The "Oliver!" musical: Richard Euston was 'Fagin', Marti Webb was 'Nancy' and Ian Pigot was the titular character, 'Oliver'. -Also in 1966, the "Royal Ballet" there were different Ballet each night. These were 'Swan Lake', 'Raymonda Act III' [sic- Raymond Act III], 'The Rake's Progress', 'Pineapple Poll' and 'Coppélia' [sic- Coppelia] (with some being repeated more than once). Historic Coventry show archive 1966 Thanks Rob, hope you're well

This is most excellent, once again, Garlands, thank you so much! I shall set about these updates a little later.

Hello, The Matrix was our regular dance night out (I worked at the Coventry Gauge and Tool and this also served as our canteen at lunchtime). They had some great bands each week, one in particular Sid Laurence with the great Susan Maughan - remember her, female vocalist.