Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

The Yvonne Arnaud Theatre stands beside the River Wey in Guildford, a modern brick building opened in 1965 to replace an earlier repertory theatre destroyed by fire. It has two performance spaces: the main auditorium and the smaller Mill Studio. The riverside site includes a restaurant and bar open to everyone, not just theatregoers. The theatre has a flexible staging system without a proscenium arch, allowing the full width of the stage to be used. Its revolving stage measures 25 ft across, and the fly tower holds a curved cyclorama 60 ft wide. The scenery workshop supplies sets to Glyndebourne, the Royal Shakespeare Company and Chichester Festival Theatre. A youth department presents regular productions in the Mill Studio and an annual summer musical on the main stage. Arts exhibitions and a film season share the wider theatre space, which also contains a cafe. The theatre’s annual pantomime draws local audiences throughout the winter.