Westminster Theatre

The Westminster Theatre stood on Palace Street in the City of Westminster. It began in 1766 as the Charlotte Chapel, built by William Dodd with funds from his wife Mary Perkins. The building later became St Peter’s Chapel under the Hoare family, who owned Hoare’s Bank. In 1924 it reopened as the St James’s Picture Theatre, a cinema designed by John Stanley Coombe Beard. The opening film was *Rob Roy*, attended by figures like Henry Lascelles, 6th Earl of Harewood. The cinema’s life was brief, as it was converted into a theatre in 1931 by Alderson Burrell Horne, known in the theatre world as Anmer Hall. The theatre became a base for Moral Re-Armament productions after being bought by the Westminster Memorial Trust in 1946. It hosted plays like *Waste* by Harley Granville Barker in 1936 and *Toussaint Louverture* by C. L. R. James in 1936, starring Paul Robeson. The producer Osmund Daltry worked with Australian theatre student Kathleen Mary Robinson, who later directed plays featuring Michael Wilding and Emlyn Williams. The theatre also supported Furndel Productions, led by Alan Badel and William Anthony Furness, with notable works such as *The Ark* in 1959. The building was remodelled in 1966 with an arts centre and expanded further in 1972. A striking mural, *Barbed Wire or Reconciliation* by Lennart Segerstråle, decorated the interior. After Moral Re-Armament left in 1990, plans were made to modernise the theatre, but a fire in 2002 destroyed much of the structure. The site was later redeveloped, leading to the opening of the St James Theatre, now known as The Other Palace, in 2012. The new theatre preserved the site’s theatrical legacy while introducing a smaller cabaret stage and additional facilities.