Harold Pinter Theatre

Crafty rather than comic, the former Comedy Theatre is best known for creating the New Watergate Club in 1956 - an enterprise that allowed the venue to put on risqué productions unlikely to get past the stringent and outdated censorship of the Lord Chamberlain's Office. Running as a club, it was able to stage Arthur Miller's 'A View from the Bridge' and Tennessee Williams's 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof' - landmark shows that pressured censors into relaxing their stance. Challenging and daring theatre has since been on the bill at the Comedy Theatre - notably the debut of Peter Shaffer's 'Five Finger Exercise' and 'The Rocky Horror Show' in 1979 - and the venue continues to peddle a mix of hard-hitters and comedies. Having played host to many of Pinter's plays , it was renamed the Harold Pinter Theatre in 2011.