Get us in your inbox

Search

Ambassadors Theatre

  • Theatre
  • Seven Dials
Ambassadors Theatre.JPG
Advertising

Time Out says

This chocolate-box-pretty theatre is one of the West End's tiniest spaces

For aeons known as the home to bin-lid-smashing dance sensation ‘Stomp!’, the Ambassadors Theatre is now pottering on as a useful transfer house for dramas that aren't quite big enough to hit up Theatreland’s larger venues. With only 444 seats, it's one of the smallest venues in the West End, and was designed from its opening in 1913 to provide a more intimate alternative to the vast, extravaganza-hosting theatres that surround it. 

Ambassadors Theatre's biggest claim to fame is as the place where the 'Mousetrap' magic began: Agatha Christie's record-breaking play opened there in 1952, before transferring to the neighbouring St Martin's Theatre in 1977, where it's still pulling in punters galore.  

In 2018, the Ambassadors Theatre was bought out by Ambassador Theatre Group, thwarting Cameron Mackintosh's long-cherished plan to buy the venue and rename it the Sondheim Theatre. Their long-term plans aren't clear but for now, it's a place to catch some of the biggest hits from off-West End theatres, including the Almeida's 'The Twilight Zone'. 

Details

Address:
West Street
London
WC2H 9ND
Transport:
Rail/Tube: Charing Cross; Tube: Leicester Square
Do you own this business?
Sign in & claim business

What’s on

Harry Clarke

  • 3 out of 5 stars
  • Drama

‘Harry Clarke’ is quite possibly the blandest name for a play in written history, and Billy Crudup is one of those well-liked supporting actors who you kind of know, are happy he exists, but aren’t maybe like: ‘oh my god BILLY CRUDUP is doing a one-man-show in London!!!’. However, behind this unassuming exterior lurks a truly odd play. In the UK debut by playwright David Cale, Harry Clarke is the English alter ego of Philip Brugglestein, a sensitive gay guy from Indiana who had already adopted another English alter ego, having moved to NYC and told people he was from London. Although Crudup dips into a multitude of roles and voices, the ‘English’ Philip serves as the show’s narrator, with an accent and persona somewhat seemingly cribbed from neurotic ‘Star Wars’ droid C3PO. Having moved away from home, Philip just seems to be… hanging out in New York, pretending to be English, but not really doing anything, until one day in a moment of bored whimsy he decides to follow Mark, a business guy, around - eavesdropping on him a little but nothing particularly untoward. However, a chance encounter with Mark at the theatre leads to a panicked Philip spontaneously resurrecting Harry, a character he made up as a child. Harry, it turns out, is a swaggeringly confident omnisexual with a fantastically interesting past and an accent that’s pure Spinal Tap. He and Mark hit it off immediately. To say much more would be to get into spoiler territory for what is in essence a twisty thriller. T

Kathy and Stella Solve a Murder!

  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • Musicals

This review is from the 2022 Edinburgh Fringe; ‘Kathy & Stella’ transfers to the Ambassadors Theatre in 2024. There is nothing out there or formally challenging about ‘Kathy & Stella Solve A Murder!’ and that’s a good thing: sometimes all you need late night at the Fringe is a raucous mini-musical about two lonely women from Hull whose so-so true crime podcast is given an unfortunate boost when a top crime author is murdered on their doorstep. We discover that the late Felicia Taylor was in town revisiting the case of the Hull Decapitator serial killer. But then her severed head is sent to Kathy and Stella. It’s a mixed blessing: on the one hand, their heroine has been brutally murdered. On the other hand, this could be the thing that really turns the podcast around.  ‘Kathy and Stella’ is pretty amusing on the subject of true crime podcasts, specifically their questionable ethics and over-familiar fandoms. There’s a minor but very funny character later on who bills himself as an ‘anti-true-crime activist’, which cracked me up. In general, though, it’s not overly obsessed with parodying the genre - if you’re after that see The Onion’s peerless ‘A Very Fatal Murder’. Where it’s brilliant is in its depiction of friendship between nerdy female outsiders. Though it’s actually written by two blokes – director Jon Brittain and Matthew Floyd Jones – actors Rebekah Hinds (Kathy) and Bronté Barbé (Stella) have wonderful chemistry together that’s at least somewhat believable amidst the

Advertising
You may also like
You may also like
Bestselling Time Out offers