Alley Theatre
Encyclopedia
- Not to be confused with the Alley Theatre (Strabane) in Northern Ireland.
The Alley Theatre is a Tony Award-winning indoor theatre in Downtown
Downtown Houston
Downtown Houston is the largest business district of Houston, Texas, United States. Downtown Houston, the city's central business district, contains the headquarters of many prominent companies. There is an extensive network of pedestrian tunnels and skywalks connecting the buildings of the district...
Houston, Texas
Texas
Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
, and hosts two stages. The "Hubbard" is the main stage with seating for 824; the more intimate "Neuhaus" seats 310. Nine towers and open-air terraces give the Alley Theatre a castle
Castle
A castle is a type of fortified structure built in Europe and the Middle East during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars debate the scope of the word castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble...
-like quality. Inside, a staircase spirals from the entrance vestibule to the second-floor lobby. A truly wide variety of plays have been performed in this theater.
The Houston Press
Houston Press
The Houston Press is an alternative weekly newspaper published in Houston, Texas, United States. It is headquartered in Downtown Houston....
ranked the building as one of the ten least photogenic buildings in Downtown Houston. John Nova Lomax, the author of the list, commented "Yeah, yeah, I like the curves and all that, but this concrete hulk still looks like something Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
’s favorite architect would have come up with on ‘shrooms."
History
The Alley theatre company was founded in 1947 by Nina Eloise Whittington VanceNina Vance
Nina Eloise Whittington Vance was the founder and first artistic director of the Alley Theatre in Houston, Texas, United States. She received awards and recognition, both nationally and internationally, for her work and contribution to the theater community.-Biography:Nina Vance, the only child of...
(1914–1980). Under the leadership of Vance, the Alley Theatre grew from its modest beginnings, in an 85-seat theatre that had to be converted and struck for every performance, to one of the most prestigious nonprofit resident theatres in the United States. The world premiere of Paul Zindel
Paul Zindel
Paul Zindel Jr. was an American playwright, author, and educator.-Early years:Zindel was born in Tottenville, Staten Island, New York to Paul Zindel,Sr., a policeman, and Beatrice Frank, a nurse; his sister, Betty Hagen, was a year and a half older than he. Paul Zindel, Sr...
's The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds
The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds
The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds is a 1964 play written by Paul Zindel, a playwright and science teacher. Zindel received the 1971 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and a New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for the work. The play's world premiere was staged in 1964 at the Alley Theatre...
was staged at the Alley in 1964. In 1996, the Alley Theatre won the Regional Theatre Tony Award
Regional Theatre Tony Award
The Regional Theatre Tony Award is a special non-competitive Tony Award given annually to a regional theatre company in the United States. Initially presented in 1948 to Robert Porterfield of the Virginia Barter Theatre for their Contribution To Development Of Regional Theatre, the Regional Theatre...
.
Having forged alliances with such international luminaries as Edward Albee
Edward Albee
Edward Franklin Albee III is an American playwright who is best known for The Zoo Story , The Sandbox , Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? , and a rewrite of the screenplay for the unsuccessful musical version of Capote's Breakfast at Tiffany's . His works are considered well-crafted, often...
, Vanessa Redgrave
Vanessa Redgrave
Vanessa Redgrave, CBE is an English actress of stage, screen and television, as well as a political activist.She rose to prominence in 1961 playing Rosalind in As You Like It with the Royal Shakespeare Company and has since made more than 35 appearances on London's West End and Broadway, winning...
and Frank Wildhorn
Frank Wildhorn
Frank Wildhorn is an American composer known for both his musicals and popular songs. He is most known for his musical Jekyll & Hyde, which ran four years on Broadway, and for writing the #1 International Hit song "Where Do Broken Hearts Go?" for Whitney Houston.-Early years:Wildhorn was born in...
, landmark theatrical events at the Alley have included the world premieres of Jekyll & Hyde
Jekyll & Hyde (musical)
Jekyll & Hyde is a musical based on the novella Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson. The original stage conception was by Steve Cuden and Frank Wildhorn. The music is by Wildhorn and the lyrics and book are by Leslie Bricusse.The musical ran on Broadway for 1,543...
, The Civil War, and Not About Nightingales a recently discovered play by Tennessee Williams
Tennessee Williams
Thomas Lanier "Tennessee" Williams III was an American writer who worked principally as a playwright in the American theater. He also wrote short stories, novels, poetry, essays, screenplays and a volume of memoirs...
.
An ex-security guard murdered a theater director on the fourth floor of the Alley Theater in 1982. The perpetrator was executed in 1993. Since the murder, rumors that the director's spirit haunts the Alley Theater emerged.