Queen's Theatre

About

The Queen's Theatre is a 507-seat mid-scale producing theatre located in Hornchurch in the London Borough of Havering, East London, United Kingdom. The theatre was originally located on Station Lane, Hornchurch, on a site that was used as a cinema and had become derelict. Hornchurch Urban District Council was one of the first councils to use powers of the Local Government Act 1948 to purchase the building in 1948.

The 379-seat theatre opened in 1953, the same year as the Coronation of Elizabeth II. It opened as a repertory theatre with each production staged for two weeks. Expected to be demolished to make way for a proposed road scheme, it was relocated to a new purpose-built building on Billet Lane in 1975.

The theatre survived an extended period without Arts Council funding from 1985 to 2000, which caused it to be threatened with closure. Under the artistic direction of Bob Carlton and then Douglas Rintoul the fortunes of the theatre improved. Building improvement works took place in 2019.

The theatre has been a Grade II listed building since 2022.