Sitting on the corner of Corporation Street and Upper Well Street in Coventry, the Belgrade Theatre holds a distinctive place in British cultural history as the first civic theatre constructed in the country after the Second World War. Designed by Arthur Ling, who had taken over from the pioneering city architect Donald Gibson in 1955, the building is now a Grade II listed structure and remains one of the most recognisable landmarks of Coventry’s postwar city centre.
Origins and Construction
The theatre’s name comes from Coventry’s twin city of Belgrade, then in Yugoslavia and now in Serbia, which pledged a gift of beech timber for the new building when construction began in 1952. The Yugoslavian ambassador, Ivo Vejvoda, visited the site in 1957 and also opened an exhibition of modern Yugoslavian art at the Herbert Gallery during the same trip. That year, the Arts Council stepped in with financial support after costs began to exceed the original budget. The theatre was officially opened at 8 pm on 27 March 1958 by the Duchess of Kent, with Coventry’s first female Lord Mayor, Pearl Hyde, delivering a welcome address from the Royal box. The first performance was Half in Earnest by Vivian Ellis, attended by figures including Sir Kenneth Clark and Sam Wanamaker.
Theatre in Education and Early Productions
Under its first director, Bryan Bailey, the Belgrade established a resident company – the first Coventry-based theatre company since the Midland Theatre Company was disbanded by the Arts Council in 1957. The resident company produced the world premieres of Arnold Wesker’s so-called Wesker trilogy: Chicken Soup with Barley, Roots, and I’m Talking About Jerusalem. In the 1960s, the Belgrade went on to develop the Theatre in Education concept, an innovative approach that began with a project called Pow Wow. The project brought children into contact with a fictional cowboy and then introduced them to an American Indian held as a prisoner, encouraging the children to engage with the characters’ perspectives before making their own judgements.
Coventry’s Postwar Vision
The Belgrade’s construction was part of a broader rebuilding of Coventry following the devastation of the Coventry Blitz. Donald Gibson, appointed as the city’s first city architect in 1938, had drawn up ambitious plans for an entirely new city centre. Earlier versions of those plans had included as many as three new theatres and cinemas, but by the 1950s falling audiences and two surviving prewar cinemas made that scale impractical. A single theatre was agreed upon, and the result was the Belgrade.