| Bedlam Theatre | |
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| Former names | New North Free Church (1848–1900) New North United Free Church (1900–1929) New North Church of Scotland (1929–1941) University of Edinburgh Chaplaincy (1957–1975) |
| General information | |
| Status | Active |
| Type | Theatre |
| Architectural style | Decorated Gothic |
| Address | 11B Bristo Place, EH1 1EZ |
| Town or city | Old Town, Edinburgh |
| Country | Scotland |
| Coordinates | 55°56′46.49″N3°11′26.60″W / 55.9462472°N 3.1907222°W /55.9462472; -3.1907222 |
| Current tenants | Edinburgh University Theatre Company |
| Construction started | 1846 |
| Completed | 1848 |
| Renovated | 2012 |
| Owner | University of Edinburgh |
| Design and construction | |
| Architect(s) | Thomas Hamilton |
| Website | |
| www | |
Listed Building – Category B | |
| Official name | Bedlam Theatre (Former New North Free Church), Including Boundary Walls, Forrest Road and Bristo Place, Edinburgh |
| Designated | 4 July 2001 |
| Reference no. | LB30020 |
Bedlam Theatre is a theatre in theOld Town ofEdinburgh, Scotland. The building was completed in 1848 for theNew North Free Church. After closing as a church in 1941, the building served as a chaplaincy centre and then a store for theUniversity of Edinburgh before reopening in 1980 as the student-run theatre ofEdinburgh University Theatre Company (EUTC), operating during Edinburgh Fringe festival as venue 49.
The New North Free Church originated in theDisruption of 1843, whenCharles John Brown, minister of theNew North Church, led many of his congregation out of theChurch of Scotland and into the newly establishedFree Church. The church was noted for its active mission and its ministry to students. After its congregation united withGreyfriars in 1941, theUniversity of Edinburgh used the building as a chaplaincy centre and then, from 1975, as a store. The university gifted the building to EUTC, who reopened it as the Bedlam Theatre in 1980. It is named for thelunatic asylum, which once stood nearby. With a capacity of 90, the building remains the United Kingdom's oldest student-run theatre, hosting around 40 EUTC productions each year as well as up to eight shows a day during theEdinburgh Fringe.
The building was designed in theDecorated Gothic style byThomas Hamilton. It forms an important part of the Old Town cityscape, terminating the view south alongGeorge IV Bridge. The theatre, restored in 2012, has been protected as aCategory B listed building since 2001.
The New North Free Church originated in theNew North Church, which, at the time of theDisruption of 1843, was meeting in the chapel at Brighton Street in theBristo. In November 1842, prior to the Disruption, the church's minister,Charles John Brown, joined other evangelical ministers in promising to leave theChurch of Scotland if state interference in the national church was not ended.[1] After theFree congregation left the New North Church in May 1843, it first met at an independent chapel nearby in Argyle Square.[2][a]
The established congregation having returned to its historic home atSt Giles', the free congregation worshipped again in Brighton Street from November 1843. When the building was sold to anEvangelical Union congregation in 1846, the Free congregation moved to theUnited Secession Church inPotterrow.[4][5] The church's building was constructed on the site of the city poorhouse at a cost of £7,000, opening June 1848.[6] That year, New North Free counted 650 members.[4]
The church ministered in an area of significant poverty, founding missions, aSabbath school, and a day school.[7] In 1852, the congregation assumed responsibility for a Free Church mission in theCowgate, which, from the following year, met at Mary's Chapel. Under Brown, the mission proved a success and was elevated to a full charge in 1859.[8] The church's district (equivalent to aparish) was thereafter moved to cover theBristo and, in 1880, the congregation purchased a former dance hall on Marshall Street to serve as mission premises.[3][9]
Brown's death in 1884 greatly affected the congregation, as did the deaths of nine other senior office holders between 1885 and 1891. By 1893, membership had declined to 470; though, during the ministry ofJohn Kelman from 1897 to 1907, this revived somewhat, standing at 560 in 1900.[4][10] The church also had a long connection with student life that continued into the early 20th century and Kelman established a special students' service.[4][11] Both Kelman and his successor,John P. Sclater, were celebrated preachers of theliberal evangelical tendency.[12]
In 1900, the Free Church united with theUnited Presbyterian Church to form theUnited Free Church. Like most Free congregations, New North joined the new denomination.[13] In 1929, the United Free Church united with the Church of Scotland and New North rejoined the national church. The union created an extraneous number of parish churches in theOld Town andSouthside: areas where the population was also declining. In this context, the congregation united with nearbyGreyfriars on 23 March 1941.[14] Greyfriars retained the New North mission halls in Marshall Street until their sale in 1961.[15]
The following ministers served New North Free Church (1843–1900); New North United Free Church (1900–1929); and New North Church of Scotland (1929–1941):[4][13][14]
1843–1884Charles John Brown
1860–1867 Andrew Crichton
1866–1897Robert Gordon Balfour
1897–1907John Kelman
1907–1923John Robert Paterson Sclater
1923–1928 William Wallace Gauld
1928–1941 Duncan William Park Strang
After the congregation vacated the building, theUniversity of Edinburgh used it as a chaplaincy centre from 1957.[16] In this period, the building was the site of ateach-in on Northern Ireland in 1969, during the early days ofthe Troubles.[17] After the completion of a purpose-built space within thePotterrow Student Centre in 1973, the chaplaincy vacated the former New North Church two years later and the university used the building as a store.[15][18][19] Contemporary suggestions for the building's use included a library for nursing students.[20]
After the chaplaincy vacated the building, it was occasionally used for student dramatic performances and as an overspill venue for theTraverse Theatre during the annualEdinburgh Fringe.[21] One notable production in this period wasBradford University Dramatic Society'sSatan's Ball (an adaptation ofMikhail Bulgakov'sThe Master and Margarita) at the 1977 Fringe.[21][22] The university supported a project to convert the building into athrust stage theatre named in memory ofTyrone Guthrie. To this end, an appeal for £150,000 was launched in 1979 but proved unsuccessful.[23] The university instead offered the building to theEdinburgh University Theatre Company (EUTC).[18] The building reopened on 31 January 1980 as the Bedlam Theatre.[24] Adrian Evans, EUTC's president for that year, suggested the name Bedlam in reference the citybedlam, which stood immediately south of the building.[25]
The university saw the building as only a temporary home for EUTC and funds for its conversion were limited. Chris Ward of Centaur Lighting was charged with leading the conversion. Initially, thelighting rig was supported by the building's galleries while the ground floor seats were taken from a cinema.[25] Internal rearrangements of the building have been carried out on occasions including a 1990 production ofPericles and a 1998 production ofHamlet.[26]
In June 2001, the university proposed that EUTC vacate the Bedlam Theatre to allow for its demolition by hotel developers. EUTC rejected the proposal and, the following month,Historic Scotland upgraded the building'slisting status fromCategory C toCategory B, effectively preventing its demolition. Its future as a theatre, however, remained uncertain.[27][28] In March 2002, the council rejected revised hotel plans, which would have excluded Bedlam while involving the demolition of a collection of 18th-century buildings to its rear.[29]
In this context, the Friends of Bedlam formed in 2003. The friends are an association of EUTC alumni which supports the theatre.[30][26] Backed by an investment of £500,000, the friends supported the first comprehensive internal and external renovation of the building from 2008.[31] Work commenced in 2012 with the cleaning and restoration of the external stonework and the reintroduction of railings around the building, the originals having been removed for scrap during theSecond World War.[32]
The auditorium can accommodate 90 patrons.[33] The theatre also has a bar and cafe.[34]
The building is the United Kingdom's oldest fully student-run theatre and one of Edinburgh's leading smaller venues. In addition to around 40 productions staged each year by EUTC, it can host up to eight shows a day during theEdinburgh Fringe, when it is numbered Fringe Venue 49.[24][34] Throughout the year, the theatre is also home to theImproverts improvisational comedy troupe[26] who are the longest running comedy troupe in Edinburgh.[35] Since 2012, the theatre has been part of Creative Carbon Scotland's Green Arts Initiative and has promoted awareness of environmental issues through shows as well as using sustainable practices. Work with the initiative has included, in 2013, Dramatic Impact: a green theatre festival. In 2015, the theatre adopted e-ticketing as an environmental measure.[36]
With theDisruption, theFree Church moved to erect buildings as quickly as possible with comfort and safety being the only requirements. In this context,Thomas Hamilton emerged as an arbiter or architectural taste for the new denomination. At the New North Free Church, he was pitched againstDavid Cousin andGeorge Smith in a competition to choose the design of the church.[37] After his design was accepted, Hamilton argued unsuccessfully for the addition of aspire to the building.[38]
The resulting building is, in the words of theBuildings of Scotland guide to Edinburgh, "a thinly detailedearly Dec rectangle".[39] The church consists of a widenave under a pitch roof. At the exterior side walls, heavybuttresses divide the nave's fivebays while a shallowparapet runs along the top. A course ofmoulding divides each bay into two storeys, with a simpletraceried in the top storey and smaller twinlancets in the bottom. A shallow, polygonalapse defines the building's southern end. The front elevation at the northern end consists of twin, two-storey, semi-octagonal stair towers on either side of a projectingporch. Heavy buttresses support the lower storeys of these towers while the upper storeys are decorated with blind tracey, which is continuous with anopenwork screen above the arched doorway. The widegable of the north elevation contains a traceried window and is flanked by octagonalturrets withpinnacles. The apex of the gable includes aniche and is capped by a pinnacle. The interior retains its gallery, supported on cast iron columns; while the apse still contains the organ loft and Gothic screens. Over the nave is a single-span timber roof.[39][40]
Additions to the building include a single-storey, flat-roofedvestry and waiting room at the east side of the building. This was constructed in 1903 to aperpendicular Gothic design ofScott & Campbell. Alexander Lorne Campbell of Scott & Campbell also undertook work on the interior of the church in 1932.[41]
The theatre has been protected as aCategory B listed building since 4 July 2001.[40]
Critical responses to the design have been generally negative. Comparing it to contemporaneous churches in Edinburgh, theBuildings of Scotland guide to Edinburgh says: "Unusually honest wasThomas Hamilton's New North Free Church (1846–48), where no serious attempt was made to hide the breadth of the gable or, for that matter, to design an authentically Gothic building."[42] Church historian A. Ian Dunlop described the building as "small, inconvenient and in no way architecturally pleasing".[3] Architectural historian Joe Rock stated the simplicity of Hamilton's Gothic church designs was best complemented by exteriors of rough masonry: as atFree St John's andRoxburgh Free. Rock argued that, in contrast to these, theashlar of New North Free is "not so successful".[37]
Nevertheless, the building forms an important part of theOld Town'scityscape, terminating the view south alongGeorge IV Bridge.[12][40] Two decades prior to the opening of the New North Free Church, Hamilton had, along withWilliam Burn, led the design of civic improvements in the Old Town. Hamilton's plans were not executed in their entirety but they included both the George IV Bridge and the triangular block formed by Teviot Row, Bristo Place, and Forrest Road at whose northern point the Bedlam Theatre now stands.[40]
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