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Stockwell Playhouse

former theatre in Stockwell, Lambeth, London, England

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 28, 2026
Entity authorityQ23304810
Source-derived summary

Stockwell Playhouse (known as the LOST Theatre until 2015) was a 180-seat Off West End Fringe theatre based in Stockwell, South London, dedicated to promoting and developing young and emerging talent.

A variety of different shows were produced throughout the year there included One Act and Five Minute Festivals.

In addition to the auditorium, the venue had two rehearsal spaces for hire by performers. There was also an award-winning bar space on the first floor called Bar 208, with a variety of drinks and beers on tap.

History

The LOST Theatre was founded by Cecil Hayter in 1979 at the London Oratory School as an after-school theatre club, taking its name from the school's initials.

In 1982 LOST was relocated to a new venue on Fulham Broadway. At this 100-seat black box, LOST was host to over 100 plays and festivals for the next 17 years until re-development of the area forced the company to look for a new home. During the next 10 years LOST was an itinerant company, hiring other theatre spaces in order to continue its work whilst branching out into Europe taking shows to Spain and Russia. In 2004 negotiations began for the acquisition of a new home in the London Borough of Lambeth (208 Wandsworth Road). This building opened in January 2010.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Stockwell Playhouse” is former theatre in Stockwell, Lambeth, London, England. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Stockwell, Playhouse and former, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewBest approached as a cultural-object dossier: authorship and date matter, but circulation and reception often explain the wider significance. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2015, 1979, 1982, 2004—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. For this dossier, Stockwell, Playhouse and former is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “former theatre in Stockwell, Lambeth, London, England” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q23304810. Authority coordinates are 51.475, -0.132. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2015, 1979, 1982 and 2004.

Critical limits

Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Stockwell Playhouse”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Stockwell Playhouse primary sources, Stockwell Playhouse archive and Stockwell research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Stockwell Playhouse”?
  2. Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
  3. Which edition, object, performance or recording is being described?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Stockwell Playhouse” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.