The Abbey Theatre (Irish: Amharclann na Mainistreach), also known as the National Theatre of Ireland (Irish: Amharclann Náisiúnta na hÉireann), in Dublin, Ireland, is one of the country's leading cultural institutions. First opening to the public on 27 December 1904, and moved from its original building after a fire in 1951, it has remained active to the present day. The Abbey was the first state-subsidized theatre in the English-speaking world; from 1925 onwards it received an annual subsidy from the Irish Free State. Since July 1966, the Abbey has been located at 26 Lower Abbey Street, Dublin 1.
In its early years, the theatre was closely associated with the writers of the Irish Literary Revival, many of whom were involved in its founding and most of whom had plays staged there. The Abbey served as a nursery for many of leading Irish playwrights, including William Butler Yeats, Lady Gregory, Seán O'Casey and John Millington Synge, as well as leading actors. In addition, through its extensive programme of touring abroad and its high visibility to foreign, particularly American, audiences, it has become an important part of the Irish cultural brand.
The Abbey arose from three distinct bases. The first was the seminal Irish Literary Theatre. Founded by Lady Gregory, Edward Martyn and W. B. Yeats[1] in 1899—with assistance from George Moore—it presented plays in the Antient Concert Rooms and the Gaiety Theatre, which brought critical approval but limited public interest.[2] Lady Gregory envisioned a society promoting "ancient idealism" dedicated to crafting works of Irish theatre pairing Irish culture with European theatrical methods.[3]
The second base involved the work of two Dublin directors, William and Frank Fay.[4] William worked in the 1890s with a touring company in Ireland, Scotland and Wales, while his brother Frank was involved in amateur dramatics in Dublin. After William returned to Dublin, the Fay brothers staged productions in halls around the city and eventually formed W. G. Fay's Irish National Dramatic Company, focused on the development of Irish acting talent. In April 1902, the Fays gave three performances of Æ's play Deirdre and Yeats' Cathleen Ní Houlihan in St Theresa's Hall on Clarendon Street. The performances played to a mainly working-class audience rather than the usual middle-class Dublin theatregoers. The run was a great success, thanks in part to the beauty and force of Maud Gonne, who played the lead in Yeats' play. The company continued at the Antient Concert Rooms, producing works by Seumas O'Cuisin, Fred Ryan and Yeats.
The third base was the financial support and experience of Annie Horniman,[1] a middle-class Englishwoman with previous experience in theatre production, having been involved in the presentation of George Bernard Shaw's Arms and the Man in London in 1894. An acquaintance of Yeats from London circles, including the Order of the Golden Dawn, she came to Dublin in 1903 to act as Yeats' unpaid secretary and to make costumes for a production of his play The King's Threshold. Her money helped found the Abbey Theatre and, according to the critic Adrian Frazier, would "make the rich feel at home, and the poor—on a first visit—out of place."[5]
The founding of the Theatre is also connected with a broader wave of change found in European drama at the end of the nineteenth century. The founding of Théâtre Libre in Paris in 1887 and the work of the Moscow Art Theatre in 1895 represented a challenge to a "stale metropolitanism".[6] This movement echoes Lady Gregory's commitment and determination to make the Abbey Theatre a theatre for the people.[7]