Under the management of John Hollingshead until 1886, the theatre had early success with Robert the Devil, by W. S. Gilbert, followed by many other burlesques of operas and literary works.

These shows employed female dancers known as the Gaiety Girls and were extraordinarily popular, inspiring imitations at other London theatres.

The theatre was financed by a joint stock company and built in 1864 as the Strand Musick Hall by Bassett and Keeling.

[4] The theatre was a venue primarily for burlesque, variety, continental operetta and light comedy under the management of John Hollingshead from 1868 to 1886, including several operettas by Jacques Offenbach and musical burlesques arranged by the theatre's music director, Wilhelm Meyer Lutz.

[5] Thespis, the first collaboration between Gilbert and Sullivan, played at the theatre in 1871, with Farren as Mercury and J. L. Toole in the title role.

On 15 December 1880, the theatre presented Quicksands, the first major English language adaptation of a drama by Henrik Ibsen.

[8] Lutz and Robert Reece's version of The Forty Thieves was performed in 1880 (following an 1878 charity production of the same story), and Aladdin in 1881.

Hollingshead called himself a "licensed dealer in legs, short skirts, French adaptations, Shakespeare, taste and musical glasses.

Although Dorothy called itself a comic opera, as did most of the British musical works of the era that were neither burlesque, pantomime nor low farce, Dorothy incorporated some of the elements that US duo Harrigan and Hart were using on Broadway, integrating music and dance into the story line of the comedy.

However, in the 1860s and 1870s, burlesques were one-act pieces running less than an hour and using pastiches and parodies of popular songs, opera arias and other music that the audience would readily recognise.

[12] These "new burlesques" included Little Jack Sheppard (1885), Monte Cristo Jr. (1886), Miss Esmeralda (1887), Faust up to Date (1888), Ruy Blas and the Blasé Roué (1888), Carmen up to Data (1890), Joan of Arc by Adrian Ross and J. L. Shine (1891) and Cinder Ellen up too Late (1891).

For Joan of Arc, Edwardes had hired a young writer, Adrian Ross, who next wrote a less baudy, more lightly comic piece, similar to Dorothy, with a minimum of plot, focusing on songs with clever lyrics, In Town (1892), with stylish costumes and urbane, witty banter.

Edwardes and this team created a series of musical shows similar to Dorothy, but taking its lighter, breezier style a step further.

These shows featured fashionable characters, tuneful music, romantic lyrics, witty banter and pretty dancing.

Gaiety Girls were polite, well-behaved young women and became a popular attraction and a symbol of ideal womanhood.

[11] Alan Hyman, an expert on burlesque theatre who penned the 1972 book The Gaiety Years, wrote: The building was demolished in 1903 as part of the road widening of the East Strand and the new Aldwych-Kingsway road development, and Edwardes quickly built the New Gaiety Theatre at the corner of Aldwych and the Strand.

Later, George Grossmith, Jr. and Edward Laurillard produced a number of successes at the theatre, including Tonight's the Night (1915) and Theodore & Co (1916).

The same year, the revue Pins and Needles opened starring the French beauty Agnès Souret and had a run of nine months before transferring to the Shubert Theatre, New York.

In 1929, Love Lies, by Stanley Lupino and Arthur Rigby, starring Cyril Ritchard and Madge Elliott, had a successful run at the theatre.

In the 1930s, the theatre played works such as Sporting Love (1934) by composer and pianist Billy Mayerl, also with Lupino, which ran for 302 performances.

[20] Standing empty during World War II, the building suffered further damage as a result of bombing during air raids.