Half Moon Theatre

The Half Moon Theatre Company was formed in 1972 in a rented synagogue in Alie Street, Whitechapel, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets.

The founders, Michael Irving and Maurice Colbourne, and the Artistic Director, Guy Sprung, wanted to create a cheap rehearsal space with living accommodation, inspired by the sixties alternative society.

[1] In 1974 an ambitious production of Henry IV, Part 1 and 2, was described by Michael Billington; "Bill Dudley has ingeniously transformed the auditorium into a medieval loft with a raked wooden platform bisecting the audience and a mini-drawbridge being lowered from a balcony for processional entrances.

This means that the actors are rarely more than about fifteen feet away from the audience; and crucial speeches, like Falstaff's on Honour, can be addressed to individual spectators rather than hurled at a faceless throng".

This opened in 1979, with a production of Robert Tressell's The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists that took advantage of the dilapidated state of the building by redecorating it as a part of the performance.

[4] Frances de la Tour enjoyed a collaboration with the Half Moon,[5] appearing in the London première of Dario Fo's We Can't Pay?

The main architect, Florian Beigel, designed a theatre in which there was no fixed seating, thereby allowing plays to be staged in many forms.This element was made possible by a planning gain deal brokered and funded by Central and City Properties without whom none of this would have been possible.

The Half Moon Photography workshop continued with the Camerawork gallery and darkroom space in Roman Road, Bethnal Green, and is now a part of the Four Corners film collective.