The O’Reilly venue features a thrust stage surrounded by the audience on three sides.

[1] The O’Reilly was built by Turner Construction Company,[3] opened on 11 December 1999, with the world premiere of King Hedley II, by the Pulitzer Prize winning playwright August Wilson.

[1] The site of the O'Reilly Theater was previously occupied by the Mercantile Library Hall, which was completed in 1870.

[6] The Bijou was replaced by a succession of vaudeville and burlesque houses—the Lyceum, Academy, and Variety—and then was razed and paved into a parking lot after being damaged in the 1936 St. Patrick's Day flood.

[1][7] Teddy Roosevelt spoke at a national convention of the Order of the Moose at Lyceum Theater on his visit to Pittsburgh in July, 1917.