[1] Robert Burns, writing from Ellisland to his friend William Nicol, on 2 February 1790, said: 'Our theatrical company, of which you must have heard, leave us this week.

The manager, Mr Sutherland, was introduced to me by a friend from Ayr; and a worthier or cleverer fellow I have rarely met with.

With a design by architect Thomas Boyd[5] of Dumfries, based on that of the Theatre Royal in Bristol, it seated between five and six hundred.

[1] One of the early lessees was John Henry Alexander from Dunbar who moved on to Glasgow to lease, then buy, the Theatre Royal, Dunlop Street in the city.

This combination of moving pictures, 'movies' and music hall acts in a mixed programme, proved successful until 1909 when the theatre was purchased by P. Stobie & Son, who installed a flat maple floor to take advantage of the late Victorian craze for roller skating.

[1] Acquisition of the theatre by the Guild of Players in 1959, at a time when demolition seemed a likely prospect, was followed by an eighteen-month period of reconstruction and a formal opening by Sir Compton Mackenzie, whose mother's company, "The Compton Comedy Company" had been the last of the touring troupes to perform there.