University of Bristol Theatre Collection

In 1969 the university made an award from its Appeal Fund to provide the Collection with adequate storage and access facilities within the department of drama.

[6][7] Their accreditation report concluded that: “Bristol University Theatre Collection has an exceptionally strong grasp of its broad network of stakeholders, and their needs.

The service is notably innovative and impressive in its determination to grasp challenging issues and to share practice with the wider archives and museum world.”[6]The University of Bristol Theatre Collection holds a wide range of material generated by or related to British Theatre, composed of documentation, designs, playbills, posters, promptscripts, playscripts, costumes, ephemera, artworks[8] (including photographs and magic lantern slides), and Audio-Visual material.

The collection holds nine of the approximately twenty surviving Bristol Old Vic silver tickets, tokens issued to shareholders who helped fund construction of the theatre in 1766.

1941), George Rowell (d. 2001), Richard Southern (1903–1989) and Glynne Wickham (1922–2004) Including: Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree (1852–1917), Honor Blackman (b.

Including: Graham Barlow (d.2003), Deirdre Clancy, David Cockayne, Edward Gordon Craig (1872–1966), Frederick Crooke (1908–1991), John Elvery (1939–1997), Paul Farnsworth, Laurence Irving (1897–1988), Oliver Messel (1904–1978), Motley Theatre Design Group, Patrick Robertson (1922–2009) and Rosemary Vercoe (1917–2013), Owen Paul Smyth (1895–1979), Yolanda Sonnabend (1935–2015), Alan Tagg (1928–2002), Julia Trevelyan Oman (1930–2003) and David Walker (1934–2008).

Collections from a wide range of people connected to the business of theatre are also represented, for example: producers, managers, agents, photographers, marketing and wardrobe professionals.

[12] As an independent charity, the Mander and Mitchenson Theatrical Collection (MMTC) was already one of the three largest theatre history archives in the country.

Students, academics, and independent researchers can access the reference library and archival collections in the main reading room.