The ‘Playhouse’ at St Paul’s: What We Know of the Theatre in the Almonry

There is little surviving evidence to establish precisely the location, dimensions, and features of the room within the cathedral precinct in which the Children of Paul’s gave their performances. This essay surveys the existing data about this venue and examines the text of the surviving plays in the repertory of the Children of Paul’s—by dramatists such as John Lyly, John Marston, Thomas Dekker, John Webster, George Chapman, and Thomas Middleton—to visualise the room’s spatial features from the stage directions and other verbal and dramaturgical clues extant in the printed playtexts. This chapter argues that the stage of the ‘playhouse’ adjoining St Paul’s may have been about as large as that of the Blackfriars, and would have afforded the Children of Paul’s every means to rival with their competitors in theatrical accomplishment.