Essoldo Bishop Auckland

Photographs taken in 1994 can be found here:

Exterior:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/stagedoor/331843068/

Interior:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/stagedoor/331843066/

The stage is about 30 feet deep and certainly not 48 feet.

The last film to play here in 1966 was 'Around The World Under The Sea'starring Lloyd Bridges, Shirley Eaton and David McCallum.

It was one of the theatres commissioned by the famous entrepreneur, Signor Pepi:-

He started building a chain of theatres. After Barrow came Blackpool(acquired by ABC as the Hippodrome and rebuilt in 1963 as the ABC - 'Europe's most luxurious theatre' and from where many lavish live shows were televised) and then Carlisle. Then, early in 1907, in partnership with the Birmingham theatre specialist George Ward, he began work on an "Opera House and Empire" on some recently-cleared land in Parkgate, Darlington.

Within seven months, the theatre was complete and, named the New Hippodrome and Palace Theatre of Varieties, it opened on September 2.

Even as Pepi received the opening night acclaim, building was beginning on another of his hippodromes, this one in Middlesbrough, on top of an old Quaker burial ground.

After Middlesbrough came Bishop Auckland Hippodrome in 1909 followed by Shildon in 1910.

But even as it was growing, Pepi's empire was crumbling at its peripheries. He sold off Middlesbrough after just eight months, losing £10,000 in the process. Shildon lasted a year, its disposal coinciding with the Bishop Auckland Hippodrome being declared bankrupt in 1911.

By the outbreak of the First World War, our principal character owned just two theatres: Darlington and Barrow. To make matters worse, on December 7, 1915, his wife Mary, Countess de Rossetti, died at their modest mid-terrace home in Barrow. She was only 46.