Chapter 3 explores how the letters patent authorizing the duopoly laid the groundwork for a theatre of lavishness and innovation, thereby affiliating the restored stage to the costly improvements sweeping London after the Great Fire of 1666. Theatrical amelioration bolstered national pride – England was finally catching up with continental stagecraft – and made available luxurious viewing conditions previously reserved for court audiences. To realize these ends, management chose newly developed, upmarket neighborhoods to site their equally expensive baroque playhouses. Despite these improvements, the companies risked disappointing the very consumer expectations aroused by the culture of improvement. They simply could not afford new scenes, machines, and special effects for every play. Moreover, their playhouses were ruinously costly to operate – they required enormous manpower compared to early modern stages – and personnel expenses skyrocketed further whenever the companies ventured upon a dramatic opera or spectacle-heavy production. Not until the 1690s were strategies finally devised to escape the culture of improvement.

This chapter focuses on the Apollo Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue, and discusses the post-war history of West End and commercial theatre in Britain. It aims to consider the ways the commercial sector and its proprietors, producers, and productions, have been shaped by, and have responded to, the changing conditions of the industry in this period. Starting and mostly staying in one location – resolutely in the heart of London’s ‘Theatreland’ – creates a tight spatial focus in an industry which in many other ways is characterised by movement: of productions, artists, audiences, and influence. The chapter explores a long-running set of tensions between heritage and contemporaneity, culture and development, and artistic and commercial interests that have played out at both the Apollo and across the wider West End and commercial sector. It argues that the Apollo makes for a reasonably representative study of the wider history and trends in post-war commercial theatre. What emerges from its history is a picture of a sector that, despite extraordinary change in both the industry and the world in which it operates, has weathered or absorbed many of these changes and demonstrated continuity, sometimes surprising, sometimes troubling, sometimes remarkable.

Stoppard has often distanced himself from his contemporaries and the central stories of British playwriting. When the new playwriting that caught most critical attention was coming from the political left, Stoppard occupied a position on the right. Stoppard has affiliations with a separate tendency in 1950s and 1960s British drama, that of British absurdism. Later in his career, the success of Arcadia, a play of both ideas and emotions, exerted considerable influence on British playwriting.

This introduction serves as an overview of the development of operetta and points to the neglect of operetta by many scholars of music and theatre. The editors begin by defining this genre, which is multi-faceted and often difficult to categorize. The introduction sets the stage for the following chapters by guiding the reader towards the important landmarks in the historical developments of operetta, such as those that occurred in France, Austria and London, and, in the twentieth century, in Berlin. In doing so, it also comments on notable composers and works. It concludes with some reflections on operetta reception in the twenty-first century.