In July 1909, the Hicks Theatre was renamed The Globe Theatre (not to be confused with another Globe Theatre on Newcastle Street which was demolished in 1902 as part of the redevelopment of the Aldwych). A new manager, Charles Frohman, succeeded Hicks, reopening the theatre in 1909 with a production of His Borrowed Plumes, written by Winston Churchill’s mother, Lady Randolph Churchill.

In 1913, the theatre tempted fate with a production titled The Clock Goes Round. The show opened on Friday 13^th with a cast of 13 characters. It closed after just 13 performances.

The theatre remained open during the first World War, enjoying success with Peg O’ My Heart. In 1925, Noël Coward’s Fallen Angels debuted here and then in 1935, Call it a Day by Dodie Smith, enjoyed a run of 509 performances. In 1938, John Gielgud directed and starred in a ‘definitive revival’ of another Coward comedy, The Importance of Being Earnest.

In 1949, Gielgud returned again with his production of The Lady’s Not for Burning. In 1960, A Man For All Seasons premiered here, and then in 1966, the theatre’s (then) longest running show, Terence Frisby’s There’s a Girl in my Soup opened, running for 1064 performances.

In April 1983, the long run record was broken by Olivier Award-winning comedy Daisy Pulls It Off, which was written by Denise Deegan and produced by Andrew Lloyd Webber, running for 1,180 performances. This was followed by another box office hit, Lettice and Lovage, starring Maggie Smith and Margaret Tyzack.

The theatre remained as The Globe until 1994, when the name changed to the Gielgud Theatre. The 1994 name change was partly in celebration of Sir John Gielgud who appeared here in ‘The Prisoner’, but also to avoid confusion with the newly recreated Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre on the Southbank.

In the 1990s, notable successes included the premier of Alan Ayckbourn’s Man of the Moment, a transfer of Design for Living starring Rachel Weisz, and a rewritten Tell Me on a Sunday starring Denise Van Outen.

The noughties saw movie-star led box office success with The Graduate starring Kathleen Turner, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest starring Christian Slater, and Equus starring Daniel Radcliffe.  The theatre continues to attract major stars throughout the 2010s, with productions of The Audience starring Helen Mirren, Blithe Spirit starring Angela Lansbury and Company featuring Patti Lupone.

The theatre has been extensively refurbished several times, notably in 1987 and 2008. It is notable for its circular Regency staircase, oval gallery and tower.

The theatre is also notable for its famous theatre cat, Beerbohm (named after actor/manager Herbert Beerbohm Tree), who caught mice here for two decades and was renowned for attacking props rifling through actors’ possessions whilst they were on stage, and occasionally appearing unexpectedly onstage, forcing actors into some hurried improvisation. When Beerbohm the theatre cat died in 1995 aged 20, so famous had be become that his obituary made the front page of entertainment industry newspaper The Stage.