Marie Lloyd : Locations

Hoxton Hall

Hoxton Hall is the smallest of the three theatres used in the filming of Miss Marie Lloyd - Queen of the Music Hall.

It's a perfectly preserved saloon-style theatre in the heart of Hoxton, where Marie Lloyd was born and brought up. Opened in 1863 as a music-hall, it was one of many small theatres in the East End of London. But it lost its licence in 1871 after complaints of rowdiness, and never regained it. It's unlikely therefore that Marie Lloyd ever sang here, as her career only started in the mid-1880s.

For a while the theatre was a Temperance Hall, and then it passed to the Quakers who still own it. It's now a Grade II* Listed building and is used as a youth arts theatre. For more information about it, see the links at the bottom of the page.

The theatre's exterior, in Hoxton Street, is unassuming. But inside is a tiny auditorium with two iron-railed balconies, supported on cast-iron pillars.


A large number of scenes were shot here, both on-stage and backstage, over the course of a week's filming.




Marie Lloyd auditions for Mr Belafonte, the music hall manager.


Marie's first appearance on stage, with the Dolly Sisters...


...watched by Percy Courtenay.


Marie appears before the Vigilance Committee accused of lewdness.

Most of the backstage scenes were filmed at Hoxton Hall. The actual backstage area at the theatre is quite small, consisting of a short passage leading from a small dressing room (not used in the filming) behind the stage, into a vestibule that used to be the main entrance to the theatre in a side street. But to create a larger backstage area in which to film, this passage was extended into the Stewart Hall, a large room in an extension built on to the back of the theatre.

Left, the Stewart Hall.

The door on the left leads into the backstage area of the theatre. A false wall was built a few feet in front of the back wall to continue the backstage passage into and across this room, ending in Marie Lloyd's dressing room, which was constructed at the far right.

Once it was dressed, this extra space created a bustling backstage corridor that was used for several scenes in the drama. The pictures below show how it was transformed.



The view from the Stewart Hall into the real backstage area. The painted wooden bench on the right of the door out of the Hall can be seen on-screen - to the right of Mr Belafonte, covered with costumes. The false wall is on the left. The picture on the right looks into the small vestibule that used to form the entrance to the theatre. Beyond the double doors, the passage goes across the back of the stage (a stage entrance is to the left) ending in the distance with a real dressing room.


The view in the opposite direction, from the old entrance vestibule into the Stewart Hall. Marie Lloyd's dressing room was constructed at the far end - the door to it can be seen in the distance in the picture on the left.


Two views of Marie's dressing room. On the left, early in her career, it appears as a small and cramped room. On the right, later in her career, it's been re-arranged and re-dressed to look like a grander and more spacious room. The painted wooden bench of the Stewart Hall can be seen below the costumes in the picture on the right.



The vestibule with the old entrance door. In the drama, it's seen briefly as the young Marie runs into the theatre to watch the show. In the picture on the right, the door to the Stewart Hall is on the right.


The entrance to the stage from the backstage passage.

Locations Introduction | Pictures of Normansfield Theatre

Links

Hoxton Hall official website
Wikipedia's page about Hoxton Hall gives some historical information about the theatre