Bathurst Street Theatre

Home to the
Randolph Academy for the Performing Arts

The Story

BATHURST STREET THEATRE 

A home for entertainment ...  a theatre with comfort ... a place with history.

HISTORY

In March 2001, the Randolph Academy for the Performing Arts outgrew its then Gloucester Street location, and moved into the more spacious Bathurst Street Theatre in the heart of Toronto's trendy Annex neighbourhood. George Randolph saw the move as essential to filling the one key component that was missing in RAPA's development as a world class performing arts training facility: a signature building.

The Bathurst Street Theatre has more to it than meets the eye.
In 1866, a church was built on the site with the seating capacity of 1200, which sometimes was not large enough to hold all the people who wanted to pray there. The present building was designed by the architectural firm Gordon & Helliwell was erected in 1888. The cornerstone was laid by Sir John A. Macdonald, the first Prime Minister of Canada.

By 1968, the congregation had declined to 60, and the United Church, with a strong interest in theatre realized there was a need for one in the community and decided to convert the church into a theatre, They took out 600 seats, put in an open stage and made the church a theatre.

Performers who have graced the Bathurst Street Theatre stage include Oscar Peterson, Jim Carrey, Eddie Izzard, Jackie Richarson, Rheostatics, Michael Barber, Adam Brazier, Gordon Pinsent, Ted Dykstra , and Brian Rintoul, as well as directors Martin Bragg, Ron Ulrich, and Keith Turnbull.Oscar Peterson once compared its acoustics favorably to those of Massey Hall.

The Bathurst Street Theatre building is included in the Ontario Heritage Trust's "Ontario's Places of Worship" directory of purpose built places of worship (e.g. churches, meeting houses, synagogues, temples, mosques, etc.) that were constructed pre-1980 and possess heritage value as an example of effective adaptive reuse to new secular uses. “Ontario’s Places of Worship” can be found at www.heritagetrust.on.ca