Manchester Hippodrome, Oxford Street

The Hippodrome was opened in 1904 on a site inbetween Great Bridgewater Street and Chepstow Street and fronting Oxford Street. Designed by Frank Matcham, who also designed the sister theatre the Ardwick Green Empire, the Hippodrome could stage music hall, circus and water spectaculars. Hidden beneath the stage of this 'three-in-one' theatre was a huge water tank that could hold 70,000 gallons and was raised by a hydraulic ram, while hidden beneath the auditorium was a lions' den and stabling for one hundred horses. Unsurprisingly, the Hippodrome became one of Manchester's top variety venues, offering comedy and tragedy, opera-bouffe and ballet, concerts and vaudeville, pantomime and puppet shows, water spectaculars and circus. Star performers who appeared at the theatre included Sarah Bernhardt and George Formby. For all its success, however, it could not prevent changes in taste in popular entertainment and the theatre was closed and then demolished in 1935 to make way for the Gaumont Cinema. It was not quite the end though, because the Hippodrome was re-created in the Ardwick Green Empire and gave a few more years of entertainment as the New Hippodrome.