Theatre Royal, Drury Lane

The first Theatre Royal was built by the dramatist Thomas Killigrew under a charter from Charles II and opened on 7 May 1663, in the first flush of Restoration drama; Nell Gwynn was among its early performers. It burned down in 1672 and was rebuilt on its present site in 1674, probably to a design by Sir Christopher Wren. In the eighteenth century it was managed by a series of great names, including David Garrick and Richard Brinsley Sheridan. It was during this period, in 1735, that Charles Macklin, later famous for his Shylock, quarrelled backstage with the actor Thomas Hallam over a wig, struck him with his cane and pierced his eye. Hallam died of the injury.

Sheridan's Drury Lane was replaced by a supposedly fireproof theatre designed by Henry Holland in 1791–94, which burned down in 1809. The present building, by Benjamin Wyatt, opened in 1812 and saw Edmund Kean draw enormous audiences. Later in the century it became the home of spectacular pantomime, with Dan Leno as its star dame, and it was during renovation work in 1848 that workmen reportedly broke into a sealed cavity in a wall and found a skeleton with a knife in its ribs, the discovery that gave the Man in Grey his backstory.

Joseph Grimaldi, who did more than anyone to create the modern clown and the British pantomime tradition, performed here and died in 1837; one of his final wishes, reportedly carried out, was that his head be severed before burial. The theatre is Grade I listed and seats just under two thousand. It was bought by Andrew Lloyd Webber's LW Theatres in 2000 and reopened in June 2021 after a restoration costing around £60 million.

The Man in Grey has an unusually good track record of witnesses. The most celebrated sighting came in 1939 during a photo call for Ivor Novello\'s The Dancing Years, when more than half the cast on stage reportedly watched the figure cross the upper circle and disappear into the wall. The show went on to be a great success, which did nothing to harm the legend that he only turns up for hits. Theatre staff have continued to report him during rehearsals and daytime tours, always following the same route, and the theatre\'s current owners are relaxed enough about the story to have built Halloween tours around it.

The 1848 skeleton is the piece of physical evidence usually cited. Accounts agree that during renovation work a sealed cavity was found behind the wall on the upper circle side, containing a skeleton with a dagger or knife in its ribs and scraps of grey cloth. Beyond that, details vary: some say the remains were those of a man murdered in the eighteenth century and walled up, others admit that nobody knows who he was. The story has been retold so often that separating the original report from later embroidery is difficult.

Grimaldi\'s kick and Leno\'s lavender are reported by staff and performers rather than by audiences, and both are told with affection. The actor Nigel Planer, who has performed at Drury Lane, has written about the ghosts and the theatre\'s fondness for them. The theatre has also featured on the television series Most Haunted.

The sceptical reading is the obvious one: theatres are dark, old and full of people who tell stories for a living, and a ghost that brings good luck is a ghost everyone has a reason to see. Even so, the consistency of the Man in Grey\'s route, from the end of the fourth row to the wall, across a century of reports is what keeps him at the top of every list of London\'s theatre ghosts.

The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane is a working West End house, so the easiest way to see it is to buy a ticket for whatever is playing; the upper circle, where the Man in Grey walks, is also the cheapest part of the auditorium. LW Theatres run regular daytime guided tours of the restored building, which take in the front-of-house rooms, the auditorium and backstage areas and tell the ghost stories along the way, and afternoon tea is served in the grand rooms upstairs. Check the theatre's website for tour dates and times.

For the ghosts specifically, the theatre has run late-night Halloween tours in late October, typically an hour-long guided walk through the front of house and backstage beginning at 10pm, with a cocktail in the Cecil Beaton Bar beforehand. Dates and prices change each year, so look out for the announcement in early autumn and book early, as they sell out.

The theatre is on Catherine Street in Covent Garden, central London, with Covent Garden and Holborn tube stations a few minutes' walk away. The restored building has step-free access to parts of the auditorium; ask the box office about specific seats. Covent Garden, the Strand and Holborn have a huge choice of hotels, so staying within a short walk of the stage door is easy.