Ticket prices in 1963:

On 16 January 1963 the General Manager announced, with some regret, higher prices for tickets.   The most expensive seat would now be 6 Shillings 6 Pence (less than one US Dollar.)  Prices for London plays would have been about twice these amounts. Click the thumbnail on the left for the full text of the announcement, including an unfortunate rise in ice cream prices.

The Ipswich Arts Theatre was in Tower Street in the centre of the small market town. Three Victorian cottages had been converted into a lecture hall, where Charles Dickens had performed extracts from his novels. Then it became a flea-pit cinema and during the War was a welcome club for troops. In 1948, it was turned into a theatre holding 360 customers.

Perhaps I was being romantic about the inadequacies of our theatre because I enjoyed the contrast between the dusty confusion backstage and the brightly-lit fun and games onstage. -- Ian McKellen, 2001