News

The Queen’s Theatre Hornchurch is overjoyed to receive a generous £4,000 donation from McDonalds Romford towards QNew, an exciting programme of building improvements which will allow the Theatre to make high quality theatre in developed spaces. The Theatre has been fundraising towards plans to innovate and renovate the iconic building for artists, participants and audiences alike, assisted by the introduction of a 65p QNew Transformation fee per ticket. This came into effect on the Theatre’s 65^th birthday, Friday 21 September. Since then, generous customers have already helped the theatre raise a public contribution towards QNew, in just two months, of £10,700. The Theatre was also recently awarded a grant of £350,000 by Arts Council England towards QNew. The funds will contribute towards supporting a number of exciting projects throughout 2019. If all the £1million required is raised, these will include:

• Equipping a new dedicated rehearsal facility on site for the first time in the Theatre’s history
• Dedicating a bespoke new space for the Theatre’s expanding range of learning and participatory work with the local community
• Creating a special room for local and regional artists to try out new ideas
• Building a new look ground floor Bar to complement the busy Café
• Making front of house and backstage much more accessible to D/deaf and disabled people
• Replacing outdated equipment so that it’s cheaper and safer to run
• Installing better air conditioning in the foyer so everyone can be comfortable all year round
• Ensuring the roof and exterior of the Theatre are weather proofed for the future

Havering McDonald's franchisee Gerry Byrne said, ‘It’s great to be supporting such a major part of our community and the excellent work the Theatre produces. The Theatre has brilliant plans for the future of the building and we’re really pleased to be contributing towards this.’ Douglas Rintoul, Artistic Director at Queen’s Theatre Hornchurch said, ‘A massive thank you to McDonalds Romford for so generously supporting our exciting QNew project. By investing into the building, this support will ensure we keep producing the very best work we can, whilst encouraging members of our community to take part or see some of our superb productions.’ For more information about QNew visit queens-theatre.co.uk/qnew/q-new-transformation/