Earliest reference

1
524 BC
Earliest reference to a competition for
tragedies in Ancient Greece
2
about 484BC
Greek playwright Euripides born. Wrote more than
90plays 18 still exist
3
about 405BC
Greek playwright Aristophanes writes The Frogs
4
about 338 BC
Greek Drama reaches Rome
5
about 300 BC
Theatre of Dionysus
re-built in stone in Athens, Greece
6
55BC
First stone theatre built in Rome
7
740 AD
 
First Chinese Drama school founded
First Chinese Drama school founded
8
1300s
Mystery Play cycles emerge in Europe
Mystery Play cycles emerge in Europe
9
 about 1370
No style of theatre starts in Japan
10
1545
Earliest record of Commedia dellArte in Italy
11
1564   William Shakespeare born in Stratford
upon Avon
12
1562
  Spanish playwright Lope de Vega born. Probably
wrote more plays than anyone else more than
300
13
1567  
First public theatre opens in England
14
late 1500s
First indoor theatres in Western Europe
15
late 1500s   First Opera composed in Italy
16
about 1595
  William Shakespeare writes Romeo and Juliet
17
1598
The Globe theatre built in London. Shakespeare
acted and his plays were performed here
18
1603
  Japanese theatre style Kabuki starts
19
1606
Ben Jonson (English) writes Volpone
20
1616
  William Shakespeare dies in London
21
1637  
First opera house opens in Venice, Italy
22
1642-1660
  Theatres in England were closed by the Puritans
23

1662
Samuel Pepys records in his diary that he saw a
Pulchinella (Punch and Judy) show in London
24
1660s
Women act for the first time on the English
stage
25
1666
  French playwright Molière writes Le
Misanthrope
26
1671   Paris Opéra opens and burns down two
years later
27
1677
Aphra Benn, first known English female
playwright, writes The Rover
28
1700
English playwright William Congreve writes The
Way of the World

29
about 1773

  German playwright Goethe begins the play
Faust
30
1788   La Scala opera house opens in Milan, Italy
31
1817
Gas lighting first used in Londons theatres
32
1871   Giuseppe Verdi writes the opera Aida
33
1879
  Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen writes A
Dolls House
34
1881 First electric lights used in
theatre (Savoy, London)  
35
1888
  Swedish playwright August Strindberg writes
Miss Julie
36
1901
  Russian playwright Anton Checkhov writes The
Three Sisters
37
1912
  Romanian playwright Eugène Ionesco born. Wrote
many surreal plays, such as Rhinoceros (1960)
38
1941
German playwright Bertolt Brecht writes Mother
Courage and Her Children
39
1953
  English playwright John Osborne writes Look
Back in Anger
40
1953
  Irish playwright Samuel Beckett writes
Waiting for Godot
41
1953
American playwright Arthur Miller writes
The Crucible
42
1960
  English playwright Harold Pinter writes The
Caretaker
43
1967
English playwright Tom Stoppard writes
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
44
1968
Stage censorship abolished in Great Britain
45
1969
Andrew Lloyd-Webber and Tim Rice (British) write
the musical Jesus Christ Superstar!
46
1973  
Sydney opera house opens in Australia
47
2002
Bombay Dreams opens - the first London musical
with an all-Asian cast
48
(No Transcript)