The Theatre Royal opened in 1884, and since then it has undergone many changes. In 1992 the beautiful Victorian-era auditorium was restored.

Theatre Royal Stratford East has a strong tradition of developing new plays and musicals, and encouraging new voices for the stage. From Shelagh Delaney’s A Taste of Honey, Theatre Workshop and Joan Littlewood's Oh, What a Lovely War!, Five Guys Named Moe, Ken Hill’s The Invisible Man, Paul Sirett & Paul Joseph’s The Big Life, Tanika Gupta’s Gladiator Games, Perry Henzell’s The Harder They Come to recent productions of Martina Cole’s Two Women, adapted by Patrick Prior and Rikki Beadle Blair’s Shalom Baby.