Welcome to Pentameters Theatre


Founded by Léonie Scott-Matthews in August 1968, Pentameters is one of the most respected fringe theatres in London.

The many authors to perform at Pentameters include Dannie Abse (1923-2014), Kingsley Amis, Margaret Drabble, Ted Hughes, Laurie Lee, Roger McGough, Edna O'Brien, Harold Pinter, John Wain and the psychiatrist R.D. Laing. The Theatre has also played host to many performers at the start of their careers, including Russell Brand, Adrian Edmundson, Ben Elton, French and Saunders, Nigel Havers, Celia lmrie, Rik Mayall, Nigel Planer, Jenny Seagrove, Pamela Stephenson and Alexei Sayle.




a poem by Peter Woodcock

(for Léonie Scott-Mathews

founder of Pentameters Theatre)


Glittering stars pasted on to backdrop which

had once been blackout curtains in the old house,

climbing up the staircase

into a doll’s house, the inner theatre of imagination

with shamanistic brilliance

voices entwine, fugitives find themselves,

lost souls flourish, lives unlived 

in bedsits and pubs, a secret alliance

woven by the times, 

recovering from austerity and lack

suddenly in technicolor

fuelled by alcohol and smoke,

dangerous dreams of liberation, 

metamorphosed on a stage,

illusion and madness,

rediscovering ourselves

in the drama of now

as yet unseen, burning passions

ebb and flow,

decades later with bruised memories,

secret pathways in starlit Hampstead

still lead to magical groves.

  "Pentameters without virtue cannot endure."

'Best Theatre, 2016'
by Hampstead Village Voice.

Léonie Scott-Matthews with the cast and crew of “House of Cowards” written by Dannie Abse (1923-2014)

Directed by Conrad Blakemore (November 2013)