Alan Durband pounds by means of innovative seven-year tax-free covenants for the conversion of the building. It was a popular theatre specialising in local Liverpool settings & political subjects which gave opportunities to new playwrights – most famous of whom is probably Willy Russell (to whom Durband lent his Welsh cottage to write 'Educating Rita') and to actors such as: Bill Nighy, Pete Postlethwaite, Jonathan Pryce & Julie Walters who joined the Theatre company around 1975. To mark this era, Willy Russell unveiled a plaque in memory of Alan Durband at the theatre in 1998 in the company of actor Pete Postlethwaite
Rita Montaner nearly four years: the longest-running contract of her career. Mongo Santamaría commented: "This launched the era of the Cuban cabaret super-productions". Montaner continued to do theater work whenever her radio show was off the air. In 1955 she triumphed as Madame Flora in the opera "La Medium" by Menotti, and in 1956 in the comedy "Mi querido Charles". Beginning in 1954, she co-starred in the comedy television program "Rita y Willy" with Guillermo Alvarez Guedes. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, she acted in numerous Mexican movies of the Rumberas film genre. These are the films Rita appeared in