Queen's Theatre in a modern style. The reconstructed theatre opened 8 July 1959 with John Gielgud's solo performance in "Shakespeare speeches and sonnets, Ages of Man". Since April 2004, the theatre has played host to Cameron Mackintosh's production of "Les Misérables" which transferred after 18 years at the nearby Palace Theatre. The musical celebrated its 20th anniversary at the venue on 8 October 2005 and overtook "Cats" as the longest running musical of all time a year later on 8 October 2006. The theatre was Grade II listed by English Heritage in June 1972. An extensive refurbishment was undertaken in the latter
Palace Theatre, Melbourne featured a 39-week season of the musical Hair from 1971-1972. The life of the theatre was short-lived, as in 1974 it was converted back into a cinema and renamed the Palace Theatre for the first time since 1916. In 1980 the cinema was sold to the Melbourne Revival Centre, a Pentecostal church headquartered in Melbourne. It became a major venue for their services, which involved theatre productions. The next sale resulted in a major refurbishment by the Melbourne architectural firm Biltmoderne. In 1987 the building was transformed into the Metro Nightclub. The Metro was described in 2006 as having a