Evans’s Supper Rooms, Covent Garden

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Evans’s Supper Rooms, Covent Garden

Arthur Lloyd is known to have performed here only once,
as he says in an interview with the ERA reporter.

King Street, Covent Garden NO 43 King Street, Thomas Archer House, is the finest of its kind in the whole of Covent Garden. The original building constituted the end one in the Piazza, and it was a worthy home for Admiral Edward Russell, the fourth Earl of Bedford's grandson. The present building which worthily replaced it in 1717 has changed much through the years inside, but the beautiful exterior has survived more or less intact. The house is named after its architect, who eventually inherited it after marrying into a branch of the Russell family. It became a hotel in 1772 and developed into an extremely fashionable one called the Star. It was then taken over by a Covent Garden theatre comedian W. C. Evans and became Evans' Hotel and Supper Rooms. One Paddy Green followed him and, in 1856, built a sumptuous music hall at the back of the house. It thrived for many years on the slightly bewildering policy of catering for 'steady young men who admire a high class of music, see no harm in a good supper, but avoid theatres and the ordinary run of music halls'. The performances were by men and boys, who sung glees and madrigals. Ladies were admitted grudgingly and allowed to see and hear from behind a screen. The National Sporting Club came into possession later-from 1891 until the thirties-the Evans's interior - From Old & New London 1897 performers still men but now delivering blows instead of ballads.

Above text from The Covent Garden Guide 1980

…The term ‘music hall’ was an old one, for there were many concert rooms in London, but it was given a new meaning in the 1850s. It was chosen deliberately to conjure up an air of respectability, for not all the forerunners of these new establishments were places of what came to be called ‘family entertainment’, A number of places compete for the honour of being the first ever of this new kind of music hall. The term appears to have been first used by the Surrey Music Hall, formerly the Grapes Tavern, in the 1840s. But the story of the Canterbury hall in Westminster Bridge Road, Lambeth, which in time became the most famous of Victorian music halls (Charlie Chaplin’s father appeared there at the end of the nineteenth century), gives a clear indication of how tastes were changing.

In Shakespeare’s day it had been a hostelry for pilgrims and took the name of the Canterbury Arms after the abolition of the monasteries. It had long been known as a place for entertainment when it was taken over by a publican, Charles Morton, in 1849. Taking as his model the song and supper room Evans’s, in Covent Garden, Morton built his first hall.
Evans’s was housed in the basement of what had once been a Georgian hotel.. It was founded by a Mr W. C. Evans, a chorister at nearby Covent Garden – a useful reminder that the antecedents of music hall were very widespread. He called it ‘Evans Late Joy’s’ (the building had originally been a hotel named Joy’s). Evans’s was for men only, and many lewd songs were sung as well as comic turns.

43 King Street, Covent Garden Evans retired, in 1844, handing over to another former chorister known as Paddy Green, who re-built the supper room and reformed the nature of the entertainment provided. Women were allowed to watch the entertainments, which included a choir of men and boys singing madrigals, ballads, and selections from operas, with piano or harmonium accompaniment, from an upper gallery if they were prepared to give their name and address – a protection against prostitution.
Evans’s opened at 8pm, but did not really begin to hum until after midnight, when Paddy Green, snuff box in hand, officiated over a range of performances drawn from the best artists appearing at the pleasure gardens such as Vauxhall. Evans’s was simply the most popular of a number of West End song and supper rooms, which included the Coal Hole in the Strand, the Cyder Cellars in Maiden Lane, Covent Garden (an American Fat Boy hamburger joint is now on the derelict site) – (This land has now been built on again and is currently a Porterhouse pub/wine bar. M.L.) – and the Mogul in Drury Lane (site now

Site of Evans's, Covent Garden in 2003 - The building is currently being demolished internally the New London Theatre). Outside the central area were all the ‘free and easies’ in public houses, often with their pleasure gardens around, in which the drinking and jollity was encouraged with all kinds of comic turns and singalongs. With such a demand for entertainment, some of the best amateur performers were being encouraged by high fees to turn professional, and they would appear at many different places to earn their living…

Text Edited from Bright Lights. Big City, London Entertained 1830-1950, by Gavin Weightman.

Right - Site of Evans's, Covent Garden in 2003 - The building is currently being demolished internally.