The £100m refurbishment of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre should transform it from a cavern in which performers feel they are "acting from Dover to Calais", into an intimate place where audiences can "see up the actors' nostrils, and observe the muscles of their eyes", according to Michael Boyd, the Royal Shakespeare Company's artistic director.
The theatre will have to lose as many as 300 of its 1,350 seats to become "the best modern playhouse for Shakespeare in the world", according to Vikki Heywood, the RSC's executive director.
Those seats - some are 30 metres from the stage - are so bad they put people off going to the theatre, she said. "Young people sit in those seats and then don't come back," she said. "That's a disaster for us."
Ms Heywood said the impact on box-office income was unlikely to be serious, since the seats to be removed are cheap and infrequently booked.
Unveiling their plans for the Stratford theatre, architects Bennetts Associates described how, instead of the stage's being tucked into a "second room" behind the proscenium arch, it will thrust out into the audience, in the tradition of renaissance theatres. And the auditorium will have only two galleries, reducing the distance between audience and actors.
The auditorium will be similar to that of the Courtyard, the 1,000-seat temporary theatre that opens next month to cover the refurbishment period.
The modern cafes and restaurants on the river side of the theatre will be stripped away, and a waterside pathway created. The main facade and foyers will be restored to the rigorous art deco look created in 1932 by the RST's architect, Elizabeth Scott, who in turn incorporated some of the ruins of the burned gothic Shakespeare Memorial Theatre, from 1879.
New restaurant and cafe facilities are planned at the top level of the theatre.
A new entrance will be created; for the first time visitors to the RST and the Swan will share the same door. The architects will also build a tower with views over the town. The project has £85m of its £100m funding in place, £50m of which comes from Arts Council England. The company is confident about raising the remaining £15m. The RST should close in April next year, followed by the Swan in August. The project is planned for completion in 2010.
