The Experience
Located in the historic district of Bristol Borough, Bristol Riverside Theatre (BRT) offers new works, classics and musicals in a once-condemned, former movie theater that has been rebuilt with state-of-the-art technology and roomy new seats. BRT received Barrymore Awards for the world premieres of Texas Flyer (original music) and The Balkan Women (best new play and direction).
Musicals here are accompanied by a professional live orchestra and have included productions such as country music star Larry Gatlin's Alive and Well (And Livin^ in the Land of Dreams). Before the show, take a walk past the Victorian mansions lining Radcliffe Street or visit nearby Lion’s Park, with benches and a gazebo facing the Delaware River.
History
Bristol Riverside Theatre is the product of Susan Atkinson’s artistic fervor. In the late 1970s, this young director chucked Broadway to launch her own theater group. For five years, her Bucks County Repertory Theatre performed in schools, churches and restaurants the mid-1980s, when the Bristol-based Grundy Foundation invited it to take over the old movie theater it had briefly considered demolishing.