Friday, June 13, 2008

Queer Paranormal Road Trip: Queen's Theatre

The Queen's Theatre can be found in the heart of Soho, only a few blocks from London's Leicester Square. London has become infamous for hauntings, and even it's gay neighborhood would not be complete without, you guessed it, a gay ghost.

The Queen's Theatre opened it's doors on Shaftesbury Avenue on October 8, 1907. Originally, it was to be named Central Theatre (to which Bernard Shaw stated, "as if it were a criminal court or a railway terminus"), but after much debate the name Queen's was attached, and a portrait of Queen Alexandra was fixed above the fireplace in the grand entrance foyer.

On September 24, 1940, during World War II, a bomb was dropped on the theater, ripping off the front of the building, destroying the stone dome and foyer, and killing three unnamed people. After a costly reconstruction, it reopened in 1959 and has been showing plays ever since. In fact, the longest running performance of Les Misérables still can be seen there to this day.

While the theater is host to a few supernatural entities, one in particular made his presence known to medium Becky Walsh during an investigation for Spirit & Destiny Magazine in 2006. A male presence had been spotted periodically in the upper circle. The team had been notified that ushers have felt uncomfortable stares while changing in the stall bars. During a séance conducted in a corridor which formerly connected to backstage, a male presence did indeed come through. And he had a message to deliver.

He fancied one of them men on the team. And he enjoyed watching the boys changing into their uniforms.

An ethereal queen in the Queen's Theatre? What are the odds?

So if you find yourself in London at one of the top theaters on the West End, be sure to keep a lookout for a male figure looming in the shadows. If you're an attractive man, he just might be looking back at you...

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