Marguerite Bullard lives in Islington and has worked front of house for Sadler’s Wells for almost 30 years, having joined as an usher in early 1994. She has had roles at stage door, ticket office, and as a cashier and house manager. Her current role is Senior House Manager, which she has held since 2010.

What do you remember about your first few years at Sadler’s Wells, and the opening of the current building in 1998?

I used to go to Sadler’s Wells a lot as an audience member and thought it would be a great place to work so I applied to be an usher to supplement my other income. The interview I did was one of the oddest interviews I think I’ve ever had! I was asked to add up the cost of an ice cream and a programme, then we had a conversation about gardening – which I don’t know a lot about. I was then offered the job!

There is a certain charm to old theatres, and the old building was charming, but it was quite clear that there wasn’t enough space – particularly on stage, as the stage was a lot smaller, so it just didn’t work as well for dance.

In the lead up to the new building, of course we all had to leave the Sadler’s Wells site and we were based at the Peacock Theatre – which is still our West End venue – for several years. There was a mix of very weird and wonderful shows there – a Wallace and Gromit show remains one of my favourite memories!

I remember going on a few tours of the new building, and thinking it was very cold – it was before we had heating in. The stage was so much bigger, and it was all much more open, glossier and shinier. It was an exciting time, although very hard work. I remember lots of colleagues working very long hours.

It opened a good month or two before it should have done. The ushers and I had to go round putting numbers on all the seats at about 6pm on opening night, as the tickets had been sold but the numbers hadn’t been put on the seats yet. We got the licence from the council for the first performance at about 8pm on the night it opened. It was a performance by Rambert, and Ian Albery, who was artistic director at the time, came on stage waving the piece of paper with the licence, about 30 minutes after the show should have started, to huge cheers! For the next few weeks, you could hear building work going on during performances, and one time I came into the auditorium to open the house and a builder was asleep on the floor of the first circle!

What has been the biggest change during your time at Sadler’s Wells?

The biggest change has been the programme and leadership. It has been different under the various artistic directors. We used to have quite a lot of opera as well as dance, which we don’t these days, and a lot more classical ballet. We used to have more dark weeks [when there is no show on stage] whereas now we have performances all year round. And the Lilian Baylis Studio was hardly ever used for performances when we re-opened.

Ian Albery, Jean-Luc Choplin and Alistair Spalding all had different visions for the theatre. The last 20 years since Alistair has been artistic director has seen great changes to the programme, with a huge range of dance styles presented on stage.

How was it during the pandemic?

It was really hard during the pandemic when the theatre was closed. Nobody knew for sure if we would ever be able to reopen and it was a very hard and sad time.

It was quite emotional when we returned and it was wonderful to be back in the theatre, in this building again and to see colleagues and audiences for the first time in ages. We needed ushers for some smaller-scale socially distanced performances when we first reopened, and so many people signed up because they couldn’t wait to be back.

Have audiences changed over the years?

Yes, audiences have changed. We have much more diverse audiences than we used to and that is a wonderful thing. And it’s mainly down to the programme and the fact there is such a range of work on stage.

The first Breakin’ Convention festival in 2004 was an amazing moment, and it really helped to break the mould. There was such a “buzz” around the place and it was such a joyful experience to be welcoming such an enthusiastic audience to the theatre.

There have been times when audience attitudes have changed. Other colleagues and I noticed some visitors being much more abrasive after the Brexit vote in 2016, for example. The majority of audience members are fantastic, and I really enjoy welcoming them to the theatre. One of the things I really love about my job is that there is always something new. Even now, after almost 30 years, every so often I will be asked something I have never been asked before, or something will happen that has never happened before!

Read a special 25th Anniversary message from our CEO Sir Alistair Spalding CBE.