Build according to the research of a historical advisor it was opened in 1997. It now stages plays every summer around May to the first week October. In the winter it is used for educational purposes. The Globe is approximately 225 yards from the original site, center to center. It was the first thatched roof building permitted in London since the Great Fire of London. Like the original the theater has a thrust stage that projects into the large circular yard surrounded by three tiers of steeply raked seating. The stage and more expensive seating areas are the only covered parts of the amphitheatre. The Globe is partly joined to a modern lobby, visitors center and additional backstage support. Seating capacity is 1,380, with a further 500 “groundlings” standing (and you must stand, no sitting allowed) in the pit, an audience about half the size of that in Shakespeare’s time.
