Garcia de Resende Theatre

The Theatre Garcia de Resende has being inaugurated on the 1 of June in the year 1892. It can be seen as one of the most represented “Theatres on the Italian Way” existing in the whole of Portugal with a capacity, to be named in one breath with the other theatres in Europe.
The original façade in rose marble is no longer, it has being replaced by a granite one in the year 1969, which has sacrificed also the formal view of the theatre.

The Teatro Garcia de Resende, named after the Renaissance artist from Évora with the same name, is one of the best examples of the so-called “Italian theatres” in Portugal. And it is even on a par with some in Europe, such as the famous Scala in Milan.José Ramalho Dinis Perdigão, owner of the Teatro Garcia de Resende, began construction in October 1881. As with other theatres in the 19th century, it was the elite of the city of Évora who pushed for this project, whose main objective was to reduce unemployment and crime.The death of the “creator” of the Teatro Garcia de Resende in 1884 slowed down its completion. It was only in 1890 that the work was completed, largely thanks to Dr. Francisco Barahona, a man of refined and cosmopolitan tastes, to whom the widow D. Inácia Fernandes de Barahona remarried.The inauguration of the theatre took place on the first day of June 1892, with the play “O Intimo” by E. Schwalbach, staged by the famous Companhia de Teatro do D. Maria II. The play was attended by Prince Afonso.