Supper first, the performance second, and no clock in the room
Four hours and £900, and in theatreland the shape of it barely varies: a table at half past six, a curtain at half past seven, and the part of the evening neither of you planned afterwards. The kitchens here are built around that first sitting. Clos Maggiore on King Street will hold a conservatory table for two before a performance, Rules on Maiden Lane has fed the same audience since the Georgians, and Frenchie on Henrietta Street is the short walk when the curtain is later.
The figure covers her hours and her company across them and nothing else. The meal, the tickets and the cab at the end are yours to arrange, and every length from one hour upwards is set down on the rail. Most of these evenings open in Covent Garden or four minutes west in Leicester Square, though the same four hours work perfectly well around a late table with no performance in them whatsoever.
Who suits this call
A shortlist rather than the whole company. If none of these is free on your night, the desk will name three more who carry the same evening just as well.
Where the four hours go on a theatre night
Half an hour in a bar to begin, because arriving at a table cold is the one avoidable mistake of the evening. An hour and a quarter for supper, which is what a kitchen will give you before it needs the table back for the second sitting. Two and a half hours for whatever is on, interval included. Then twenty minutes to walk back through an emptied Piazza, which is when people tend to say the thing they came out to say. That is four hours with the edges neat, at £900.
Getting a table the same afternoon
Theatre night tables go early, and the sensible order is companion first, table second: the desk replies in under a quarter of an hour and a restaurant will not. Once her name is written down you have a party of two and a fixed hour to ask for. If the room you wanted is full, the second tier here is as good as the first, the small dining rooms around Seven Dials keep counter seats back most nights, and the booking page holds wording you can copy for the message that starts all of it.
Dressing for the room you have chosen
There is no single answer, because this postcode holds a panelled Victorian dining room and a bare wood counter within four minutes of each other. Name the room to the desk and she will dress for it: something unfussy for a Seven Dials kitchen, something more considered for the river road, a coat that reads properly in an opera house foyer. Getting this right matters less to the restaurant than it does to you, and she would far rather ask the question than guess at the answer.
Names who are good across a table
Karolina keeps up with the season well enough to have opinions about casting, and will explain over supper why the second act worked. Bianka has a view on where you ought to eat before the question has finished, and it is usually the right one. Liana is unhurried, reads everything, and is easy company after a day of being talked at. Vanessa rushes nothing, ever, and Thea is green eyed, warm and good at the long second bottle. Four of those five sit in the late twenties group.
A dinner with no performance in it
Plenty of these four hour evenings never go near an auditorium. A slow table on Lamb's Conduit Street, a walk down to the water afterwards, a nightcap under a low ceiling in Strand and Aldwych: the length is what you are booking, not the itinerary. Three hours at £700 covers a table and a drink comfortably if you would rather not start early, and £500 buys the two hour version for a night that began somewhere else entirely.
When the table runs long
Kitchens overrun and so do second bottles. If the four hours will run out before you are ready, say so at the table and the desk will tell you within a few minutes whether the rest of her night allows another hour, charged at the ordinary rate and never at a premium. If it does not, the evening ends where it was booked to end. Lateness at the front works the same way: fifteen minutes of grace, after which the hours move rather than stretch.
This evening, answered
No. The figure is four hours of her time and her company. The bill, the tickets and anything else ordered are settled by you on the night, which is also the reason nobody at this house ever asks you for a card number.
Wherever you would like them to. Most guests have her come to the hotel so you walk out together, and some prefer to be at the table first and have her join them there. Both are ordinary. Say which when you write, and give the restaurant name if it is the second.
Yes. Three hours at £700 handles a table and a drink without a performance, and two hours at £500 suits a late supper. Four hours is simply the length that fits a dinner and a curtain with room to breathe between them.
Neither, and we would rather not: an agency holding your reservation is a trail nobody needs. Give the desk the curtain time and the name of the restaurant, and everything on our side is timed around both of them.
Written for this evening
Other evenings
Call the stage door
One message names the evening you want and the desk answers inside a quarter of an hour, at any point on the clock. Tell us the day, the hour, how long you would like and where she should come, and the rest is written down for you.
Running order
- Half hour
- Beginners
- YouCurtain up
- Interval
- Final bow