Imperial Theater

The Imperial Theater is a theatre located opposite the imperial palace’s detached court gardens and the palace complex moat. The Imperial Theatre is noted for being the first western style theatre in Japan, the building also incorporates the Idemitsu Museum of Arts.

The theatre was first opened in 1911, although the present theatre complex was built in the mid 60′s and hosts everything from local production of big Broadway musicals like Rent, Les Miserables or Mis Saigon through to local production and films.

The theatre is owned by the Toho group, one of Japan’s largest film company’s and a gift shop on site sells plenty of DVD and CD’s of the companies and the Imperial Theatre’s work.

Also part of the theatre building on the 9th floor is the Idemitsu Museum of Arts which is an exhibition hall for the Idemitsu Collection. The hall houses special exhibitions around six to seven times a year, with themed exhibitions of selected works from the Idemitsu Collection of Japanese painting and calligraphy, and East Asian ceramics. Other attractions include a year-round exhibition of major works by the French master of religious paintings Georges Rouault as well as the works by the Norwegian painter Edvard Munch.

The Imperial Theatre is located at 3-1-1 Marunouchi and is only a few meters from Yurakucho Station (Y18) on the Tokyo Metro Yurakucho Line or Hibiya Station (I08) on Toei’s Mita line. Hibiya Park is only a few blocks away along with the Hibiya stations (H07 & C09) of Tokyo Metro’s Hibya or Chiyoda Line.