The Shakespeare ceiling
Romeo and Juliet, Othello and King Lear above the hall.
Erika Mlejová (sk:Redaktor:Erika Mlejová) — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Ladislav Luppa — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Ingo Mehling — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Scotch Mist — CC BY-SA 4.0
A neo-Renaissance building standing squarely in the middle of Hlavná square, dividing it in two and becoming its visual axis. It was built between 1897 and 1899 in the style then standard for theatres across the Austro-Hungarian empire: an ornamented facade, statuary, a dome and a grand central stair. The interior is the surprise: a horseshoe hall with four tiers of boxes, entirely gilded, and a painted ceiling showing scenes from **Shakespeare** — Romeo and Juliet, Othello, King Lear, and A Midsummer Night''s Dream. The theatre is **fully working**: opera, ballet and drama in rotation, with a season from September to June. Prices are among the lowest in Europe for performance of this standard. Note: **it is not normally visitable as a museum** — the natural way to see the interior is to **attend a performance**, and tickets are cheap and often available on the day. Directly in front of it is the **Singing Fountain**, the city''s best-known evening appointment.
Romeo and Juliet, Othello and King Lear above the hall.
A horseshoe with four tiers of boxes.
Neo-Renaissance with statuary and a dome, the axis of Hlavná.
Hlavná 58, Košice
It depends on the form. **Opera and ballet, yes without hesitation**: ballet has no words at all, and opera is given in its original language (usually Italian) with surtitles, so the experience is the same as anywhere — except that a ticket here can be **ten times cheaper** than in Vienna, a few hours away. **Drama, though, is in Slovak** with no surtitles as a rule, and is impractical for non-speakers. ⚠ The season runs **September to June** and the theatre closes in summer — which is exactly when most tourists visit Košice. ⚠ Book online or at the box office; tickets are usually available on the day.
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