The Rose Theatre

‘What’s in a name?’, a famous playwright once asked. The Rose Theatre, in its current position in Broadwaters Kidderminster, has been home to the Nonentities Society since 1981. The building takes its name from the founder of the society, Kenneth Rose, who fought long and hard to keep a theatre in Kidderminster. When Mr Rose needed a name for his newly formed society back in 1937, he coined ‘The Nonentities’ as a reaction against the grander, more pretentious names of other similar societies of the time.

The Nonnies were a force to be reckoned with and survived the closure of the Playhouse in 1968, the interim move to St Oswald’s and the fight to fund a new building – we are now firmly in place at The Rose Theatre. We survived the recent threat of closure during Covid, thanks to the generous support of our members and audiences from the Wyre Forest area and beyond. We are mindful of the tremendous responsibility to keep alive a theatre which encourages the development of a variety of the Performing Arts. Read on for more detailed accounts of our history.