Yes, Master Shakespeare, you may perform!

This was once the main entrance of the Priory of the Knights Hospitallers of St John, built in 1504. Following the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII it became the Office of the Revels to which dramatists brought their plays to be licensed for performance in London.

So William Shakespeare would have come here clutching his hand written draft of Hamlet or Macbeth, nervously to await the judgment of the office.

Even genius has to deal with red tape :-)