Theatre and stage

La salle de spectacle is a plain phrase in French and a trap in translation, because the word inside it has drifted a long way in English. Le spectacle is the ordinary, unloaded name for a performance of any kind: a play, a circus, a concert, a school show. Aller au spectacle is to go out for the evening; le spectacle commence à vingt heures is what a poster says; la salle de spectacle is simply the room the public sits in. « Spectacle » in English does none of that work. It names something striking and usually excessive, a sight that draws a crowd, and it carries a judgement the French word has not got: to make a « spectacle » of yourself is to be embarrassing in public. In the plural it has wandered off again and means a pair of glasses. So a sentence telling the reader that the « spectacle » begins at eight sounds either grand or faintly absurd. The words to reach for are « show » and « performance », and for the room itself « auditorium ».