Impavidi is the oldest example of theatre built as indipendent building with a clear precise connotation, a “lay temple” of a middle class who at the beginning of the 19th century wants to claim its emergent role.
For this reason the church and the convent of the Black Friars, already deserted for some years, were considered the ideal place to satisfy the necessity of a town which since ‘700 was famous for its theatrical life.
The idea of building the theatre was born by the association of 14 entrepreneurs that became eight when six of them thought that it was not a good idea to use a place for public amusement where once there had been religious services.
The work started the 31st May 1807 and finished July 1809.

A large part of the pre-existing structure was demolished, but there are still some traces; a lunette painted in the changing room reveals us the cloister that is still intact in a bordering building and perhaps also the pit under the stage should belong to the convent, even if, at that time it was in use to place one under the stage to improve the acoustics of the hall.
The project was assigned to the architect Paolo Bargigli, professor of the Accademy of Carrara, and later he was partenered by Bernardo Valenti, who brought substantial changings to the original project.
Valenti built a theatre in which there is a masterly balance between 18th century and neoclassical elements.
The theatre opens on Garibaldi square with a front with two different rows of windows, where some of the 2nd floor are gabled; the façade is enriched by a cornice, some pilasters and various wrought-iron objects, an evidence of this old tradition of Sarzana.
The stalls are surrounded by three tiers of boxes and by the gallery which could offer about 800 seats.
Decorations, stuccoes and medallions adorn the inside; the squared proscenium has on the top a rectilinear proscenium arch held up by corinthian pilasters; the front curtain, a Maret’s work now lost, depicted Homer while he was playing the lyre to accompany the verses of his poems; the second curtain and the ceiling were painted by the genoan painter G. Battista Celle; the partions which separated the boxes are decorated with caryatids in relief.
The ceiling fell down in 1815 and only a year later the theatre had again its fresco-painted vaulted ceiling; futher damages happened during the Second World War when a bomb fell on the vault and some frescoes were irremediably damaged; after an exam of the pictures of the vault it is clear the absence of playing cupids and other decorative elements. The roof above is held by wooden trusses that cover a light of about 15 m. with an impressive and suggestive wooden frame of rafters and joists.
Recently the theatre was opened again after it has been conformed to the new safety regulations, keeping on the tradition that, for almost two centuries, sees Impavidi the witness of life and emotions of the people of Sarzana.