the troupe for which shakespeare wrote his earliest plays is not known with certainty; the title page of the 1594 edition of "titus andronicus" reveals that it had been acted by three different companies. after the plagues of 1592–93, shakespeare's plays were performed by the lord chamberlain's men, a new company of which shakespeare was a founding member, at the theatre and the curtain in shoreditch, north of the thames. londoners flocked there to see the first part of "henry iv", leonard digges recalling, "let but falstaff come, hal, poins, the rest ... and you scarce shall have a room". when the landlord of the theatre announced that he would not renew the company's lease, they pulled the playhouse down and used the timbers to construct the globe theatre, the first london playhouse built by actors for actors, on the south bank of the thames at southwark. the globe opened in autumn 1599, with "julius caesar" one of the first plays staged. most of shakespeare's greatest post-1599 plays were written for the globe, including "hamlet", "othello" and "king lear".