Lucille Lortel Theatre

Coordinates: 40°43′59.78″N 74°0′20.72″W / 40.7332722°N 74.0057556°W / 40.7332722; -74.0057556

Lucille Lortel Theatre
Theatre de Lys

(2013)
Address 121 Christopher Street
Manhattan, New York City
USA
Owner Lucille Lortel Foundation
Type proscenium
Capacity 299
Opened June 9, 1953
Website
www.lortel.org

The Lucille Lortel Theatre is an off-Broadway playhouse at 121 Christopher Street in Manhattan's West Village. It was built in 1926 as a 590-seat movie theater called the New Hudson, later known as Hudson Playhouse. The interior is largely unchanged to this day.

In the early 1950s, the site was converted to an off-Broadway theater as Theatre de Lys, opening on June 9, 1953, with a production of Maya, a play by Simon Gantillon starring Kay Medford, Vivian Matalon, and Susan Strasberg.[1] It closed after seven performances. Much more successful was The Threepenny Opera which opened March 10, 1954, with a cast that included Bea Arthur, John Astin, Lotte Leyna, Leon Lishner, Scott Merrill, Gerald Price, Charlotte Rae and Jo Sullivan.[2] Because of an incoming booking, it was forced to close after 96 performances. Re-opening September 20, 1955, with largely the same cast, The Threepenny Opera this time played until December 17, 1961,[3] a then record-setting run for a musical in New York City.

In 1955, financier Louis Schweitzer acquired the building as an anniversary present for his wife, actress-producer Lucille Lortel. In 1981, the year of her 81st birthday, the theatre was renamed in her honor. After Lortel's death, the theatre was left to the Lucille Lortel Foundation.[4]

Notable productions

References

  1. ↑ Maya at the Internet off-Broadway Database
  2. ↑ The Threepenny Opera (1954) at the Internet off-Broadway Database
  3. ↑ The Threepenny Opera (1955–1961) at the Internet off-Broadway Database
  4. ↑ "Preserving a Theater Legacy in Westport"
  5. ↑ Review: The School for Scandal by Helen Shaw, Time Out, New York
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Lucille Lortel Theatre.


This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 8/5/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.