Irving Place Theatre

For the rock venue, see Irving Plaza

The Irving Place Theatre was a located at the south-west corner of Irving Place and East 15th Street in the Union Square neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. Built in 1888, it has served as a German language theatre, a Yiddish theatre, a burlesque house, a union meeting hall, a theatre and a cinema. It is now demolished.

History

The original building on the site was Irving Hall, which opened in 1860 as a venue for balls, lectures, and concerts. It was also for many years the base for one faction of the city's Democratic Party.[1]

The facility was rebuilt, and opened as Amberg's German Theatre in 1888 under the management of Gustav Amberg, as a home for German-language theatre.[2] Heinrich Conried took over management in 1893, and changed the name to Irving Place Theatre. The first night of the play Narrentanz (The Fool´s Game) by Leo Birinski took place here on November 13, 1912.[3]

In 1918 the facility became the home of a Yiddish theater company under the management of Maurice Schwartz.[4] By the 1920s burlesque shows were offered alongside Yiddish drama.[5]

Clemente Giglio converted the theate in 1939 into a cinema to present Italian films.[6] In 1940 it was taken over by a group of non-Equity actors, the "Merely Players", whose productions were picketed by the theatrical unions.[7] During the war it presented a steady program of mixed bills of Soviet propaganda and French films, as well as weekly folk dance sessions.

References

Notes
  1. ^ "Union Square Loses Its Old Residences" (PDF). The New York Times (The New York Times Company). 18 June 1916. http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9C03E2DF123DEF3ABC4052DFB066838D609EDE. Retrieved 2009-06-14. 
  2. ^ Ward & Trent, et al., ed (1907-21). "23". The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 Volumes. XVIII. New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons. ISBN 1-58734-073-9. http://www.bartleby.com/228/0823.html. 
  3. ^ "The Fool´s Game Acted" (PDF). The New York Times (The New York Times Company): p. 11. 14 November 1912. http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=F60E1EFE355E13738DDDAD0994D9415B828DF1D3. Retrieved 2011-08-01. 
  4. ^ "German Drama to Move; Irving Place Theatre Will Be Yiddish Playhouse". The New York Times (The New York Times Company). 14 February 1918. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9C0CE4D6103FE433A25757C1A9649C946996D6CF. Retrieved 2009-06-14. 
  5. ^ Shteir, Rachel (2004). Striptease: the untold history of the girlie show. Oxford University Press US. pp. 65. ISBN 9780195127508. http://books.google.com/books?id=fEtWpyiGxDAC. Retrieved 2009-06-14. 
  6. ^ "The Screen: Ethiopian War in Film" New York Times (April 11, 1939) - "Cinema opens April 10, 1939 with "II Grande Appello" ("The Last Roll-Call") made in Ethiopia by Mario Camerini"
  7. ^ "Show That Defies Unions Takes In $74 in a Week" New York Times (February 25, 1940) - "Outside the New Irving Place Theatre, at Fifteenth Street, the actors have posted a sign that reads: 'We are a young cooperative group, pro-labor to a man,' After giving 'Othello' for a week despite picket lines established by A.F. of L. theatrical unions, a group of youthful actors checked up on their box-office receipts yesterday and discovered that they had taken in $74"

External links