The Casino Theatre was a Broadway theatre located at 1404 Broadway and West 39th Street in New York City. Built in 1882, it was a leading presenter of mostly musicals and operettas until it closed in 1930."Casino Theatre (Built: 1882 Demolished: 1930 Closed: 1930)" Internet Broadway Database (Retrieved on December 31, 2007)
The theatre was the first in New York to be lit entirely by electricity, popularized the chorus line and later introduced white audiences to African-American shows. It originally seated approximately 875 people, however the theatre was enlarged in 1894 and again in 1905, after a fire, when its capacity was enlarged to 1,300 seats. It hosted a number of long-running comic operas, operettas and musical comedies, including Erminie, Florodora, The Vagabond King and The Desert Song. It closed in 1930 and was demolished the same year.Miller, Tom. "The Lost 1882 Casino Theatre – 39th Street and Broadway", Daytonian in Manhattan, June 3, 2013, accessed October 21, 2014
History
The Casino Theatre, designed in Moorish Revival style by architects Francis Hatch Kimball and Thomas Wisedell, was the first theatre in New York to be lit entirely by electricity.Casino Theatre. World Theatres – Broadway and Off Broadway Theatres, accessed May 24, 2011 It was built in 1882 more than 15 blocks north of where the theatre district was then centered, 23rd Street. In 1890, New York's first roof garden was added to the theatre.Bloom, Ken. Routledge Guide to Broadway, Routledge (2013), pp. 44–45 It originally seated approximately 875 people, however the theatre was enlarged in 1894 and again when it was rebuilt in 1905 after a fire in 1903. The redesigned Casino seated 1,300.
The theatre opened with productions by the McCaull Comic Opera Company. It was first managed by producer and composer Rudolph Aronson, and later by Canary & Lederer from 1894 to 1903, and from 1903 by the Shuberts. As the center of the Broadway theatre district moved uptown, north of 42nd Street, the Casino closed in 1930. It was demolished the same year, along with the nearby Knickerbocker Theatre, to make way for the expanding Garment District.
The Casino hosted a series of successful operettas and other musical theatre pieces in the 1880s and 1890s, including the extraordinarily successful Erminie.IBDB entry for the original New York run, accessed October 21, 2014. See also Stone, David. Violet Melnotte (1855–1935) , Who Was Who in the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, Boise State University, accessed October 21, 2014 In 1891, it premiered Cavalleria Rusticana in America, and in 1894 it presented the first Broadway revue, The Passing Show. In 1898, it was host to the premiere of Clorindy, or The Origin of the Cake Walk, the first African-American musical to be presented before a white audience.
The theatre is perhaps best remembered, however, as having been the home of the 1900 production of the Edwardian musical comedy, Florodora. In that show, it became the first theatre in New York to feature a chorus line, the "Florodora Sextet". The sextet's original lineup included a number of ladies who would later achieve fame and fortune. The production "elevated the chorus girl into ... an attraction in its own right." Evelyn Nesbit was a chorus girl in the show in 1901. Over the decades, the theatre also became known for its free Christmas presentations for New York children.
Over the next decade, the theatre continued to present musicals and operettas, some of the most successful being A Chinese Honeymoon (1902), The Earl and the Girl (1905) and The Chocolate Soldier (1909). During World War I, it hosted transfers of several of the Princess Theatre musicals, among other musicals, such as The Blue Paradise (1915) and Sometime (1918). In the 1920s, the theatre was the home of several hit operettas, particularly The Vagabond King and The Desert Song. Although the Casino had led the move uptown by the Broadway theatre district, by 1930, most of the theatres had moved even further north, to the West 40s. The last performance was the opera Faust presented by the American Opera Company on January 18, 1930 with tenor Charles Kullman in the title role and soprano Nancy McCord as Marguerite. The theatre was demolished a month later.
Notable productions
1882: The Queen's Lace Handkerchief 1883: The Beggar Student 1884: Nell Gwynne 1885: Die Fledermaus 1886: Erminie 1888: The Yeomen of the Guard 1890: The Grand Duchess 1891: Cavalleria Rusticana 1894: The Passing Show 1895: The Wizard of the Nile 1896: The Lady Slavey 1896: In Gay New York 1897: The Belle of New York 1897: The Wedding Day 1898: Clorindy, or The Origin of the Cake Walk 1900: Little Red Riding Hood 1900: Florodora 1900: The Casino Girl 1900: The Belle of BohemiaFranceschina, John. Harry B. Smith: Dean of American Librettists, Routledge (2003), p. 169 via Google Books 1901: The Little Duchess 1902: A Chinese Honeymoon 1903: The Runaways 1904: Piff! Paff!! Pouf!!! 1904: Baroness Fiddlesticks 1905: The Earl and the Girl 1909: Havana 1909: The Chocolate Soldier 1912: The Firefly 1912–13: Seasons of Gilbert and Sullivan 1914: High Jinks 1915: The Blue Paradise 1916: Very Good Eddie 1917: Oh, Boy! 1918: Oh, Lady! Lady!! 1918: Sometime 1921: Tangerine 1922: Sally, Irene and Mary 1923: Wildflower 1924: I'll Say She Is – Marx Brothers 1925: The Vagabond King 1926: The Desert Song 1928: My Maryland 1929: The New Moon 1930: American Opera Company's Madama Butterfly and Faust
References
External links
Casino Theatre at the Internet Broadway Database Photos of the theatre and its stars