Lenox Lyceum in 1492. The Lenox Lyceum (LL) was built by New York City contractor and real estate developer John D. Crimmins. Crimmins was at that time Commissioner of the
New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, and the planned LL had the backing of the city government. on Madison Avenue into a music hall for
Theodore Thomas and his orchestra. Transformation of the building into a performance venue under this plan began in 1888 but it was abandoned after the announcement to build
Carnegie Hall.
The Philadelphia Times stated that the LL sat 1500 people and "combined the best features of a theatre, ballroom, lecture auditorium, and a dining hall." The choreographer and ballroom operator
Edward Ferrero was the original lessee of the theatre, and he ran it through 1899. The LL was officially inaugurated on January 2, 1890, with a performance by Theodore Thomas's orchestra. In 1890–1891 Thomas conducted several concerts at the LL featuring music by mainly American composers, among them
Rudolph Aronson,
Frederick Grant Gleason,
Victor Herbert,
John Knowles Paine,
Herman Rietzel, and
Harry Rowe Shelley. The concerts tended to feature popular music, but at times Thomas and his orchestra would play more serious masterworks by major composers. Victor Herbert shared conducting duties with Thomas, Soloists who performed with the Thomas's orchestra at the LL included pianist
Leopold Godowsky, violinist
Franz Wilczek, and soprano
Anna Mooney Burch. The LL was used for a banquet celebrating the centennial of the founding of the
Federal judiciary of the United States on February 4, 1890. The
Supreme Court of the United States and former American president
Grover Cleveland were seated on the stage of the hall.
James C. Carter was the toastmaster at the event, and speeches were given by Cleveland, chief justice
Melville Fuller, and justice
John Marshall Harlan among others. Edison had earlier demonstrated twelve of his
Edison's Phonograph Dolls at the LL in 1889. On October 1, 1890, the LL was one of two venues that gave the first performances in New York City of
Pietro Mascagni's opera
Cavalleria rusticana. The LL staging was the authorized version as its producer,
Oscar Hammerstein I, had purchased the rights to performance in the United States. However, its evening performance on that day was not the first, as Rudolph Aronson of the
Casino Theatre, rushed to grab the first performance credit by giving an unauthorized matinee performance of the opera. Hammerstein sued and the Casino version was forced to close. The LL cast was led by
Georgine von Januschofsky as Santuzza with her husband
Adolf Neuendorff conducting. In April 1891 soprano
Olga Islar performed at the LL with the
Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and conductor
Anton Seidl. In 1892 the
Spanish Benevolent Society held its annual ball at the LL which was attended by the Cuban nationalist poet
José Martí. On March 27, 1892,
Walter Damrosch conducted the premiere of
Reginald De Koven's
March of the Gnomes at the LL. The following December,
Anton Seidl conducted a performance of
La Gioconda with
Emma Juch in the tile role and
Clara Poole King as Laura. On February 20, 1893 the
New York City Police broke up a
Mardi Gras banquet sponsored by the
French Consulate, evicting 1500 French people from the venue. The diners, participating in a tame family-oriented event, were targeted because of a wild party, the French Ball (February 11, 1893), that had created headlines earlier that month and embarrassed the city in the press. That same year the LL was the main venue for the World's Candy Exposition. In mid December 1889 a large event honoring archbishop
Michael Corrigan just prior to his pilgrimage to the
Vatican was held at the LL. In February 1894
Professor Mike Donovan gave a boxing exhibition at the LL as a fundraiser for the
New York Athletic Club. French writer and critic
Ferdinand Brunetière lectured on the
Alliance française at the LL during his visit to the United States in 1897. On October 14, 1899
Theodore Roosevelt addressed a largely African-American audience at the LL during his campaign for
Governor of New York. In the early 20th century the LL was used frequently for fairs, bicycle tournaments, This was followed by
The Bohemian Girl with a cast led by May Fiske and Henry C. Peakes. The LL was used temporarily as an armory by the
71st New York Infantry Regiment after a fire damaged the regiment's armory. 'They were in residence at the LL in 1904 when a construction on a new armory began. The leader of the band of the 71st regiment was composer
Francesco Fanciulli whose romaze,
Love Story, was premiered at the LL by cellist Louis Blumenberg in March 1903.
New German Theater . 's painting
The Quest for Beauty. In 1908
Walter J. Salmon Sr., the owner of the LL, leased the theatre to Maurice Baumfeld of the German Theatre company. Under Salmon's supervision significant alterations and renovations to the theatre began in April 1908, and it was renamed the New German Theater (sometimes given as New German Theatre, also referred to as Neues Deutsches Theater). The redesigned theatre removed columns that obstructed views of the stage, and the seating capacity was diminished to 1200 people. Architecture firm Hedman and Schoen (Axel S. Hedman & Eugene Schoen) oversaw the design and construction which included a new facade on the exterior of the building, and artist
Alphonse Mucha was hired to create murals and other interior designs to decorate the theatre. These included stencils in the shape of abstract plant forms, and a giant painting,
The Quest for Beauty, above the proscenium. This was immediately followed by a production of
Ferenc Molnár's
The Devil with
Eugen Burg in the title role. It toured to the
Brooklyn Academy of Music. Other actors in the NGT company included
Hedwiga Reicher, Carl Sick, Bianca Froehlich, Ilse von Tasso,
Emil Lind, Mara Korff,
Harry Liedtke, Martha Spier, Ferdinand Steil,
Madame Neuendorff, and Kurt Grosser. Japanese actress Madame Fuki-Ko was a guest performer at the NGT in November 1908 and performed the one act Japanese play
The Vampire Cat of Nabéshima in a triple bill with two German one-act plays. In February 1909
Conrad Dreher joined the company to star in
Oscar Blumenthal and
Max Bernstein's comedy
Matthias Gollinger. Dreher also penned the play
Zechpreller which was given at the NGT in March 1909. The NGT was not successful and only lasted for the 1908–1909 season. Some of the other plays performed by the NGT included
Gustav Wied's
2 x 2 = 5 (1908),
Pierre Wolff's
Das Grosse Geheimnis (1908),
Friedrich Schiller's
The Robbers (1908),
Ludwig Ganghofer and
Marco Brociner's
The Wedding of Valeni (1908), and Ludwig Heller's
Wolken Kratzer (1908),
Robert und Bertram (1908, either the play by
Gustav Räder or one based on it),
Henri Bernstein's
La Griffe (1909, given in a German language translation
Die Kralle), Schiller's
William Tell (1909), 's
Jaegerblut (1909),
Der Blaue Teufel (1909),
Oscar Wilde's
Salome (1909), and
Gerhart Hauptmann's
The Weavers (1909). After the company of the NGT departed, a touring light opera company temporarily took over the theater to give performances of
Franz Lehár's operetta
Der Rastelbinder in early April 1909.
Plaza Music Hall / Plaza Theatre In February 1909 it was announced the
Shubert brothers had acquired the NGT for the 1909–1910 season and that it would join its theatre empire as the Plaza Theatre. However, this plan never came to fruition, and in April 1909 the NGT was leased instead by William Morris of the
William Morris Agency. It was re-named the Plaza Music Hall (PMH) as a venue for
vaudeville, re-opening under that name on April 19, 1909, with a program headlined by
Julian Eltinge,
Edith Helena, Rice & Cady, and
Saharet. Some of the other vaudeville performers who worked at the PMH during its history included
Mr. and Mrs. Sidney Drew (1909); Scottish actress
Cecilia Loftus (1909);
John C. Rice and his partner Sally Cohen (1910); British singer and actress Lucy Weston (1910); Irish tenor Joseph Sheehan (1910); English singer and comedian
George Lashwood (1911); comedy team
Montgomery and Moore (1911); husband and wife duo Charles Ross and Mabel Fenton (1911), sidewalk pitchman Charles Kenna (1911); comedy duo Bert Clark and Mabel Hamilton (1911); and The Pendleton Sisters (1911). It was still operating as the PMH as late as March 1911 when it was acquired by
Marcus Loew. Loew converted the theatre into a
cinema as a part of his movie theatre empire. ==References==