Wallack's Theatre

{{multiple image James W. Wallack and Lester Wallack, father and son, were 19th century actors and theater managers; that is, entrepreneurs whose business was a theatrical stock company, a troupe of actors and support personnel presenting a variety of plays in one theater. Aged 57, he was a well-known and well-respected British American actor who had proved himself as a manager at the National Theater (Church and Leonard Streets) from 1837 until it burned down in 1839. The elder Wallack had made his first appearance in America at age 24, on September 7, 1818, playing Macbeth at the Park Theatre to much acclaim. Lester's first appearance in the United States had been made, also to much acclaim, at age 27 on opening night of the aforementioned Broadway Theatre, September 27, 1847, playing Sir Charles Coldstream in the afterpiece, Dion Boucicault's and Charles Mathews' farce Used Up. (His stage name was John Lester; he didn't work as Lester Wallack until October 1858.) Ireland's assessment (published in 1867): The establishment heretofore known as Brougham's Lyceum, which during the [1851–52] season had ceased to attract any share of public attention, [in 1852] passed into the hands of James W. Wallack, who, with [his department heads], soon succeeded not only in rivaling, but in a measure superseding Burton's Theatre in public esteem. The hand of a master was visible in every production, and the taste, elegance, and propriety displayed about the whole establishment gave it a position of respectability never hitherto enjoyed in New York, except at the old Park Theatre. In 1858, the English violinist and conductor Henry Cooper and English soprano Annie Milner formed an opera company for Wallack's Theatre. The company, which performed mostly Italian operas, was not successful compared to the established opera companies performing Italian opera in New York City. The company instead became a touring company, and finally returned to England in 1861 after the outbreak of the Civil War. After Wallack, 1861–69 In 1861, Wallack moved his company. After he left number 485, the theater was continued under various managers and names and underwent various vicissitudes—German opera, melodrama, legitimate theatre, concerts, Lent's Circus—until 1864, when it came under the management of George Wood, who restored its pre-circus condition and opened it May 2 as the Broadway Theatre. On April 1, 1867, Wood transferred the lease to Barney Williams, who managed the house for its last two years. The final performance was a benefit for Williams' business manager on Wednesday, April 28, 1869, comprising Ireland as It Was, the farces The Returned Volunteer and Game of Tag, two dance numbers, and performers with velocipedes. The Broadway Theatre was soon torn down and replaced by the extant (in 2013) building comprising a store and lofts. ==844 Broadway at 13th Street==

Wallack's Theatre, 1861–81 As the city grew northward, James Wallack sought to follow. So did William Gibson, a glass stainer and supplier of architectural ornament, who by 1860 had acquired land on the northeast corner of Broadway and 13th Street Sketches for the interior of the theater were begun by Trimble, the last he ever made: the work and his career were ended by blindness. The design was carried out by his student Thomas R. Jackson. For something more than twenty years [writes Brown] the most famous theatre in the United States was that of James W. Wallack, situated on the northeast corner of Broadway and Thirteenth Street. ... It was in this house the name of Wallack won its proudest laurels. [James] W. Wallack was its first manager, but he never played there, and to all intents and purposes J. Lester Wallack, with Theodore Moss in the business department, was from the first head and front of the theatre. ... The initial program was The New President, by Tom Taylor, September 25, 1861. The first season closed June 9, 1862, with a benefit to Theodore Moss. The New York Times wrote:The last night at Wallack's was an appropriate climax to nine months of brilliantly successful management. ... The entertainment offered on [Moss'] behalf on Monday was, in our opinion, the very best that had been advertised anywhere for a twelve-month. The Little Treasure and Rural Felicity were given, and between the pieces Mr. Wallack—the Veteran himself—delivered his annual speech. In 1869, Junius Henri Browne wrote: Wallack's is, and has been for years, the best theater in the United States, and is quite as good as any in Europe outside of Paris. It is devoted almost entirely to comedy, and has no 'stars,' as that term is usually employed, but the most capable and best-trained company that can be selected at home or abroad. Plays without any particular merit succeed, because they are so carefully put upon the stage, so fitly costumed and so conscientiously enacted. ... The old stage traditions and time-honored conventionalisms are given up there. Mouthing, ranting, and attitudinizing are not in vogue; and men and women appear and act as such, and represent art instead of artificiality. It is commonly said that New-York goes to Wallack's; and so it does more than to any other place of amusement. But lovers of good acting from every section usually avail themselves of a sojourn in the city to witness the artistic representations at that theater. Among the actors were, at various times, Charles Fisher, John Gilbert, James Williamson, J. W. Wallack Jr., E. L. Davenport, J. H. Stoddart, Charles Mathews, E. M. Holland, Steele Mackaye, Charles Coghlan, Harry Edwards, Madame Ponisi, Mary Gannon, Mrs. John Hoey, Rose Eytinge, Effie Germon, Jeffreys Lewis, Ada Dyas, Stella Boniface, and Madeline Henriques. According to Brown, some of the notable performances in the 1860s, not only on account of their artistic quality, but on account of the large receipts, were The Poor Gentleman, The Provoked Husband, She Stoops to Conquer, Still Waters Run Deep, The School for Scandal, Captain of the Watch, Central Park, ''The Belle's Stratagem, and The Rivals.'' But the great run of those days was made by Rosedale, in which Lester Wallack was a singularly graceful, handsome, and attractive hero. The rôle fitted him admirably. The play ran in 1863 for 125 nights, something almost unprecedented. ... The most phenomenal run at the house occurred during the following decade, when Dion Boucicault produced The Shaughraun, which had 143 performances." In 1871 Lester Wallack brought the English scenic designer Joseph Clare to New York to become his company's resident designer. Theatre historian Gerald Bordman stated that Clare's work for Wallack gained Clare "the reputation of possibly the finest set designer in America, with his settings admired for their elegance and proper sense of period". 1887–95 On August 22, 1887, the house opened under the management of Henry E. Abbey, John B. Schoeffel, Burgess went bankrupt and Moss reacquired the primary leases, which expired May 1, 1899, finally ending his association with the Star Theatre. In that year the ground owner, William Waldorf Astor, announced the projected redevelopment of the site, but the Gulick firm made a good enough offer that the plan was postponed and a provisional lease was granted to them, which in the event ran two years. A time-lapse film of the demolition, which began the same month, was made by the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company from diagonally across Broadway; it was added to the National Film Registry in 2002. The theater was replaced by an eight-story commercial structure, designed by Clinton & Russell, whose principal tenant was the clothier Rogers, Peet & Co. Today the entire block is occupied by a 1999 mixed-use building, with an entrance to a multiplex cinema on the Wallack's site. ==30th Street and Broadway==

'' for January 7, 1882 Wallack's Theatre, 1881–88 1881–87 Ground was broken for Lester Wallack's new theater on the northeast corner of 30th Street and Broadway and on December 4, The New York Times reported: The building, which is erected on ground leased for 21 years, with the privilege of two renewals of 21 years each, has frontage of 105 feet on Broadway and 122 feet on Thirtieth-street. In due course, a nine-story flat-house will rise above the theatre [never built], and shops will environ it. ... The main entrance is on Broadway and is 30 feet wide, the visitor passing under a portico resting on six polished red granite columns. There are, besides, two gallery entrances on Broadway, an entrance on Thirtieth-street, and stage entrances on Thirtieth-street and on Broadway. ... The parquet and balcony contain 800 seats. ... The gallery contains 450 most comfortable chairs. There are also eight boxes. ... Under the Broadway curbstone and the main entrance is a café. ... A magnificent chandelier of copper and brass, with a spread of 14 feet and 200 burners, depends from the dome, and smaller gas-fixtures spring from the painted panels on the walls and other points. Electric lights will be used outside the theatre, and the question of using them within was ... dismissed from immediate consideration. ... The architect is Mr. George A. Freeman Jr. And losing his health. The Wallack stock company played six seasons at 30th Street and 35 altogether. The company ended its last home season on May 7, 1887, played a week in Brooklyn, and on May 16 went to Daly's Theatre, across the street, for a two-week run of The Romance of a Poor Young Man. On May 30 its engagement, and its existence, ended. opened October 8, 1888, as a "combination house" (i. e., a theater for the presentation of combination companies), having been previously booked with the Abbey firm's attractions for most of the first season. Palmer's announced goal was to establish a stock company there, either by using players from his company at the smaller Madison Square Theatre, or by transferring the entire troupe. But although his actors performed occasional engagements at Palmer's, it remained a combination house. Among the performers appearing at Palmer's Theatre were Benoît–Constant Coquelin and Jane Hading, Richard Mansfield, Rose Coghlan, Mary Anderson, Mrs. James Brown–Potter, Charles Wyndham, Tommaso Salvini, E. S. Willard, Marie Wainwright, John Drew (Jr.), Maude Adams, Annie Russell, Lillie Langtry, Julia Marlowe, and Georgia Cayvan. The McCaull company played 30 weeks in 1889 and 17 in 1891. Comic operas were also given by the companies of Henry E. Dixey, Digby Bell, and Della Fox, among others. The biggest hit at Palmer's Theatre was the burlesque 1492 Up to Date, which played 29 weeks (not counting a summer hiatus, during which the show played the Garden Theatre) in 1893 and 1894. By November 1896, Palmer was $31,000 in arrears to Moss, who threatened to sue. Instead, Palmer relinquished his lease two years early, on November 16. Moss restored the theater's original name on December 7. Moss died July 13, 1901, at his country home in Sea Bright, New Jersey, just a few weeks after the Star Theatre's demolition. Moss' eldest daughter had married Lester Wallack's eldest son; another daughter was married to architect C. P. H. Gilbert. Unlike Lester Wallack, Moss died a wealthy man. His will left the entire estate to his wife Octavia, and requested that the name of Wallack's Theatre be retained. Octavia Moss became the manager of Wallack's Theatre, with active control in the hands of her son, Royal, and Charles Burnham continuing as business manager. In May 1902, Mrs. Moss renewed the ground lease. Over the following years, the theater's hits included The Sultan of Sulu (1902–03), a musical satire by George Ade with music by Alfred George Whathall; The County Chairman (1903–04) by George Ade, starring Maclyn Arbuckle; The Sho-Gun (1904–05) by George Ade with music by Gustav Luders; The Squaw Man (1905–06) by Edwin Milton Royle, starring William Faversham and George Fawcett; The Rich Mr. Hoggenheimer (1906–07), a musical farce with book and lyrics by Harry B. Smith and music by Ludwig Engländer, and starring Sam Bernard; A Knight for a Day (1907–08), a musical comedy with book and lyrics by Robert B. Smith and music by Raymond Hubbell; Alias Jimmy Valentine (1910) by Paul Armstrong, starring H. B. Warner and Laurette Taylor; Pomander Walk (1910–11) by Louis N. Parker, starring George Giddens and Lennox Pawle; Disraeli (1911–12) by Louis N. Parker, starring George Arliss; and Grumpy (1913–14), a thriller by Horace Hodges and T. Wigney Percyval, starring Cyril Maude and Margery Maude. Mrs. Moss died January 15, 1910. Royal Moss, administrator of her estate, leased Wallack's Theatre to Charles Burnham. In January 1915, the Treblig Realty Company, comprising Mrs. Moss' heirs, sold the theater. On January 27, English actor-manager Granville Barker and his troupe began a repertory season at Wallack's. In March, plans were announced for a 12-story factory building to replace 29–33 West 30th Street – i. e., the stage and dressing rooms – curtailing Barker's run. The last performance at Wallack's 30th Street theater occurred on Saturday night, May 1, 1915, when Barker's company presented Androcles and the Lion and The Man Who Married a Dumb Wife. Following the plays, an epilogue written for the occasion by Oliver Herford was read by Rose Coghlan, the leading lady on opening night in 1882. Replacement The new building opened in 1916. The rest of the theatre was turned into retail stores, until it was replaced in 1931 by an eight-story factory building, 1220 Broadway. Both are office buildings today. ==References==