Apollo and Lyric Theatres

THE APOLLO THEATRE on 42nd Street—not to be confused with the Apollo Theater in Harlem—was built in 1910 as a vaudeville house originally called the Bryant Theatre. It was taken over in 1920 by the Selwyn brothers. It was to be the block’s last addition after the Times Square Theater, with which it shared a facade. Designed in the Adamesque style by architects de Rosa and Pereira, the interior was painted tan, rose and blue. The Apollo’s auditorium lay on 43rd Street with a long, narrow hallway leading to a 42nd Street entrance.

The theater opened on November 11, 1920 with Jimme, followed by Macbeth starring Lionel Barrymore. The first real successes came to the Apollo in 1923 in the form of W.C. Fields starring in Poppy and then in 1924 with a Gershwin version of George White’s Scandals. Five more editions of Scandals played at the Apollo, with stars including Ethel Merman, Jimmy Durante, Ray Bolger and Rudy Vallee. Ethel Merman returned in 1933 to star in Take a Chance. From 1934 to 1938 the theater was operated by Max Wilner and ran burlesque shows, but after a unified outcry against burlesque by religious, business, and real estate interests in the late 1930s, it became a film venue.

The Apollo ran foreign films for decades. By the 1970s, like many theaters on 42nd Street, the Apollo ran X-rated films. In 1978, the theater was renovated and reopened with its entrance on 43rd Street. One year later, the opening of On Golden Pond heralded the return of legitimate theater to the stage of the Apollo, which went on to present The Fifth of July in 1978, Bent in 1979 and The Guys in the Truck in 1983. The theater once again showed movies until 1987, when the Orchestra seats were removed, the floor leveled and the interior covered in flat white paint. This incarnation, renamed the Academy, was used for cabaret and popular music concerts featuring ’90s acts like The Smashing Pumpkins, Sonic Youth and Marilyn Manson. The venue closed in 1996.