Hudson Theatre
139 West 44th Street | also 153 West 44th Street | Times Square | built 1988
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The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.
Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.
- 1903
Actors christen the unfinished Hudson Theatre with champagne on its roof
At 9 a.m. on March 30, 1903, producer Henry B. Harris gathered his staff and stage stars at the construction site to name the theater and win press attention. Alice Fischer and Robert Edeson climbed ladders to the roof, where Fischer broke a champagne bottle against the flagstaff and Edeson raised a flag reading Hudson Theatre. The companies then lunched inside the unfinished house.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1903
The Hudson Theatre opens with Ethel Barrymore in Cousin Kate
Financier George Gustav Heye and producer Henry B. Harris open a Beaux-Arts theater on West 44th Street, its facade designed by J.B. McElfatrick & Son and its interior by Israels & Harder. The 1,076-seat house, finished in marble and Tiffany art glass, opens with Ethel Barrymore starring in Cousin Kate.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1904
Henry Miller interrupts Camille to tell the audience that New York's critics are ignoramuses
Henry Miller was starring with Margaret Anglin in Camille when the audience applauded so long after the third act on April 30, 1904 that he stepped before the curtain. He told them the city's critics did not take serious actors seriously. The Times reported it the next day, and in a follow-up interview Miller said editors wanted reviewers to be witty instead of thoughtful.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1904
Ethel Barrymore speaks the line "That's all there is, there isn't any more" in Sunday
Barrymore returned to the Hudson in 1904 in Thomas Raceward's play Sunday. According to the Landmarks Preservation Commission's report on the theater, she delivered the lines that became famous: "That's all there is, there isn't any more." She had opened the house the year before in Cousin Kate.
- 1905
Shaw allows an altered Man and Superman at the Hudson, a first for him
During the 1905-06 season the Hudson presented George Bernard Shaw's Man and Superman, with Richard Bennett in the lead. The Landmarks Preservation Commission notes that Shaw had never before let one of his plays be staged in a version that departed from his own text.
“This was the first time that Shaw had allowed one of his plays to be performed in a version different from the way he had actually written it.”
- 1912
Producer Henry B. Harris dies aboard the Titanic
Harris, who had bought the Hudson Theatre from Heye in 1908 for $700,000, drowns when the Titanic sinks that April. His widow, Renee Harris, takes over operation of the theater and becomes one of Broadway's first female producers.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1934
CBS leases the Hudson and turns its stage into a radio studio
In 1934 the Columbia Broadcasting System leased the theater and opened it as the CBS Radio Playhouse. The first-floor boxes were removed to fit in booths for the announcer and for commercials. The radio era ended in 1937, when the theater took back the Hudson name and returned to staged productions.
- 1941
Arsenic and Old Lace opens a run of 1,444 performances
The dark comedy Arsenic and Old Lace begins a run at the Hudson that reaches 1,444 performances by 1944, a record for the theater at the time. The hit comes years after a 1932 foreclosure had cost the Harris family ownership of the house.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1950
NBC turns the theater into a television studio
NBC converts the Hudson into a broadcast studio, where it produces The Tonight Show with hosts Steve Allen and later Jack Paar through 1960. The run follows CBS's earlier use of the space as a radio playhouse in the mid-1930s.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1962
NBC reportedly sells the Hudson to builders planning a garage, and theater people protest
In December 1961 the Times reported that the Hudson had been sold to a garage operator who would raze it once its last tenant, producer Robert Breen, left. On May 18, 1962 it reported NBC had sold the theater for about $1.25 million to a construction firm planning offices and a garage. A public outcry and Actors' Equity demonstrations, according to Daytonian in Manhattan, changed NBC's mind.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1982
Eighty-two witnesses speak for landmark status for the Hudson at 1982 hearings
The Landmarks Preservation Commission held hearings on the Hudson on June 14 and 15 and again on October 19, 1982. Eighty-two witnesses spoke for designation and one against. The owner appeared but had not formed a view, and the commission designated the theater a landmark on November 17, 1987.
“Eighty-two witnesses spoke or read statements into the record in favor of designation. One witness spoke in opposition to designation.”
- 1990
Kasparov and Karpov play the World Chess Championship in the Hudson while renovations continue
In 1990 the Hudson, by then a conference center for the Hotel Macklowe, hosted the World Chess Championship between the Soviet grandmasters Garry Kasparov and Anatoly Karpov. It was New York's first world championship since 1907. The match went ahead while the theater's $7 million renovation was still under way.
Source: Wikipedia
- 2017
The Hudson reopens as a Broadway theater after three decades
Following stints as an adult movie house, a nightclub, and a hotel conference center, the theater reopens for live Broadway performances with Sunday in the Park with George. The revival follows the building's 1987 landmark designation and its incorporation into the Millennium Broadway hotel complex.
Source: Wikipedia
Further reading
- Hudson TheatreWikipedia
- The 1903 Hudson Theatre -- No 139 W 44th StreetDaytonian in Manhattan
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