By
Samuel L. Leiter
The Orpheum Theatre, at
Fulton Street and Rockwell Place, near where today’s BAM Harvey stands, opens,
December 29, 1900.
For further background on Brooklyn’s
theatre history please see my book, Brooklyn Takes the
Stage: Nineteenth-Century Theater in the City of Churches (McFarland: 2024) and my
blog, “Annals of the
Brooklyn Stage.” The latter is a week by week
description of theatre activity in Brooklyn; obviously, it will expand rather
slowly because so much must be described.
These were halcyon
days for Brooklyn theatre, as the two months chronicled here reveal. Stock
companies across the country were returning to the fray, and, despite the
recent failure of the Park Theatre company, new groups were still anxious to try
their hand. When the year began, there were two stock companies, the Baker
Stock Company in the Western District at the Park Theatre and the Payton
Theatre Company in the Eastern at Corse Payton’s Theatre. In February they were
joined by a third, the Spooner Stock Company, which took over at the Park while
the Bakers reopened the Criterion. This gave Brooklyn nine legitimate theatres,
with occasional contributions from the Brooklyn Academy of Music.
Even more
impressively, Brooklyn added a luxurious new vaudeville theatre, the Orpheum
Music Hall (usually called only the Orpheum), which opened for a guest audience
on December 29, 1900, and for regular audiences on December 31. It was located
at Fulton and Rockwell Place, close to where the Majestic (now the BAM Harvey)
would be built several years later, and which remains the only one of Brooklyn’s
theatres from the turn of the twentieth century still in use. Brooklyn now had
six lively theatres for vaudeville, which was booming in America, and
burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, the Brooklyn Music Hall, the Empire Theatre, the
Novelty Theatre, the Star Theatre, and, of course, the new Orpheum. All told, locals
had as many as sixteen large professional theatres of all types to visit on those rare occasions when all
were open.
During January and
February, 1901, a robust number of stars visited Brooklyn’s playhouses, both
legit and nonlegit, those at the former including Maude Adams, James O’Neill (in
his perpetual Monte Cristo), Marie Dressler (now at the head of her own
company), Mrs. Leslie Carter, Maxine Elliott, Nat C. Goodwin, John Hare, E.S.
Willard, Olga Nethersole (with her controversial meal ticket, Sapho),
and Henrietta Crosman, formerly of the Park Theatre’s stock company, and now a
rising star, in her hit play, Mistress Nell.
1.
December 31, 1900-January 5, 1901
Amphion: Hodge, Podge and Co.,
with Peter F. Dailey
Bijou: 8 Bells, with the Byrne
Brothers
Columbia: San Toy, with
Augustin Daly Musical Company
Gayety: The Floor Walkers, with
Ward and Vokes
Grand Opera House: The Rebel,
with Andrew Mack
Montauk: L’Aiglon, with Maude
Adams
Park: (Baker Stock Company) The
Lost Paradise
Payton’s: (Payton Theatre Company) The
Two Orphans
Vaudeville: Hyde & Behman’s,
Brooklyn Music Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum
2.
January 7-12, 1901
Amphion: Zaza, with Mrs. Leslie
Carter
Bijou: Through the Breakers
Columbia: Sweet Anne Page, with
Lulu Glaser Opera Company
Gayety: William H. West’s Big Minstrel
Jubilee
Grand Opera House: The Rebel,
with Andrew Mack
Montauk: Foxy Quiller, with
Jerome Sykes
Park: (Baker Stock Company) Lynwood
Payton’s: (Payton Theatre Company) Men
and Women
Vaudeville and burlesque: Hyde &
Behman’s, Brooklyn Music Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum
3.
January 14-19, 1901
Amphion: All on Account of Eliza,
with Louis Mann, Clara Lipman
Bijou: In Old Kentucky
Columbia: Monte Cristo, with
James O’Neill
Gayety: The Merry Tramps, with
the Royal Lilliputians (sic)
Grand Opera House: William H. West’s
Big Minstrel Jubilee
Montauk: When We Were Twenty-One,
with Nat C. Goodwin, Maxine Elliott
Park: (Baker Stock Company) Myrtle
Ferns
Payton’s: (Payton Theatre Company) A
Child of the State
Vaudeville and burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Brooklyn
Music Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum
4.
January 21-26, 1901
Amphion: The Still
Alarm, with Harry Lacy
Bijou: Lost in the
Desert
Columbia: A Royal
Rogue, with Jefferson De Angeles
Gayety: Miss Prinnt,
with Marie Dressler in her first role heading her own company as a star
Grand Opera House: The
Merry Tramps, with the Royal Lilliputians
Montauk: The Gay Lord
Quex, with John Hare
Park: (Baker Stock
Company) Oaken Hearts
Payton’s: (Payton Theatre
Company) Hazel Kirke
Vaudeville and burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Brooklyn
Music Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum
5.
January 28-February 2, 1901
Amphion: Vanity Fair, with Gertrude Coghlan
Bijou: At the Stroke of Twelve
Columbia: Sapho, with Olga Nethersole
Gayety: At Piney Ridge, with David Higgins
Grand Opera House: Sis Hopkins, with Rose Melville
Montauk: David Garrick, The Professor’s Love
Story, The Middleman, Tom Pinch, with E.S. Willard
Park: (Baker Stock Company) Nell Gwynn
Payton’s: (Payton Theatre Company) The Galley Slave
Vaudeville and
burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Brooklyn Music Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum
6.
February 4-9, 1901
Amphion: Lost River
Bijou: Across the Pacific, with Harry Clay Blaney
Columbia: Arizona
Gayety: The Rebel, with Andrew Mack
Grand Opera House: At Piney Ridge, with David
Higgins, Gloria Waldron
Montauk: A Royal Family, with Annie Russell
Park: (Baker Stock Company) Mr. Jim
Payton’s: (Payton Theatre Company) The Wife (cancelled
on opening night because of Etta Reed’s illness; A Private Secretary put
on instead with The Wife opening on Wednesday)
Vaudeville and burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Brooklyn
Music Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum
7.
February 11-16, 1901
Amphion: The Night of the , with Mathews and Bulger
Bijou: The Still Alarm, with Harry Lacy
Brooklyn Academy of Music: Mistress Nell, with Henrietta
Crosman (three nights only)
Columbia: The Burgomaster
Criterion: (Baker Stock Company) Captain Letterblair (Baker
Stock Company moves from Park Theatre to Criterion)
Gayety: McFadden’s Row of Flats
Grand Opera House: The Dairy Farm
Montauk: A Royal Family, with Annie Russell
Park: (Spooner Stock Company) A Soldier of the Empire (Spooner
Stock Company takes over the Park Theatre)
Payton’s: (Payton Theatre Company) The Octoroon; or,
Life in Louisiana
8.
February 18-23, 1901
Amphion: Unleavened Bread
Bijou: An African King
Brooklyn Academy of Music: Humpty Dumpty, with James
A. Adams’s Pantomime Company
Columbia: Self and Lady, with Charles Frohman’s
Comedians
Criterion: (Baker Stock Company) The Girl I Left Behind Me
Gayety: In Old Kentucky
Grand Opera House: McFadden’s Row of Flats
Montauk: Madge Smith, with May Irwin
Park: (Spooner Stock Company) That Girl from Texas
Payton’s: (Payton Theatre Company) The Banker’s Daughter
Vaudeville and burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Brooklyn Music
Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum
9.
February 25-March 2, 1901
Amphion: East Lynne
Bijou: The Mormon Wife
Columbia: Quo Vadis (a new version by Stanislaus
Stange, different from those seen previously in Brooklyn)
Criterion: (Baker Stock Company) Under Two Flags
Gayety: A Wise Guy, with Maggie Cline
Grand Opera House: Lost River
Montauk: Janice Meredith, with Mary Mannering
Park: (Spooner Stock Company) A Fair Rebel
Payton’s: (Payton Theatre Company) The Son of Napoleon (a
new version of L’Aiglon)
Vaudeville and burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Brooklyn
Music Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum
love this!! such amazing photos!
ReplyDeleteLots more where these came from. Not seen for 125 years!
ReplyDelete