Comedy Theatre (New York City)
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| Address | 110 West 41st Street New York City United States |
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| Coordinates | 40°45′16″N 73°59′07″W / 40.7543717°N 73.9853195°W |
| Owner | The Shubert Organization |
| Type | Broadway |
| Capacity | 687 |
| Construction | |
| Opened | September 6, 1909 |
| Demolished | 1942 |
| Years active | 1909–1942 |
| Architect | D. G. Malcolm |
The Comedy Theatre was a Broadway theatre located at 110 West 41st Street in Manhattan that opened in 1909. It presented the first Broadway appearances of Katharine Cornell and Ruth Draper, as well as Eugene O'Neill's first Broadway play. Shuttered in the wake of the Depression, it reopened in 1937 as the Mercury Theatre — the venue for Orson Welles's groundbreaking adaptation of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar and other productions for the Mercury Theatre repertory company. In 1939 it began presenting classic Yiddish theatre. The building was demolished in 1942.
Architect D. G. Malcolm designed the Comedy Theatre, a Broadway theatre located at 110 West 41st Street in Manhattan, for The Shubert Organization. Its first production, The Melting Pot, opened September 6, 1909. The 687-seat theatre was a venue for more intimate productions, and was often leased to producers including William Collier, Cecil B. DeMille, and the Washington Square Players.Katharine Cornell made her first Broadway appearance at the Comedy Theatre, and Ruth Draper also made her debut there.Eugene O'Neill's first Broadway play, In the Zone, opened at the Comedy Theatre in 1917. With its narrow orchestra pit and a booth for follow spots at the rear of the second balcony, the theatre was also used for small musical shows.
The Comedy Theatre was shuttered in 1931, in the aftermath of the Wall Street Crash of 1929. It reopened in 1937 as the Mercury Theatre, leased by John Houseman and Orson Welles for their new repertory theatre company, the Mercury Theatre. Houseman later described the venue as "an intimate, rococo, two-balcony theatre [that] was for many years one of Manhattan's most elegant smaller playhouses."
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