Walter Kerr Theater
| Ritz Theatre | |
The marquee of the Walter Kerr Theatre in 2006
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| Address | 219 West 48th Street Manhattan, New York City |
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| Coordinates | 40°45′38″N 73°59′08″W / 40.760638°N 73.985605°WCoordinates: 40°45′38″N 73°59′08″W / 40.760638°N 73.985605°W |
| Owner | Jujamcyn Theaters |
| Type | Broadway theatre |
| Capacity | 975 |
| Construction | |
| Opened | 1929 |
| Reopened | 1990 |
The Walter Kerr Theatre is a Broadway theatre. Located at 219 West 48th Street, it is owned and operated by Jujamcyn Theaters. One of the smaller auditoriums in the Theater District, it seats 975.
The Shubert family engaged Herbert J. Krapp to design their Ritz Theatre in 1921. ABC operated it as a radio and then television studio between 1943 and 1965. The Shuberts sold the theatre to John Minary in 1956, who sold it to Joseph P. Blitz later that year. In 1963, a partnership including Roger Euster acquired the property; in 1964 Euster sold his stake to Leonard B. Moore. It remained vacant from 1965 to 1971, when it reopened with the musical Soon, book by Martin Duberman, which closed after three performances. It housed a number of productions in the next two years and even screened adult films for a period before it became a children's theater named in honor of Robert F. Kennedy in 1973. Jujamcyn acquired the property in 1980. The last production staged at the Ritz was Chu Chem. On March 5, 1990, the theatre reopened after a $2 million restoration now renamed for theater critic Walter Kerr with August Wilson's The Piano Lesson. Since then it has housed seven winners of the Tony Award for Best Play: Angels in America: Millennium Approaches, Angels in America: Perestroika, Love! Valour! Compassion!, Proof, Take Me Out, Doubt, and Clybourne Park. It also housed one winner of the Tony Award for Best Musical: A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder.
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