Apollo Theatre (42nd Street)


The Apollo Theatre was a Broadway theatre whose entrance was located at 223 West 42nd Street in Manhattan, New York City, while the theatre proper was on 43rd Street. It was demolished in 1996 and provided part of the site for the new Ford Center, now known as the Lyric Theatre.

History

The Apollo was built in 1920 by the Selwyn Brothers as one of a pair of theatres designed by Eugene De Rosa with a unified facade on West 42nd Street incorporating both theatres' entrances. The other, called the Times Square Theatre, occupied the rest of the 42nd Street frontage, while the Apollo was behind it, on 43rd Street. To the east of them stood the Lyric Theatre. The Apollo was initially a musical theatre venue for such works as the Gershwin musical Strike Up the Band and George White's Scandals. As in many other playhouses of the 1920s, movies often played the Apollo during its run as a "legitimate" house; in 1922, for example, Silver Wings, Around the World With Burton Holmes, and two D. W. Griffith films, Orphans of the Storm and One Exciting Night, had engagements.
By the early 1930s the Apollo had been turned into a film venue exclusively. In the 1970s it featured X-rated films. It returned to serving as a theatre in the late 1970s, but this venture failed and the Apollo ended its existence as a night club. The building was neglected, fell into disrepair, and was condemned. In 1990 it was among the 42nd Street theatres repossessed by the City and State of New York and in 1992 came under the protection of the New 42nd Street organization. It was demolished in 1996.
Some of the theatre's architectural features, including the proscenium arch, which were protected by landmark status, were removed and later incorporated into the Ford Center for the Performing Arts, now the Lyric Theatre.
The exterior of the theatre is featured in HBO's series The Deuce.