The New Amsterdam Theatre Aerial Gardens
In the early 1900’s the roof garden was a distinctive feature of summer life in New York City as it offered a refuge from the sweltering temperatures of the streets and non air-conditioned homes. These gardens which occupied the roofs of theatres and restaurants usually featured a small stage from which variety acts were presented to an audience seated around small tables where they could enjoy light refreshments.
However, when Klaw and Erlanger built the New Amsterdam theatre they decided to experiment with the roof garden idea so they built a regular auditorium on the roof of the New Amsterdam which they called the “Aerial Gardens.” The auditorium consisted of a stage with a proscenium width of 34 ft. and a depth of 29′ 3,” an orchestra floor, and an upper tier of boxes suspended by iron braces. It resembled in every way an ordinary theatre except for one distinctive feature. Opening from the auditorium at the rear and on the 41st Street side of the building was a garden terrace with plants, trees, and small round tables with chairs where the audience could enjoy refreshments in the open air. In 1915 Ziegfeld decided to renovate the Aerial Gardens so he asked his newly hired brilliant Austrian scenic designer, Joseph Urban to do the job.
What Urban did was to turn the New Amsterdam Roof Theatre into a glittering nightclub showplace which included a moveable stage, a glass see-through runway for the showgirls, and the latest stage lighting instruments to create stunning rainbow effects on stage. Out in the house where once there were traditional seats there was now a dance floor surrounded by small tables for drinking and dining and featuring inter-table telephones. The outer walls of the theatre at the rear of the auditorium and on the 41st Street side consisted of large windows which swung open in the summer months to create the feeling of an open-air theatre.
The year was 1915; and to dazzle the out-of-towner, wake up the tired businessman, shock Mrs. Grundy, and otherwise enflame the peasants – Herr Ziegfeld presented the Madchens in uniform, giving their all on that new and sensational see-through runway. The Madchen at the upper right looks ready for a solo take-off. From the Terry Helgesen Collection.
But the main attraction was not this newly designed theatre but the spectacle on stage known as The Midnight Frolic. It was this show which first introduced to New York audiences many of the entertainers who would later go on to star in the Follies downstairs and become legends in the theatre. Will Rogers and Eddie Cantor were first tried-out upstairs before starring downstairs. Because the stage opening of the Roof Theatre was identical in size to the main stage downstairs production numbers were often first tried upstairs before becoming part of the Follies downstairs and likewise, popular numbers from the Follies would be moved upstairs to continue their run in the Frolics. On one occasion a royal visitor from England was so taken by a production number in the Follies that Ziegfeld ordered that the entire number along with the scenery and costumes be moved to the stage upstairs where the number was repeated in its entirety in that evenings performance of the Frolic, much to the delight of the visiting prince. Stars moved from one stage to the other too, often in the same evening, first performing in the Follies downstairs then moving upstairs to the Roof Theatre to do an entirely different routine in the Frolic. Without question the “in” thing to do in the ‘teens when out for a night on the town in New York was to head for the New Amsterdam Theatre lobby as 11 : 30 p.m. approached to crowd into one of the tiny elevators with the best of New York to be taken to the Roof Theatre for The Midnight Frolic.
When Prohibition came into effect The Midnight Frolic was discontinued. In 1923 the Roof Theatre was converted back into a traditional theatre house seating 700 and called the Dresden. As movies replaced the live shows downstairs the Roof Theatre also saw less use as a legitimate theatre and was used instead as a radio, then television studio. Over the years its crumbling and deserted interior has intermittently been host to Broadway legends in their infancy as its stage has been used to rehearse such hits as Death of a Salesman, A View From the Bridge, A Streetcar Named Desire, My Fair Lady, and a 1978 revival of Eugene O’Neill’s A Touch of the Poet starring Jason Robards. During Mayor John Lindsay’s administration there was talk of re-opening the Roof Theatre as an Off-Broadway theatre but this never came about due in part to the cost involved in renovating the interior plus the greater problem of satisfying the New York City Building Safety Laws with only two small functioning elevators in the downstairs lobby as a means of reaching the upstairs theatre.
Above: The stage and the proscenium as they appeared in the 1930’s, when the house was often used for rehearsals. A portion of the asbestos curtain shows. Photo from the Terry Helgesen Collection.
Above: The stage of the Roof Theatre in 1978. The three runways extending from the stage out into the house were added to accommodate the television cameras during the period the theatre was used as a TV Studio . The orchestra pit was also covered over to increase the stage space for the cameras. On either side of the proscenium can be seen the boxes which lit up with the warning “On-The-Air.” Photo by Mark 6
One can only hope that someday soon these problems can be overcome for here atop all the garishness found on the street below sits a tarnished jewel of a theatre unknown to most New Yorkers but just waiting to be re-discovered and polished again into a brilliant glittering nightspot.
This story was written by Harry Lines and originally published by THS in 1978. If you find this story fascinating, we have a treasure trove of information about the history of your favorite theatres. Sign up for an account on our site and enter through the STAGE DOOR!
The New Amsterdam Theatre is currently operated by Disney Theatricals and is home to the very successful production of Disney’s Aladdin.
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