Photo from Saturday
Eddie Izzard's solo performance of "Hamlet" is getting a four-week window at the Orpheum Theatre on Second Avenue between Seventh Street and St. Mark's Place. (H/T Steven!)
The show, currently in production at the Greenwich House Theater, will be moving to the East Village for an extended run from March 19 to April 14... tickets are now on sale here.
The performance has drawn decent reviews, though some outlets, like the Times, were tough. ("One comes away with the sense that Eddie Izzard didn't perform “Hamlet” so much as become defeated by it.")
In any event, this continues the post-"Stomp" life of the Orpheum... Rachel Bloom's "Death, Let Me Do My Show" most recently held forth here.
"Stomp" ended its 29-year reign at the Orpheum in January 2023. Now, with performers like Bloom and Izzard taking the stage, the Orpheum is returning to its roots in the 1980s and early 1990s when it hosted Off-Broadway productions like Sandra Bernhard's "Without You I'm Nothing," Eric Bogosian's "Sex, Drugs, Rock & Roll" and John Leguizamo's "Mambo Mouth."
Does anyone know what year the Orpheum opened?
ReplyDeleteFrom Cinema Treasures
ReplyDeletehttps://cinematreasures.org/theaters/13829
The site on which the Orpheum stands is alleged to have been a concert garden as early as the 1880s and, as such, to be one of the oldest continuously operating places of gathering for entertainment events in New York City.
A 1904 NY Times article describes a visit to the Orpheum as an evening which began with entertainment from a Hungarian orchestra, continued with dinner in the 7 o'clock hour, and concluded with a three-hour stage show by a Viennese theatre company.
The theatre was part of the exploding Second Avenue Yiddish theatre scene in the early decades of the 20th century but was exhibiting motion pictures by at least 1921. By 1926 it was operated by the Meyer & Schneider circuit. Additional references indicate that it continued to do so through the mid-1950’s.
In 1958, the theatre became a home for legitimate theatre, referred to in some press accounts of the time as the New Orpheum, seating just 299 persons (down from a reported seat count of 560 while a cinema earlier in the decade). Though the Off Broadway venue continued to occasionally show film (hosting, for example, an International Film Festival for Children in 1971 and a weekly Film Makers' Festival in 1980), in the 1980’s and 1990’s it became a venue primarily associated with two productions: the original stage version of “Little Shop of Horrors” (1982-1985) and “Stomp” (1994-present).
I wouldn't trust anything the NYT says...they have become a garbage paper since changing ownership. Izzard is fantastic and anything they do is going to be great!
ReplyDeleteYou'd be wrong. I'm a big Izzard fan, but not this time...
DeleteWhen the Times changed ownership to whom? It’s been the hands of the same family for several generations.
DeleteSuch wonderful news!
ReplyDeleteLove EI.
ReplyDeleteI didn't want to get Eddie's pronouns wrong, so I googled, and the latest seems to be that all pronouns are OK!
ReplyDeleteI don't trust the NYT theater criticism either, fwiw. (And why have the COMEDY guy review this play?) I see you, Grieve, not linking to the Times, and I don't blame you one iota. Most of the time, the rules are "never read the comments," but I find that for NYT theater criticism (and for the recipe section) the comments are often a freaking DELIGHT. My fave this time: "Apparently this reviewer's seat wasn't facing the stage."
(That said: I've heard the performance is great and the script isn't all one might wish.)
As a big Izzard and Shakespear fan, I was really excited to see this, but I gotta agree with the Times review that Izzard seemed "defeated by it."
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