1681 BroadwayThe Broadway Theatre (formerly Universal's Colony Theatre, B.S. Moss' Broadway Theatre, Earl Carroll's Broadway Theatre, and Ciné Roma) is the most famous Broadway theatre located in midtown Manhattan. Since December 10, 2019, the Broadway Theatre stage has been hosting the West Side Story musical, the most exciting musical theater masterpiece of the 20th century.
It has a large seating capacity of 1,761, and unlike most Broadway theaters, it is actually located on Broadway, at number 1681.
Designed by architect Eugene De Rosa for Benjamin S. Moss, it opened as B.S. Moss's Colony Theatre on Christmas Day, 1924, as a venue for vaudeville shows and motion pictures. The theater has operated under many names and owners. It was renamed Universal's Colony Theatre, B.S. Moss' Broadway Theatre, and Earl Carroll's Broadway Theatre before becoming a legitimate theater house simply called Broadway Theatre on December 8, 1930. In 1937, known as Ciné Roma, it showed Italian films. For a short time during the 1950s it showed Cinerama films.
On November 18, 1928, the first Mickey Mouse cartoon released to the public, Steamboat Willie, debuted at the Colony. Producer Walt Disney returned on November 13, 1940, to debut the feature film Fantasia in Fantasound, an early stereo system.
The legitimate theater opened in 1930 with The New Yorkers by Cole Porter. Stars such as Milton Berle, Alfred Drake, José Ferrer, Eartha Kitt, Vivien Leigh, Zero Mostel, and Mae West have appeared on stage.
The Shubert Organization bought the theater in 1939 and renovated it extensively in 1956 and 1986. It has long been a popular theatre for producers of musicals because of large seating capacity, and the large stage, which is nearly sixty feet deep. Often plays that have become successful in smaller theaters have transferred to the Broadway Theatre.