ACROSS THE RIVER FROM BROADWAY: ANNALS OF THE BROOKLYN STAGE (1898-1908): FEBRUARY 1901

This blog is dedicated to preserving a record of Brooklyn theatre theatre-related images based largely on publication in nearly a half-dozen contemporary Brooklyn newspapers and one weekly magazine (Brooklyn Life) of 1898-1908. It also lists the week-by-week productions at each legitimate theatre from January 1898 through December 1908. It is adapted from my earlier blog, BROOKLYN THEATRE FROM 1898: AN ILLUSTRATED CHRONOLOGY and is intended as a supplement to a forthcoming two-volume book also called ACROSS THE RIVER FROM BROADWAY: ANNALS OF THE BROOKLYN STAGE (1898-1908).

The book covers everything related to Brooklyn theatre during the first decade of the former city's first decade as a borough of Greater New York, including plays, playhouses, productions, people, producing policies, scandals, lawsuits, fires, accidents, brawls, ethnic theatres, crimes, religious attacks, rivalry with Manhattan, and so on. The focus is on legitimate theatre, but considerable attention is paid to developments in vaudeville and burlesque as well.

To find a specific month, please use the search box in the upper left corner. May-June and August-September are always joined, so searches for one of those months should be, for example, May-June 1906.

Samuel L. Leiter

Author: BROOKLYN TAKES THE STAGE: NINETEENTH-CENTURY THEATER IN THE CITY OF CHURCHES (McFarland: 2024).

FEBRUARY 1901

*=novelties (recent plays new to Brooklyn)

February 4-9:

Amphion: Lost River*
Bijou: Across the Pacific (Harry Clay Blaney)
Columbia: Arizona*
Gayety: The Rebel (Andrew Mack)
Grand Opera House: At Piney Ridge (David Higgins, Gloria Waldron)
Montauk: A Royal Family* (Annie Russell)
Park: Mr. Jim (Baker Stock Company)
Payton’s Lee Avenue: The Wife (Payton Stock Company; opening night cancelled; A Private Secretary put on instead; The Wife opened Wednesday)
Vaudeville/burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Brooklyn Music Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum

February 11-16:

Amphion: The Night of the Fourth* (Mathews and Bulger)
Bijou: The Still Alarm (Harry Lacy)
Brooklyn Academy of Music: Mistress Nell (Henrietta Crosman; three nights)
Columbia: The Burgomaster
Criterion: Captain Letterblair (Baker Stock Company)
Gayety: McFadden’s Row of Flats
Grand Opera House: The Dairy Farm
Montauk: A Royal Family (Annie Russell)
Park: A Soldier of the Empire (Spooner Stock Company)
Payton’s Lee Avenue: The Octoroon; or, Life in Louisiana (Payton Stock Company)
Vaudeville/burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Brooklyn Music Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum

February 18-23:

Amphion: Unleavened Bread*
Bijou: An African King*
Brooklyn Academy of Music: Humpty Dumpty (James A. Adams’s Pantomime Company)
Columbia: Self and Lady* (Charles Frohman’s Comedians)
Criterion: The Girl I Left Behind Me (Baker Stock Company)
Gayety: In Old Kentucky
Grand Opera House: McFadden’s Row of Flats
Montauk: Madge Smith* (May Irwin)
Park: That Girl from Texas (Spooner Stock Company)
Payton’s Lee Avenue: The Banker’s Daughter (Payton Stock Company)
Vaudeville/burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Brooklyn Music Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum

February 25-March 2:

Amphion: East Lynne
Bijou: The Mormon Wife*
Columbia: Quo Vadis
Criterion: Under Two Flags (Baker Stock Company)
Gayety: A Wise Guy (Maggie Cline)
Grand Opera House: Lost River
Montauk: Janice Meredith (Mary Mannering)
Park: A Fair Rebel (Spooner Stock Company)
Payton’s Stock Company: L’Aiglon, the Son of Napoleon (Payton Stock Company)
Vaudeville/burlesque: Hyde & Behman’s, Brooklyn Music Hall, Empire, Star, Novelty, Orpheum