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well-stocked wardrobe. There were two different entrances from the street for the theatre patrons, those going to the pit and those headed to the boxes. The entryway to the pit was only eighteen inches wide, a death trap in the event of a fire. Like
English theatres the New Theatre on Chestnut Street had all the essentials. A proscenium with proscenium doors in the proscenium walls with a balcony overhead. Not long after its construction the New Theatre was often referred to as one of the Seven Wonders of America.
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Philadelphia for many years, was now regarded as too small and cramped for the Grand Opera performances of the era. In 1854, a committee of prominent
Philadelphians funded and ordered construction of the much larger and grander American Academy of Music on Broad Street, which was completed and opened in early 1857. Some of the traditions of "Old Drury" were imported to the academy, including the bell that announced the rising of the opening curtain.
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152:. Below the statues were semi-circular recesses containing basso relievos of tragic and comic muses. (Note: During this period in American orthography, it became usual to spell the street name "Chesnut", which is why the inscription on the facade of the building does not include the internal T. This particular spelling was abandoned in later years.)
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with triple tiers of boxes making a horseshoe around the orchestra and apron of the stage that accommodated about 2,000 theatergoers. The façade was made of
Italian-style marble with an arcade supported by a row of composite columns with a plain entablature. The entrance stood between two wings whose
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who in 1791 convinced a group of
Philadelphia investors to build a theater suitable for Wignell's company to perform in. Wignell had not yet formed his company when the New Theatre was being set up to be built, but as the New Theater was being built, Wignell was in England recruiting actors to be a
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In 1816 the New
Theatre became the first American theater to be illuminated by gas fixtures rather than candlelight or oil lamps. Four years later a suspicious fire destroyed the theater along with its library, music, scenery and costumes. The cause of the fire remained a mystery since the building
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The stage ran with a depth of seventy-one feet and had a width of thirty feet. The three tiers of boxes could hold nine hundred people; the theatre itself was able to hold an audience of two thousand. There were multiple dressing rooms, two green rooms, and for the first time in
America a large
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The second
Chestnut Street Theatre was demolished in 1855. The neighborhood around Chestnut and Sixth had become increasingly unfashionable and the narrow streets were often congested by business traffic. In addition, The Chestnut Street Theatre, which had been a home to opera performances in
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The third
Chestnut Street Theatre was built in 1862, seven blocks to the west of its original location, where once again it found favor with Philadelphia audiences as a fashionable night spot. Tragic actress
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epidemic spoiled the theater's debut in 1793, and its first regular season did not begin until the following year when the inaugural night's entertainment offered a double feature, John O'Keeffe's
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Two years later, the second
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Over the following twenty-seven years the theater would become a showcase for works by local and national dramatist of the day.
82:. $ 30,000 was raised for the construction of the building and the final touches were not completed until 1805 under architect
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Philadelphia in 1830--1: or, A brief account of the various institutions and Public
Objects in the Metropolis – 1830
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was the first theater in the United States built by entrepreneurs solely as a venue for paying audiences.
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It closed its doors for the last time in 1913 after the curtain fell on the final act of
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The New Theatre was built on Chestnut Street near the corner of Sixth Street across from
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The Chestnut Street Theatre (originally named the New Theatre) was the brainchild of
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had been vacant for several days while the company was engaged in Baltimore.
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Within These Walls: A History of the Academy of Music in Philadelphia
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Advertisement for plays at the Chestnut Street Theatre, July 1853
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part of his company. The New Theater's design, modeled after the
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was among those who starred at the debut of the third theater.
263:. New York: Greenwood Press, Publishers. pp. 50–52.
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An Oyster Barrow in front of the Chestnut Street Theater
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Early Opera in America By Oscar George Theodore Sonneck
372:. Philadelphia: The Academy of Music. pp. 15–31.
261:The Philadelphia Theatre in the Eighteenth Century
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329:History of Philadelphia, 1609-1884, Volume 2 By
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410:Concise Oxford Companion to the Theatre (2 ed.)
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