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Clinton Hall Mercantile Library Bldg 13 Astor Place

The Astor Opera House, also known as the Astor Place Opera House and later the Astor Place Theatre, was an opera house in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the List of co ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

, located on Lafayette Street between

Astor Place Astor Place is a one-block street in NoHo/ East Village, in the lower part of the New York City borough of Manhattan. It runs from Broadway in the west (just below East 8th Street) to Lafayette Street. The street encompasses two plazas a ...

and East 8th Street. Designed by Isaiah Rogers, the theater was conceived by impresario Edward Fry, the brother of composer William Henry Fry, who managed the opera house during its entire history.Burrows & Wallace, p.724

Opera House

Fry engaged the Sanquerico and Patti Opera Company under the management of John Sefton to perform the first season of opera at the house. The opera house opened on November 22, 1847 with a performance of Giuseppe Verdi's '' Ernani'' with Adelino Vietti in the title role. Sefton and his company were not re-engaged by Fry, and the opera management of the house went to Cesare Lietti for the second season. During his tenure the opera house presented the United States premiere of Verdi's ''

Nabucco ''Nabucco'' (, short for Nabucodonosor ; en, " Nebuchadnezzar") is an Italian-language opera Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal tra ...

'' on April 4, 1848. Lietti was also replaced after one season, and the Astor's third and longest lasting opera manager, Max Maretzek, was hired for the third season, which commenced in November 1848. The following year Maretzek founded his own opera company, the Max Maretzek Italian Opera Company, with whom he continued to stage operas at the Astor Opera House through 1852. Under Maretzek the opera house saw the New York premiere of Donizetti's ''

Anna Bolena ''Anna Bolena'' is a tragic opera (''tragedia lirica'') in two acts composed by Gaetano Donizetti. Felice Romani wrote the Italian libretto after Ippolito Pindemonte's ''Enrico VIII ossia Anna Bolena'' and Alessandro Pepoli's ''Anna Bolena'', b ...

'' on January 7, 1850 with soprano Apollonia Bertucca (later Maretzek's wife) as the title heroine. The theatre was built with the intention of attracting only the "best" patrons, the " uppertens" of New York society, who were increasingly turning out to see European singers who appeared at local venues such as Niblo's Garden. It was expected that an opera house would be:

a substitute for a general drawing room – a refined attraction which the ill-mannered would not be likely to frequent, and around which the higher classes might gather, for the easier interchange of courtesies, and for that closer view which aides the candidacy of acquaintance.

In pursuit of this agenda, the theatre was created with the comfort of the upper classes in mind: benches, the normal seating in theatres at the time, were replaced by upholstered seats, available only by subscription, as were the two tiers of boxes. On the other hand, 500 general admission patrons were relegated to the benches of a "cockloft" reachable only by a narrow stairway, and otherwise isolated from the gentry below, and the theatre enforced a dress code which required "freshly shaven faces, evening dress, and kid gloves." Limiting the attendance of the lower classes was partly intended to avoid the problems of rowdyism which plagued other theaters in the entertainment district at the time, especially in the theatres on

the Bowery The Bowery () is a street and neighborhood in Lower Manhattan in New York City. The street runs from Chatham Square at Park Row, Worth Street, and Mott Street in the south to Cooper Square at 4th Street in the north.Jackson, Kenneth L. ...

. Nevertheless, it was the deadly Astor Place riot in 1849 which caused the theatre to close permanently – provoked by competing performances of ''

Macbeth ''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...

'' by English actor William Charles Macready at the Opera House (which was operating under the name "Astor Place Theatre", not being able to sustain itself on a full season of opera) and American Edwin Forrest at the nearby Broadway Theatre.

Clinton Hall

After the riot, the theater was unable to overcome the reputation of being the "Massacre Opera House" at "DisAster Place." By May 1853, the interior had been dismantled and the furnishings sold off, with the shell of the building sold for $140,000 to the New York Mercantile Library, which renamed the building "Clinton Hall". In 1890, in need of additional space, the library tore down the opera house building and replaced it with an 11-story building, also called Clinton Hall, which still stands on the site.White, Norval & Willensky, p.162

References

Notes Bibliography * * * Further reading * Hassard, Jno. ohnR. G. (February 1871)
"The New York Mercantile Library"
''Scribner’s Monthly'' Vol. 1 No. 4. New York: Scribner & Co., pp. 353–67

External links

*{{commons category-inline, Clinton Hall (former Astor Opera House) Opera houses in New York City Music venues in Manhattan Demolished buildings and structures in Manhattan 19th century in the United States Theatres completed in 1847 Music venues completed in 1847 Astor family East Village, Manhattan 1847 establishments in New York (state) Buildings and structures demolished in 1890