Lee Shubert (born Levi Schubart; March 25, 1871 – December 25, 1953) was a Lithuanian-born American theatre owner/operator and producer. He was the eldest of three brothers of the notable Shubert family.

Biography

Born to a

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

family, the son of Duvvid Schubart and Katrina Helwitz, in Vladislavov, in the Suwałki Governorate of

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, a part of the

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(present-day Kudirkos Naumiestis,

Lithuania Lithuania, officially the Republic of Lithuania, is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea, bordered by Latvia to the north, Belarus to the east and south, P ...

), Shubert was 11 years old when the family emigrated to the

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and settled in

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, where a number of

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ish families from their hometown already were living. His father's

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kept the family in difficult financial circumstances, and Lee Shubert went to work selling newspapers on a street corner. With borrowed money, he and younger brothers Sam and

Jacob Jacob, later known as Israel, is a Hebrew patriarch of the Abrahamic religions. He first appears in the Torah, where he is described in the Book of Genesis as a son of Isaac and Rebecca. Accordingly, alongside his older fraternal twin brother E ...

eventually embarked on a business venture that led to them to become the successful operators of several theaters in upstate New York. The Shubert brothers decided to expand to the huge market in

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, and at the end of March 1900 they leased the Herald Square Theatre at the corner of Broadway and 35th Street in

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. Leaving younger brother Jacob at home to manage their existing theatres, Lee and Sam Shubert moved to New York City, where they laid the foundations for what was to become the largest theatre empire in the 20th century, including the Winter Garden and Shubert Theatres. The all-powerful Theatrical Syndicate essentially excluded competition. Since the Shuberts were not permitted to use Syndicate-controlled theaters, they put on shows in rented circus tents, holding "three times as many customers as the typical theater." In 1910, they formed the "Independent National Theatre Owner's Association", which brought about the defection of many theaters from all around the country that previously had been affiliated with the Syndicate. In 1922, it was announced that "Lee Shubert and A. L. Erlanger ... rivals for twenty years" had reached a working understanding. Lee Shubert was a hard nosed businessman who has been criticized for being money and power oriented with little interest in culture. He was well-known for banning critics from all his theaters if they wrote something that upset him, to the point that the laws in the state of New York were changed to prevent the practice.Kashmir Hill
Lawyers Barred by Madison Square Garden Found a Way Back In
''The New York Times'', January 16, 2023, accessed January 16, 2023. Nonetheless, he recognized the need to attract some of the top stage actors from the long-established European theatres (as Gaby Deslys) to perform at the new Broadway houses. After a disastrous production of ''

Hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play. Set in Denmark, the play (the ...

'' in 1901 at a competitor's theatre, French megastar

Sarah Bernhardt Sarah Bernhardt (; born Henriette-Rosine Bernard; 22 October 1844 – 26 March 1923) was a French stage actress who starred in some of the most popular French plays of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, including by Alexandre Dumas fils, ...

vowed never to return to America until Lee Shubert convinced her to perform for his company in 1905."Shubert Organization Inc. history
fundinguniverse.com, retrieved December 30, 2009 At his death in 1953, Shubert's estate was worth $16 million . He boasted in 1924 of his family success: :We began building theaters, and introduced practical commercial methods into a flagrantly impractical and precarious profession....This sordid commercialism has helped to make the American stage a legitimate,

financial risk Financial risk is any of various types of risk associated with financing, including financial transactions that include company loans in risk of default. Often it is understood to include only downside risk, meaning the potential for financi ...

, stabilized its revenue, attracted real money to it, reduced the margin of chance, increased its facilities, and widened its opportunities.

Personal life

Shubert was married to Marcella Swanson, a former actress who was approximately 30 years younger. They had previously been secretly married on July 29, 1936, in

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and divorced in September 1948 in

Reno, Nevada Reno ( ) is a city in the northwest section of the U.S. state of Nevada, along the Nevada–California border. It is the county seat and most populous city of Washoe County, Nevada, Washoe County. Sitting in the High Eastern Sierra foothills, ...

. They remarried in

Miami Miami is a East Coast of the United States, coastal city in the U.S. state of Florida and the county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade County in South Florida. It is the core of the Miami metropolitan area, which, with a populat ...

in March 1949. Shubert died in

on December 25, 1953, and was interred in the family plot at Salem Fields Cemetery in

Brooklyn Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...

. His widow died in 1973.

Notes

Sources

*Hirsch, Foster. ''The Boys from Syracuse'' (1998). SIU Press.

References

External links

The Shubert Brothers: A Brief History
at shubertfoundation.org via

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