The Lunt-Fontanne Theatre: The Last Theater Designed by Carrère and Hastings

The Lunt-Fontanne Theatre is located at 205 West 46th Street in the Theater District of Midtown Manhattan. Designed by Carrère and Hastings in the Beaux-Arts style, the theater opened in 1910 as the Globe Theatre for Charles Dillingham. The name was inspired by the Globe Theatre in London. The theater is currently operated by the Nederlander Organization, and its facade is a designated New York City landmark.

The theater's facade on 46th Street was originally the carriage entrance. It features a central pavilion with five vertical bays and arches, flanked by simpler pavilions. The first story was designed as a raised basement and contains a granite water table and blocks of rusticated stone. Above the central doorways are archivolts with sculpted heads and modillion blocks with alternating somber and snarling faces, which served to identify the building's theatrical use.

The theater underwent significant changes over the years. It was converted into a movie house operated by the Brandt chain in the 1930s. In 1957, City Playhouses Inc. bought the property and commissioned Roche and Roche to completely renovate the interior. It reopened on May 5, 1958, as the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre. The current interior configuration dates to 1958 and contains about 1,505 seats across two levels.

The Broadway entrance was cut off from the theater during the 1957 renovation and was later demolished in 2006. The theater's tiled roof and the auditorium's ceiling were originally designed with retractable sections, which are no longer in use. Today, the Lunt-Fontanne stands as the only surviving theater of four designed by Carrère and Hastings, and the last theater designed by that firm.

Sources: Wikipedia, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons