From Broadway To 52nd Street

Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart wrote the musical Betsy as a vehicle for an actress named Belle Baker. When its producer Flo Ziegfeld decided that the show needed a big hit ballad, he went straight to Irving Berlin and asked him for one and Blue Skies was quickly dropped into the musical and on opening night on December 28, 1926 in the New Amsterdam Theatre, Rodgers and Hart – who never countenanced interpolations into their shows – sat in their house seats, fuming.   The show faded away after only thirty-nine performances, however, Blue Skies went on to become part of show business history and a popular standard.

Broadway History: At its height in 1928, Broadway had been reduced to a twelve-block area between 41^st and 53^rd streets, however it originally encompassed an area stretching from 35^th to 54^th street, between 6^th and 8^th avenues. Although the district was comprised of nearly 80 theatres only four theatres are actually located on Broadway, The Marquis at 46^th, The Palace at 47^th, The Winter Garden at 50^th and The Broadway at 53^rd Street. The balance of the legitimate houses was located either east or west of this avenue. This however was not always the case. In 1810, if you wandered up Broadway north of the Battery towards the villages of Greenwich or Harlem farther to the north of the common pasture, Sheep’s Meadow; past Wall Street and Maiden Lane, at City Hall Park you would have passed the beautiful Park Theatre on Park Row. A second theatre, The Bowery, was built in 1821 and the migration of “mid-town” towards the north was well underway.

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