The Four Marx Brothers brought a company of 16 to headline a program on Thanksgiving Day, November 26, 1914. Originally the theater offered a program of seven different acts each week, with three nightly performances and matinees on Saturday. According to a review by Charles Mandy (who did not mention Goldberg's performance), the opening night crowd was "large, responsive, and representative of the best element of the city,", though the "girl ushers, neatly uniformed…proved very acceptable…the crowd made the addition of one or two 'boys' necessary." The acts booked for the opening performances included the Jesse Lasky company's performance of Gertrude Jennings' The Rest Cure", cartoonist Rube Goldberg, Willard and Bond, Four Bards, Claudius and Scarlet, Loraine and Dudley, Walter Van Brunt, and Archie and Gertie Falls. It was Wednesday, January 14, 1914, then, that hosted the Lyric's debut. The result was a two-day delay in opening. The Orpheum's operator, Karl Hoblitzelle of the Interstate Company, objected and rushed to Birmingham to get a restraining order. As the opening approached, Wells received congratulatory telegrams from many of his peers in other cities, including Sam and Lee Shubert, William Brady, Oscar Hammerstein, George M. Keith acts booked for the Orpheum that week would be "transferred" to the "New Lyric". The theater's debut was set for Monday, January 12, with Wells publishing announcements that the eight B. Beneath the stage are a series of dressing rooms, each about eight feet square with sinks in the corners. A gold-leafed and painted asbestos curtain hung on the stage beneath a proscenium featuring a large mural known as The Allegory of the Muses, which was painted by local artist Harry Hawkins. A center section at the front of the stage had a water tank underneath for aquatic shows (and to hold ice for a rudimentary attempt at providing air conditioning). The Lyric originally had 1,583 seats spread across the main floor, two steep balconies, and two opera boxes. The interior design is also a near-identical match to the Wells Theatre which opened in 1913 in Norfolk, Virginia. Keith circuit and with Wells in particular indicate that he was probably involved in the design of the Lyric. Howell of Richmond, Virginia, to design renovations to the Orpheum in 1912. Wells already owned and managed a number of theaters across the South, including the Bijou and Orpheum Theatres, opposite each other at 3rd Avenue and 17th Street North. The office building is a concrete frame and the auditorium is spanned with riveted hot-rolled steel trusses.Ĭlark formed a partnership with Jake Wells to operate the theater. Clark purchased three adjoining lots and hired the Hendon Hetrack Construction Company to construct a six-story office building and theater on the property. The development of the Lyric Theatre began when real-estate developer Louis V. The auditorium of the Lyric on opening week
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