FIFTH AVENUE THEATER 28TH STREET FACADE
NOVEMBER 2, 1938. ABBOTT FILE 309

FIFTH AVENUE THEATER INTERIOR:

STAIRCASE
NOVEMBER 2, 1938. ABBOTT FILE 310

SHOWING CHANDELIER, ROTUNDA, AND SECOND BALCONY
NOVEMBER 2, 1938. ABBOTT FILE L-24

SHOWING ORCHESTRA, BOXES, FIRST AND SECOND BALCONIES
NOVEMBER 2, 1938. ABBOTT FILE L-23

SHOWING DETAIL OF PROSCENIUM ARCH
NOVEMBER 2, 1938. ABBOTT FILE L-25

SHOWING GRAND CHANDELIER AND PROSCENIUM
NOVEMBER 2, 1938. ABBOTT FILE L-26

DRINKING FOUNTAIN BEHIND SCENES
NOVEMBER 2, 1938. ABBOTT FILE L-27

ENTRANCE FROM 1185 BROADWAY
NOVEMBER 2, 1938. ABBOTT FILE L-28

SHOWING SECTION OF ORCHESTRA AND FIRST BALCONY
1185 Broadway
NOVEMBER 2, 1938. ABBOTT FILE L-29

The Fifth Avenue Theatre, built in 1873, was not located on Fifth Avenue. It took its name from its prior venue, which had been destroyed by fire. In 1891, the "new" Fifth Avenue Theatre also burned, and the next year the fireproof structure in Abbott's photograph was built. The Fifth Avenue Theatre suffered the same fate as others established in Chelsea during the Victorian era. In its heyday, the great stars of the period performed there, including the celebrated Italian tragedienne Eleanora Dusa, who made her American debut at the theater. After 1900, it slipped into decline, showing vaudeville, movies, and burlesque.

When Abbott photographed the side entrance of the theater in 1938, it was about to undergo renovation as a modern movie house (facade). With the boarded-up doorways in deep shadow, the elaborate balustrades and ornamental terra-cotta surface attract attention. Only the neighboring loft, with its commerical signs for garment, fur, and plant wholesalers, reveals the modern character of the neighborhood.

Unlike the other Victorian theaters that Abbott photographed, the Fifth Avenue Theatre's interior was intact and closed to the public. She seized the opportunity to document it thoroughly. After one exposure of the lobby with an 8-x-10-inch camera (staircase), Abbott switched to a more flexible hand-held camera. With the lights of the theater switched on, she worked without flash.

Abbott's documentation was unconventional, lacking full views of either the stage or the auditorium. In three exposures, she focused on the junctures of proscenium, rotunda, and seating; these large fragments of the interior reveal the theater's architectural components and its encrusted surfaces of gilt plaster. In close-ups, Abbott featured the plasterwork (detail of Proscenium Arch, and section of the Orchestra) and the relatively austere staircase at the Broadway entrance. The most unusual of the photographs, reminiscent of Atget's Parisian documents, monumentalizes a mundane water fountain.

Before 1952, the theater was razed; a one-story Woolworth's occupied the Broadway corner, with a lot behind on West 28th remaining vacant. Today the old Woolworth's houses several retail stores, backed by an eight-story parking garage on the border between the garment and wholesale flower districts.

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