Haunted Broadway Theaters

The Hirschfeld has Martin Beck's ghost supposedly. Every so rare often weird things happen--lights and doors opening.

---

At the Harkness Theatre , formerly the Colonial, since torn down; Broadway between 62nd and 63rd.

My friend Maggie was working in the theatre and locking up one night. Making her way up the side aisle, alone in the house with just the work light on, she was whistling. As she finished one line, someone/something went on to the next phrase.

She beat a hasty exit and dined out on the story for the next month.

---

I hold that Liza's ghost inhabits Studio 54 (and yes, I know she's alive. If you've been there, you'll know what I mean).

There's a good chance that many of them are haunted. And it's especially important NOT to whistle in a theatre because of the sailor history. Theatres would hire sailors to be the flymen...and they would whistle to cue scenery to fly in and out...you don't want to whistle onstage...and possibly have a piece of scenery flying at your head.

---

the winter garden... last year when friends and i stayed after to gratefully go backstage, everyone including the cast was gone.. the only people there were us 5 and the stage door guy.. we all took photos from the stage which was dumb because the house lights were off and the orch, was dark/empty... but when i got my photo back, there and i scanned it on my old comp, there were 3 figures in chairs.. 1 in the first row in a white/black suit and 2 figures in the mezz... my friends freaked out and the stagedoor guys admitted that a long long time ago someome hung themselves in the theatre from the rafters during a show. and no broadway guy..it wasnt barrett foa, jon-erik goldberg or joe machota sitting in chairs :)

Updated On: 2/20/04 at 01:15 PM

Borstal-- the Virginia

---

I like that site it's cool.

The Belasco Theatre on W44th Street is probably the most widely known to be haunted. The theatre opened in 1907 by David Belasco, playwirght/actor/producer/director and set designer. He alwasy dressed in priestly garb and was known as "the bishop of Broadway."

The first Belasco Theatre was in actuality Oscar Hammerstein's Republic on W42nd Street which Belasco named after himself. In October 1907 he opened his own theatre calling it the Stuyvesant. The theatre included a private apartment above the house for Mr. Belasco and his own private backstage elevator. It was in 1910 that he renamed the Stuyvesant the Belasco after losing his name on the earlier Republic Theatre on 42nd Street. Belasco died in 1931, and the Belasco was first taken over by Katherine Cornell Productions then the Group Theatre in 1934, which presented DEAD END and GOLDEN BOY. Since the mid-1940's the Belasco has been home to many flops, limited runs and a few hits, included in that group was OH, CALCUTTA! which had an entirely nude cast and sexually explicit sketchs and dances. For a time in the early 1950's it was an NBC radio playhouse.

Actors and theatre staff who have worked in the Belasco have claimed for many years to have seen the ghost of David Belasco sitting in an unoccupied box at opening nights. He is always dressed in his prietly garb. Creaky elevator chains have been heard rattling backstage eventhough Mr. Belasco's private elevator has worked for years. It is a known fact by those that have seen him that David Belasco continues to occupy his theatre on W44th Street. Be sure to look for him the next time you go to an opening at the Belasco.

Most of the above comes from Louis Botto's At This Theatre, 1984.

I would imagine Martin Beck's ghost must be really pissed off now, especially since it's not even "his" theater anymore!

some guy jumped off the inside balcony of the marquee landing on the bar below.

---

The Mark Hellinger is hanunted by the ghost of Legs Diamond and/or Peter Allen.

---

It will always be the Mark Hellinger.