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So you are the Related Companies. You have a nice plot o' land over on 42nd and 10th, the former sites of the 286-seat Houseman and 199-seat Fairbanks theaters. Thanks to some goverment tricks, if you build some nice theaters on the site you can also build an extra-tall tower to boot. So, What do you do?
Well, if you're anything like the real Related Companies, first you'd make a deal to build a classical music center that would have been affiliated with the Orchestra of St. Luke's. Then, bored with that idea, you'd instead try to pull a switcheroo and go with the House of Blues instead. Then, when that doesn't go so well with the neighbors (especially with those crazy artists over in Manhattan Plaza), you try instead for a "classy 1,800-seat" Cirque du Soleil permanent theater (we mentioned it here).
Only problem? Cirque du Soleil is, clowns or no, a circus and the neighbors want them some "legitimate theatre." Which means for the moment, unless Related wants to give up on its ginormous tower 60-story tower, Cirque ain't getting a home in midtown.
We'd love a Cirque in the city, but in this case we have to side with the community. Keep the legitimate the-a-ter on Theater Row. Anyone care to agree or disagree?
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Wouldn't you rather have a HOUSE OF BLUES then a stupid Cirque Du Soleil, or are you like 90 years old and from the midwest? I'm just asking.
Actually, since I'm not from the midwest and enjoy going to see both plays and musicals quite a bit, I'd rather have neither. I'd prefer to have real theaters in which actors get a chance to, y'know, act. If the HOB and CDS want to have presences in the city that's really nice, but they don't need to displace the legitimate theaters to do that. That goes doubley so since in this case both institutions entire reason d'etre to be on 10th and 42nd is so that Related can build a 60-story tower there.
I agree with Garth plus Cirque du Soleil is so played out, different name, different tights same tricks. Seen it once, you've seen them all.
screw cirque and "legit theatre." Build a sports arena there instead.
WHY DON'T THEY ADD SOME FLAVOR AND THROW SOME WHORES WHILE THEY ARE AT IT. WHAT IS ALL THIS ANTI ARTISTIC VISION CRAP! WHAT? CLOWNS AND ILLUSIONISTS DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH PEDIGRI FOR YOUR HOOD?
PUFFF!
AND THEN PEOPLE WONDER WHY ART AND THEATER IS SO LAME IN THE USA!
VARIETY IS THE TRADEMARK OF NYC!
LET THE CLOWNS FREE!
What's funny is that Related also owns my building, Manhattan Plaza ;) They're getting to wish they'd never gotten to know us. We already know the kind of tricks they try to pull.
Thing is, those other things (HOB, Cirque) need way more seats than the kind of thing that used to be there. Even though we're right by the busiest tourist area in the city, people feel pretty strongly about keeping the real estate west of 9th Av a 'neighborhood'.
how is Cirque any different from the lion king?
Hey look here at what Related destroyed on that block. Read this and try to tell me that replacing low-rise urban culture with generic megadevelopment is good for the city.
Bah, humbug. House of Blues is the TGI Friday's of the music world -- stick one in Times Square or next to Jekyll & Hyde, and call it a day. As for Cirque Du Soleil, it's hard to believe that anyone's found a way to make clowns pretentious, but they pulled it off.