William Hammerstein (September 26, 1875 – June 10, 1914) was an American theater manager. He ran the
Victoria Theatre on what became
Times Square
Times Square is a major commercial intersection, tourist destination, entertainment hub, and neighborhood in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It is formed by the junction of Broadway, Seventh Avenue, and 42nd Street. Together with adjacent ...
, Manhattan, presenting very popular vaudeville shows with a wide variety of acts. He was known for "freak acts", where celebrities or people notorious for scandals appeared on stage. Hammerstein's Victoria Theatre became the most successful in New York.
Early years
![Paradise Roof Garden above the Victoria Theatre, NY, c](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b2/Paradise_Roof_Garden_above_the_Victoria_Theatre%2C_NY%2C_c._1902.jpg)
William Hammerstein was born in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
on September 26, 1875,
["New York, New York City Births, 1846-1909," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:271S-4VN : accessed September 21, 2015), William Hamerstein, September 26, 1875; citing Birth, Manhattan, New York, New York, United States, New York Municipal Archives, New York; FHL microfilm 1,322,094.] son of
Oscar Hammerstein, the theater impresario, and his first wife, née Rose Blau.
[
He started work as a press agent, then built a vaudeville theatre on 110th Street, Manhattan, called Little Coney Island.
He also managed burlesque shows.
Willie Hammerstein managed his father's Olympia Theater, which opened in 1895.
In November 1896 Willie Hammerstein brought the ]Cherry Sisters
The Cherry Sisters – Addie (1859–1942), Effie (1867–1944), Ella (1854–1934), Lizzie (1857–1936), and Jessie Cherry (1871–1903) – were five sisters from Marion, Iowa who formed a notorious vaudeville touring act in the late 19th centu ...
to the Olympia roof garden. The sisters put on a terrible act where they sang sentimental, dialect or patriotic songs. One of them played the piano and another banged a drum. Willie knew how bad they were. He provided a net that protected them when the audience, as expected, started throwing produce and garbage at the stage. The word spread, and the sisters became a big draw.
Oscar Hammerstein went bankrupt in 1898. The Olympia theater was sold in an auction. Hammerstein managed to raise enough money to build the Victoria Theatre, which opened as a legitimate theater on March 3, 1899. On June 26, 1899, he opened a partially enclosed roof garden theater, the Venetian Terrace Garden, with an outdoor promenade that was attached to the roof garden of Hammerstein's Theatre Republic in 1900. Hammerstein enlarged the roof garden theater and reopened it in May 1901 as the Paradise Roof Garden.
Victoria Theatre
In February 1904 Willie Hammerstein took over management of his father's Victoria Theatre.
He was talented at promoting his shows, and was skilled at finding and booking profitable acts.
The Victoria had been staging variety acts, plays and musicals.
Willie Hammerstein started putting on popular low-brow vaudeville shows at low prices. He signed up stars and unknown new performers, celebrities of all types, physical freaks, illusionists and risqué exotic dancers. The highly varied programs drew large and often noisy audiences.
Hammerstein ran the only vaudeville theater in Times Square, and had no other theatres.
He was able to develop shows uniquely fitted to his local audience.
The crowd at the Victoria like the rather jaded and cynical atmosphere, the stage slang and black humor.
Acts could afford to include more sexual innuendo than in other houses.
To keep costs and prices down, a typical Hammerstein bill would feature a few well-paid stars and a large number of lower-priced novelty acts.
Hammerstein made the Victoria the most popular venue for vaudeville in New York.
The Victoria was a grand building, and played some high-quality acts.
As of 1905 the theater owners who booked through the William Morris Agency
The William Morris Agency (WMA) was a Hollywood-based talent agency. It represented some of the best known 20th-century entertainers in film, television, and music. During its 109-year tenure it came to be regarded as the "first great talent a ...
seemed likely to become dominant in the vaudeville industry. They included Hammerstein, Frederick Freeman Proctor
Frederick Freeman Proctor (March 17, 1851 – September 4, 1929), aka F. F. Proctor, was a vaudeville impresario who pioneered the method of continuous vaudeville. He opened the Twenty-third Street Theatre in New York City.
Bio
Frederick Fre ...
, Timothy Sullivan
Timothy Daniel Sullivan (July 23, 1862 – August 31, 1913) was a New York politician who controlled Manhattan's Bowery and Lower East Side districts as a prominent leader within Tammany Hall. He was known euphemistically as "Dry Dollar", as the ...
and Percy G. Williams
Percy Garnett Williams (May 4, 1857 – July 21, 1923) was an American actor who became a travelling medicine salesman, real estate investor, amusement park operator and vaudeville theater owner and manager. He ran the Greater New York Circuit ...
.
Later the Keith
Keith may refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Keith (given name), includes a list of people and fictional characters
* Keith (surname)
* Keith (singer), American singer James Keefer (born 1949)
* Baron Keith, a line of Scottish barons ...
- Albee circuit booking office gave Hammerstein a monopoly on big-time vaudeville in Times Square.
Willie's father was much more interested in grand opera, and in 1906 opened the Manhattan Opera House
The Manhattan Center is a building in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Built in 1906 and located at 311 West 34th Street, it houses Manhattan Center Studios, the location of two recording studios; its Grand Ballroom; and the Hammerstein Ballroo ...
.
Revenue from the Victoria kept the opera house running.
At one point Oscar Hammerstein, always short of money, moved to sell the Victoria to the Shubert family
The Shubert family was responsible for the establishment of the Broadway district, in New York City, as the hub of the theater industry in the United States. They dominated the legitimate theater and vaudeville in the first half of the 20th cen ...
.
Willie and his brother Arthur
Arthur is a common male given name of Brittonic languages, Brythonic origin. Its popularity derives from it being the name of the legendary hero King Arthur. The etymology is disputed. It may derive from the Celtic ''Artos'' meaning “Bear”. An ...
, who produced shows, blocked the attempt.
In March 1913 Keith and Albee paid Oscar Hamilton a reported $225,000 to give up his monopoly.
They opened the Palace Theatre at 47th Street and 7th Avenue, advertising "refined glamour" and featuring the biggest stars of vaudeville.
Acts became harder to book, since performers did not want to be connected with a rival of the powerful Keith's circuit.
Acts
Performers enjoyed playing the Victoria. Buster Keaton
Joseph Frank "Buster" Keaton (October 4, 1895 – February 1, 1966) was an American actor, comedian, and filmmaker. He is best known for his silent film work, in which his trademark was physical comedy accompanied by a stoic, deadpan expression ...
thought it was the greatest of the vaudeville houses.
Hammerstein asked performers back many times if he liked them, as with the British comedian Harry Tate
Ronald Macdonald Hutchison (4 July 1872 – 14 February 1940), professionally known as Harry Tate, was an English comedian, who performed in the music halls, in variety shows, and in films.
Career
Born in Lambeth, the son of a Scottish tea m ...
.
In June 1905 Willie Hammerstein signed up Will Rogers
William Penn Adair Rogers (November 4, 1879 – August 15, 1935) was an American vaudeville performer, actor, and humorous social commentator. He was born as a citizen of the Cherokee Nation, in the Indian Territory (now part of Oklahoma ...
to perform in the Victoria for afternoon matinees and in the Paradise Roof Garden in the evenings.
The young Mae West
Mae West (born Mary Jane West; August 17, 1893 – November 22, 1980) was an American stage and film actress, playwright, screenwriter, singer, and sex symbol whose entertainment career spanned over seven decades. She was known for her breezy ...
played eleven one-week engagements in 1912 and 1913, a good fit with the audience through her suggestion of notoriety.
Hammerstein often booked acts from Europe, who sometimes made up half the show.
He introduced the dancers Gertrude Hoffmann and Constance Stewart-Richardson
Lady Constance Stewart-Richardson (later Matthew; ; 1883–1932) was a British dancer and author.
Biography
She was a daughter of Francis Mackenzie Sutherland-Leveson-Gower, 2nd Earl of Cromartie (1852–1893) and sister of Sibell Lilian Blunt-M ...
to the vaudeville stage.
A review in the ''New York Dramatic Mirror'' of August 12, 1905, gives a sense of the shows:
Willie Hammerstein became known for his "freak acts". Typically these featured people who had scandalized the public and gained notoriety. Members of love triangles involving murders or suicides were popular, if one of their members was free to appear and give the public the titillating details.
Evelyn Nesbit
Evelyn Nesbit (born Florence Evelyn Nesbit; December 25, 1884 or 1885 – January 17, 1967) was an American artists' model, chorus girl, and actress. She is best known for her years as a young woman in New York City, particularly her inv ...
was an example.
In 1911 Irving Berlin
Irving Berlin (born Israel Beilin; yi, ישראל ביילין; May 11, 1888 – September 22, 1989) was a Russian-American composer, songwriter and lyricist. His music forms a large part of the Great American Songbook.
Born in Imperial Russi ...
was featured at the Victoria, billed as "The Composer of a Hundred Hits", and performed a number of his songs including '' That Mysterious Rag''. Berlin was hired more as a celebrity songwriter than for his ability to sing, but was a hit with the audience anyway.
Other types of human curiosity were "Shekla, Court Magician to the Shah of Persia" and "Madamoiselle Fatima, Escaped Harem Dancer: ... She has a distinctive Turkish personality and dances with original movements all her own, accompanied by her two Eunuch Servants."
Hammerstein also put on novelties like Don the Talking Dog
Don the Talking Dog (1905–1915) was a popular vaudeville act in the early 20th century. Don was raised in Theerhütte, Germany by Martin Ebers and Martha Haberland. His breed is unconfirmed – reports state that he was a German hunting dog ...
.
Sports celebrities like boxer James J. Corbett
James John "Jim" Corbett (September 1, 1866 – February 18, 1933) was an American professional boxer and a World Heavyweight Champion, best known as the only man who ever defeated the great John L. Sullivan (hence the " man who beat the man ...
and baseball pitcher Rube Marquard
Richard William "Rube" Marquard (October 9, 1886 – June 1, 1980) was an American left-handed pitcher in Major League Baseball in the 1910s and early 1920s. He achieved his greatest success with the New York Giants. He was inducted into the Ba ...
also drew audiences.
Family and legacy
Hammerstein was unusual in making a sharp separation between his work in the theater, which he loved, and his home life.
He would not pose for a photograph, and told his press agents not to use his name in publicity.
Hammerstein married Alice Nimmo in 1893, and they had two sons, Oscar
Oscar, OSCAR, or The Oscar may refer to:
People
* Oscar (given name), an Irish- and English-language name also used in other languages; the article includes the names Oskar, Oskari, Oszkár, Óscar, and other forms.
* Oscar (Irish mythology) ...
and Reginald. They lived at 315 Central Park West.
His wife died in 1910 and he married her sister, Annie Nimmo.
He never took part in Broadway night life, and he did not want his two sons to get involved in theater.
However, Oscar Hammerstein II
Oscar Greeley Clendenning Hammerstein II (; July 12, 1895 – August 23, 1960) was an American lyricist, librettist, theatrical producer, and (usually uncredited) director in the musical theater for almost 40 years. He won eight Ton ...
became famous as a lyricist and musical comedy writer.
Willie Hammerstein suffered from a disease of the kidneys, and died in New York on June 10, 1914.
He was aged 38.
He had made the Victoria his own. His brother, Arthur, took over management but was unable to recapture the spirit.
The theater soon had to be closed.
The Victoria Theatre was pulled down two years after Willie Hammerstein died, and the Rialto
The Rialto is a central area of Venice, Italy, in the ''sestiere'' of San Polo. It is, and has been for many centuries, the financial and commercial heart of the city. Rialto is known for its prominent markets as well as for the monumental Rialto ...
was built in its place, the first movie palace in Times Square.
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Hammerstein, Willie
1874 births
1914 deaths
American theatre managers and producers
American people of German-Jewish descent
Hammerstein family (show business)
19th-century American businesspeople
Special Tony Award recipients
Deaths from kidney disease