subject: The distinctive architectural feature of the typical Broadway theater [print this page] The distinctive architectural feature of the typical Broadway theater is the juxtaposition of two almost independent buildings facing and opening into one another through a proscenium arch.
The distinctive architectural feature of the typical Broadway theater is the juxtaposition of two almost independent buildings facing and opening into one another through a proscenium arch. The audience sits in the auditorium structure and watches the actors perform in the stage house.
This separation is more than an aesthetic impression, because the building codes require that a physical barrier protect the audience from a fire starting on the stage. A fireproof wall, rather than a mere partition separates the structures, and this separation is completed by a fireproof curtain that is rigged to fall automatically and close the proscenium opening in case of fire.
Automatic fire doors similarly close all other openings between the two structures. The codes keep such openings to a minimum.
This separation came about in the nineteenth century in the United States as a result of theater fires.lt has produced a fundamental structural change from previous centuries without making much corresponding change in the appearance of the building.
Most theaters of the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries were remodeled from banquet hall, tennis court; and other rectangular halls, and remained essentially a single structure with a thin partition for the proscenium wall.
So far as the audience is concerned, a theater is primarily a place for entertainment. Its great attraction is the opportunity it affords for vicarious experience. The audience approaches the theater with the expectation of some form of glamour,excitement,or emotional vividness.
The architect and the decorator try to sustain and increase this excitement and anticipation as the spectator moves through the theater. One of the familiar architectural devices for this effect is spaciousness of lobby,foyer and auditorium. Color and ornamentation are other devices for the same purpose,as seen in almost all theaters built before the twentieth century.
Nor did it spring into being overnight.lt evolved gradually, over a long period, from the ideas of many people, each one building on the work of their predecessors. The process began in 1873, when it was accidentally discovered that the electrical resistance of the element selenium varied in proportion to the intensity of the light shining on it.
Scientists quickly recognized that this provided a way of transforming light variations into electrical signals. Almost immediately a number of schemes were proposed for sending pictures by wire (it was, of course, before radio). One of the earliest of these schemes was patterned on the human eye. j Suggested by G.R.Carey in 1875,it envisioned a mosaic of selenium cells on j which the picture to be transmitted would be focused by a lens system.
At the receiving end there would be a similarly arranged mosaic made up of electric lights. Each selenium cell would be connected by an individual wire i to the similarly placed light in the receiving mosaic. Light falling on the cell would reproduce the original picture.
Had the necessary and the right kind of lights been available, this system would have worked. But it also would have required an impractical number of connecting wires.Carey recognized this and in a second scheme proposed to "scan "the cells, transmitting the signal from each cell to its associated light, in turn, over a single wire.
If this were done fast enough, the retentive power of the eye would cause the resultant image to be seen as a complete picture.
The distinctive architectural feature of the typical Broadway theater
