History and architecture
The ANTA Theater survives today as one of the historic theaters that symbolize American theater for both New York and the nation. Built in the 1924-25, the ARM was constructed for the Theater Guild as a subscription playhouse, named the Guild Theater. The founding Guild members, including actors, playwrights, designers, attorneys and bankers, formed the Theater Guild to present high quality plays which they believed would be artistically superior to the current offerings of the commercial Broadway houses. More than just an auditorium, however, the Guild Theater was designed to be a theater resource center, with classrooms, studios, and a library. The theater also included the most up-to-date staging technology.
Besides its historical importance as Broadway's major repertory theater, the ANTA is an exceptionally handsome theater building. Its exterior, designed by prominent theater architect C. Howard Crane with Kenneth Franzheim, drew inspiration from 15th-century Tuscan villas. Differing markedly than the Beaux-Arts influenced neo-classical styles of the majority of other theaters of the period, the theater building provoked as such admiration as the company's planned operations.
For half a century the ANTA Theater has served as home to countless numbers of the plays through which the Broadway theater has cane to personify American theater. During most of its life, the theater has housed two special repertory companies, unique to Broadway. As such, the ANTA continues to help define the Broadway theater district, the largest and most famous concentration of legitimate stage theaters in the world.
Sources and further reading
This history comes from the Landmarks app’s historical catalog. Names and building uses may reflect the period described.