page_title: Winter Garden Theatre (1850)
section_title: Edwin Booth
hierarchical_section_title: Winter Garden Theatre (1850) / Edwin Booth
caption_attribution_description: John Wilkes Booth, Edwin Booth and Junius Booth, Jr. (from left to right) in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar in 1864.
context_page_description: The first theatre in New York City to bear the name The Winter Garden Theatre had a brief but important seventeen-year history as one of New York's premier showcases for a wide range of theatrical fare, from Variety shows to extravagant productions of the works of Shakespeare. Initially known as Tripler's Hall or Metropolitan Hall, it burned down in 1854 and was rebuilt as The New York Theatre. Although it burned to the ground several times, it rose from the ashes under different managers, bearing various names, to become known as one of the most important theatres in New York history.
context_section_description: On February 21, 1863, Edwin Booth took on the management of the Winter Garden Theatre (together with his brother-in-law, John Sleeper Clarke) with the intention of shifting the focus from musicals and burlesques to classical dramas.  This enterprise  included a toga-clad, one-night production of Julius Caesar on the evening of November 25, 1864, Evacuation Day, played by Edwin and his brothers, John Wilkes Booth and Junius Brutus Booth, Jr..
  The goal of staging Julius Caesar for just one night was to raise funds for the establishment of a statue of William Shakespeare designed by John Quincy Adams Ward in the relatively new Central Park on the northern outskirts (then) of Manhattan.  Tickets went for sale for a (then) astounding price of five dollars. Considering the way history was to unfold, it is curious that it was Edwin Booth who played the role of Brutus, assassin of Julius Caesar, and the role of Marc Antony was played by John Wilkes Booth, while "lean and hungry" Cassius was given to the heavier built Junius Brutus Booth, Jr..
  In the handbill promoting the production (right), it stated that there would appear, for one night only, "The Three Sons of the Great Booth."  The three Booth brothers were then listed, from oldest to youngest, Junius, Edwin, and John, and beneath this, the Latin phrase that left no doubt that the entire production was dedicated to their father, the great tragedian Junius Brutus Booth: Filii Patri Digno Digniores.
  As their mother watched on from a box on the aisle, the three Booth brothers reenacted the tragedy of Julius Caesar before an audience in The Winter Garden Theatre that was "packed to the rafters."  During the performance the clanging of fire bells could be heard from the streets of New York, as confederate sympathizers during the ongoing American Civil War tried to burn the city to the ground, which included fires set in the Lafarge House, which abutted the rear of The Winter Garden Theatre.  About a half-hour into the performance, during the first scene of Act Two, when Brutus was pacing in his orchard, contemplating his pending assassination of Caesar, the clang and clatter of horse-drawn fire engines could be heard from the street outside.  It seemed that there was a fire next door in the Lafarge House which threatened to engulf The Winter Garden Theatre.  Before panic could consume the audience, Edwin stepped to the footlights to calm the audience.
caption: Julius Caesar at The Winter Garden Theatre, with John Wilkes Booth, Edwin Booth, and Junius Brutus Booth, Jr., November 25, 1864.
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