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'Cats' Revival Will Ease Your Sadness Over Ziegfeld Theater's Closing

By Maya Rajamani | January 21, 2016 3:34pm
 The Ziegfeld Theater will close and be replaced by a ballroom event space.
The Ziegfeld Theater will close and be replaced by a ballroom event space.
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DNAinfo/Ben Fractenberg

MIDTOWN — Manhattan may be losing the historic Ziegfeld Theater — but a few feisty felines may help ease the blow.

The theater at 141 W. 54th St. near Sixth Avenue — which has hosted countless star-studded movie premieres and was one of the only remaining movie “palaces” in the country — will close and be replaced by an event space called the Ziegfeld Ballroom, the New York Post first reported.

But New Yorkers with memories of the good ol' days may be able to find some consolation in the U.S. revival of "Cats," which returns to Broadway on Aug. 2, with previews starting in July.

The Ziegfeld, which operated as a Broadway theater from 1927 to 1966, reopened in 1969 as a movie house, its website said.

Speculations that the theater could shutter began surfacing several years ago. The theater, which was leased for years by Cablevision, closed for a month in 2012 to host several private events. The Post reported the company was considering selling it.

Last April, Cablevision CEO and New York Knicks owner James Dolan told the Hollywood Reporter the theater was losing “a lot of money” and would “probably” be shut down.

On Wednesday, Cablevision released a statement saying the owners of the theater had secured a new tenant for the location.

“... [W]e will be exiting our lease in the coming weeks to accommodate the new tenant,” the company said. “We wish the owners of the Ziegfeld Theater the best of luck with the future of the establishment and with the new tenant that they have selected.”

In its own statement, theater owners Fisher Brothers and Core Ziegfeld LLC — who also operate the event space Gotham Hall near Penn Station — said the 21,331 square-foot Ziegfeld Ballroom would open in the space in fall 2017, with space for galas and events.

The space will “undergo a major renovation” before the new venue opens, but will still be able to host movie premieres, the statement said.

"Cats," meanwhile, first opened on Broadway in 1982, ending its run nearly two decades later in 2000.

The revival will premiere at the Neil Simon Theatre at 250 W. 52nd St., Playbill reported.