Radio City Music Hall

 Radio City Music Hall opened on this date in 1932. John D. Rockefeller Jr. had originally planned to build a new Metropolitan Opera House on some land he owned in Midtown Manhattan, but the stock market crash of 1929 put an end to that plan. He decided to build a block of buildings anyway, which he called "Rockefeller Center." The cornerstone of the center was a vast Art Deco theater that offered lavish entertainment at reasonable prices. Radio City Music Hall boasted the largest indoor theater in the world; its marquee spanned an entire city block. The stage was equipped to produce water effects like fountains and rain showers, and fog could even be piped in from a ConEd utility plant nearby. One New York critic wrote, "It has been said of the new Music Hall that it needs no performers."

Opening night was not a big success. Crowds turned out for the high-class variety show featuring Ray Bolger and Martha Graham, but individual acts were lost in the cavernous space, and it got bad reviews. Radio City was better suited to big, splashy spectacles. Two weeks after the opening, impresario Roxy Rothafel staged a movie premiere — Frank Capra's The Bitter Tea of General Yen — coupled with a stage spectacular, and started the Radio City tradition of movies combined with stage shows. That tradition continued until 1979.

The Christmas Spectacular is another Radio City tradition that has endured. The first Christmas Spectacular was staged December 21, 1933, a year after the theater opened. It was a 30-minute production that was paired with a movie feature. In 1979, the show was expanded to 90 minutes, and since that time it stands on its own, incorporating 3-D movies and, of course, the precision legs of the Radio City Rockettes.