[35] The entrance vestibule, originally immediately inside the doors, contained green tiles and relief panels by St. John Issing.

[33] Grendellis and Ricci designed terracotta panels for the arched pediments above the seventh-story windows, which represent dance, declamation, and song.

[40] The tower wing was used as offices for Klaw and Erlanger and later Florenz Ziegfeld Jr.[42] The theater was also mechanically advanced for its time, with heating, cooling, and vacuum-cleaning systems, as well as a fireproof structural frame.

[49] Leading from the 42nd Street entrance vestibule is the lobby, which runs under the office wing; the space contains curving Art Nouveau-style floral motifs.

[50][46] The remainder of the wall contains marble panels, separated by terracotta pilasters that were designed by Neumark of Bremen and carved by Grendellis and Ricci.

[32][63] The rear (east) wall of the reception room has a fireplace with a Caen stone and Irish marble mantel, also decorated with curving foliate patterns.

[62] The men's lounge was a smoking room with depictions of various figures, which New York Plaisance magazine referred to as "notably artistic and interesting".

[61][62] The upper portions of the walls contain sixteen murals attributed to Edward Simmons and R. W. Finn, which depict New York City's historical development.

[109] A controversy arose in early 1903 when a neighboring landowner, Samuel McMillan, discovered that the office wing on 42nd Street would protrude 4 ft (1.2 m) beyond the lot line.

[119] The New Amsterdam Theatre opened on October 26, 1903,[27][120] with Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream,[121][122] which was a failure despite costing five times as much as the typical Broadway show.

[129] Klaw and Erlanger had begun renting out the New Amsterdam, since they wanted to focus on other theatrical ventures, and since it was expensive for them to produce all of the theater's shows.

[130] The men disagreed over the theater's bookings; Klaw wanted to stage classical productions, but Erlanger preferred large revues and musicals.

[131][132] The next year, the theater hosted Forty-five Minutes from Broadway, featuring Fay Templeton and Victor Moore,[19][133][134] as well as The Governor's Son, starring the family of George M.

[149][160][161] Among the performers in the Follies were Fanny Brice, Eddie Cantor, W. C. Fields, Ina Claire, Marilyn Miller, Will Rogers, Sophie Tucker, Bert Williams, and Van and Schenck.

[171][172] The musical Watch Your Step premiered at the New Amsterdam in 1914,[129][173] featuring Irving Berlin's first complete Broadway score;[149] it ran for 175 performances.

[131][175] The following year, Sir Herbert Tree and Company staged several Shakespeare plays,[149][176] and Guy Bolton and Emmerich Kálmán's musical Miss Springtime ran 224 performances.

[229] During early 1933, the musicals Alice in Wonderland[227][230][231] and The Cherry Orchard[232][233] had limited runs at the New Amsterdam, presented by Eva Le Gallienne and her Civic Repertory Theater.

[243][244][245] The Dry Dock Savings Bank acquired the New Amsterdam Theatre through a foreclosure proceeding in May 1936 after the theater's owners had failed to pay over $1.65 million in interest, taxes, and other fees.

[239][256] Bernard Sobel, Flo Ziegfeld's former agent, lamented in The New York Times that the cinema conversion was "another indication that the old order has indeed changed".

[269] Later that decade, a critic characterized the roof theater as a "gloomy cavern" and the main auditorium as "just another in the dubious string of 42nd Street movie houses".

[273] The 42nd Street Development Corporation, formed in 1976 to discuss plans for redeveloping Times Square, considered turning the New Amsterdam Theatre into a dance complex in 1977.

[274] The same year, the City University of New York's Graduate Center hosted an exhibition with photographs of the New Amsterdam and other theaters to advocate for the area's restoration.

[278] Theatrical operator Nederlander Organization tried to buy the New Amsterdam Theatre from Finkelstein in early 1982, before the city and state governments selected developers for the sites, but was unsuccessful.

[281][282] The theater was technically owned by the New York City Industrial Development Corporation, which issued $5 million in bonds to finance the acquisition.

[296] Marian Sulzberger Heiskell, a chairwoman of the 42nd Street Development Project, was a family friend of Michael Eisner, the chairman of The Walt Disney Company.

[303] Disney had tentatively agreed to take over the New Amsterdam by the end of the year,[83][304] and mayor Rudy Giuliani and governor Mario Cuomo publicly announced plans for the theater's restoration in January 1994.

[295] Other Broadway theater operators had initially opposed the economic incentives, alleging the 42nd Street Development Project was tantamount to a subsidy for the New Amsterdam.

[324] Disney's decision to stage these events was to ensure the New Amsterdam's restoration would not be overshadowed by the premiere of The Lion King, which in itself was a highly acclaimed production.

[322][325] The roof theater remained closed, and Disney had no plans to reopen it,[326] in part because the elevators could not accommodate 700 patrons under city building codes.

[329] Besides theatrical productions, the revived New Amsterdam has hosted events benefiting Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, including past iterations of the annual Easter Bonnet Competition.