[2] The building has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1980.

The theater opened on January 24, 1910, with a production of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew,[6] starring E. H. Sothern and Julia Marlowe.

The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places—as the Sam S. Shubert Theatre[a]—in 1980.

In February 1996, the Wang Center for the Performing Arts signed a 40-year lease agreement to operate the theatre with the Shubert Organization, which continues to own the building and property.

[7] The theatre reopened after renovation in November 1996, as the first stop on the first national tour of the musical Rent.