Of the Princeton Triangle Club’s many contributions to the cultural life of Princeton University and its surrounding region, none is more imposing than the McCarter Theatre, which stands massive and towered on its 2. 7-acre plot—much of it in sweeping lawn—at what was once a main approach to the campus: across University Place from the old Pennsylvania "Dinky”station.

What the existence of this 1,000 seat theater has meant to both University and region is immeasurable, for it has been host through the years to an incredible number and variety of important dramatic, musical, dance, film, and other events.

Construction of such a theater was probably inevitable when Princeton students formed an organization (named in 1893 “the Triangle Club” [q.v.]) to begin a tradition of undergraduate musical extravaganzas destined to become nationally famous. After a 1924 fire leveled the rickety 1890 campus “Casino,” a serious fund- raising effort began for a new theater.

In June 1927, between acts of Triangle’s Samarkand, Professor Donald Clive Stuart, considered by many the father of performed drama at Princeton, came on stage and introduced Thomas N. McCarter ’88 and accepted his check for $250,000 toward a new theater for Triangle and other uses.

Under the devoted stewardship of Benjamin Franklin Bunn ’07 (q.v.), Triangle had accumulated a substantial hoard of its own, so that, by June 1928, Mr. McCarter’s contribution, plus Triangle’s box office kitty, and other gifts, totaled $450,000, and construction could begin.

On February 21, 1930, the McCarter Theatre—designed by architect D. K. Este Fisher, Jr. ’13, and built of native shale relieved by red brick on lines described as Georgian with Gotic accents—opened its doors to its first audience, for Triangle’s The Golden Dog. The next night it was formally dedicated.

Now the Club had a rock—solid house made to order for its annual large-cast shows and the makings of an equally impressive financial headache; for the McCarter, conceived in boom, was born in depression, and into a world in which talking pictures and radio were beginning to give painful competition to “live” performances of all kinds, even before the coming of television.

For some years the McCarter was a popular house for pre-Broadway tryouts of new plays and post—Broadway tours of established hits. Among its world premieres were Our Town by Thornton Wilder, A.M. ’26; Bus Stop by William Inge; The Wisteria Trees, adapted from Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard by a Triangle stalwart Joshua Logan ’31; and Separate Tables by Terence Rattigan.

It is hard to name an American stage star of the 1930's and 1940's who did not play McCarter: John Barrymore, Ethel Barrymore, George M. Cohan, Helen Hayes, Katharine Hepburn, Paul Robeson, Cornelia Otis Skinner———the list goes on and on.

But after World War II, not only did the number of touring Broadway hits decline but New York producers began to cut costs by substituting in—town previews for out-of-town tryouts of new works. McCarter’s income from these sources shrank, and Triangle's earnings from its own shows had already shrunk, with the result that the Club was going steadily into debt to the University for the high costs of theatrical landlordism: insurance, utilities, repairs. and the like.

In 1950, with the debt at $47,000 and obviously increasing, Triangle and the University made a deal: the University would cancel the debt—“in recognition of Triangle’s services to the University and significant contributions to McCarter Theatre”—and would take over the theater, giving Triangle use of it for rehearsals and productions, and maintaining the club’s office and workroom.

The loss of booked—in plays left a vacuum at McCarter that Princeton’s president Robert F. Goheen sought to fill in the late 19505 with a program of plays produced under University auspices. The aim was to give an undergraduate, in four years, a taste of world drama “from Greek to modern, Oriental plays to musicals” with obvious entertainment and cultural benefits to the region.

That program has continued to this writing, with changes in emphasis and in management: artistic directors have included Milton Lyon, Ellis Raab (for 1960 when his APA Company was in residence), Arthur Lithgow, Louis Criss, and Michael Kahn.

Costs for the theater program, and for theater maintenance in general, have risen sharply, and the University. while continuing to subsidize it, has increasingly taken the line that the community that shares McCarter‘s benefits should assume more financial responsibility for its operation. The community has shown an impressive willingness to do this, but the surrounding region is relatively sparsely populated for the maintenance of so large a theater.

Meanwhile, McCarter during the cooler months lacking airconditioning, it is "dark" in the summer - is one of the busiest theaters in America, offering, in addition to its own drama program, a feast of other experiences for students and the general public. With an illustrious past and present, it has, like most cultural institutions, a promising and precarious future.

William McCIeery

Source: Leitch p. 294 ff

More information on McCarter Theater

McCarter Theater in Evolution of the Campus