Ed Sullivan Theater

Stand on the Broadway sidewalk and look up. A tall vertical sign spells out the name in lights, and a marquee hangs over the doors. Taxis hiss past and tour groups pause beside you. Somewhere a street vendor calls out, and the smell of roasted nuts drifts across the corner. This stretch of Broadway, just north of Times Square, feels busy but ordinary. Yet the building in front of you has carried some of the most watched moments in American television.

The theatre opened in 1927, built by the producer Arthur Hammerstein. He named it in memory of his father, Oscar Hammerstein the First, a famous opera impresario of the late nineteenth century. Oscar's grandson, Oscar Hammerstein the Second, later wrote the lyrics for Oklahoma and The Sound of Music. So the family name on the original building belonged to a true Broadway dynasty. It was a place meant for live music and grand stage shows, not cameras.

The architect was Herbert J. Krapp, one of the busiest theatre designers of that era. He drew dozens of Broadway houses during the boom of the 1920s. Here, he did something unusual. Inside, he gave the auditorium a Gothic character — pointed arches and stained glass, almost like a church. That choice surprises many visitors. They expect a sleek television studio, and instead the bones of the room come from a cathedral style of the Middle Ages.

Notice how the theatre sits inside a larger building. The auditorium is wrapped by an office block that faces Broadway. This arrangement was common in Manhattan, where land was expensive. Office rents helped pay for the theatre behind them. From the street, you see mostly the tower and the bright signage. The real space, where audiences sit, stretches back toward the middle of the block, out of sight.

The early years were not easy. The Great Depression arrived only a couple of years after the opening, and Broadway struggled. The theatre changed hands and changed names more than once. For a time in the 1930s, the showman Billy Rose ran it as a music hall. Then, in the middle of that decade, the broadcaster CBS took it over for radio. The stage began to face microphones instead of only live audiences.

Radio gave way to television. In 1948, a newspaper columnist named Ed Sullivan began hosting a Sunday night variety programme for CBS. At first it was called Toast of the Town. Sullivan was famously stiff on camera, and comedians loved to imitate him. But he had a sharp eye for talent. Opera singers, acrobats, puppets and rock bands all shared his stage. By the 1950s, the show was broadcasting from this very theatre.

Here is the moment most people know. On 9 February 1964, the Beatles made their first live American television appearance on this stage. Around 73 million people watched that night — a huge share of the country at the time. Many musicians later said that broadcast made them want to start a band. Think about that. A single evening in this room helped change popular music on two continents.

The Beatles were not alone. Elvis Presley appeared on Sullivan's programme in the 1950s, and the network famously filmed him from the waist up on one occasion. The Rolling Stones, the Supremes and many others followed. In 1967, CBS renamed the building the Ed Sullivan Theater, honouring the host while he was still on the air. His show ended in the early 1970s, after more than two decades on Sunday nights.

For a while after that, the theatre had a quieter life. It hosted other television productions and occasional events, and its future was uncertain. Then, in 1993, David Letterman brought his new CBS programme here. The Late Show with David Letterman needed a home, and the network restored the old house for it. Crews cleaned and repaired the interior, bringing back much of the original decoration. Letterman stayed for more than twenty years.

A small piece of trivia that regulars still mention: Letterman liked his studio cold. Very cold. Audiences were often told to bring a jacket, even in summer. The idea was that a chilly room keeps people alert and laughing. Letterman also turned the surrounding block into part of the show. Nearby shopkeepers, neighbours and passers-by on this street became recurring characters on national television.

In 2015, Stephen Colbert took over The Late Show and the theatre was renovated again. Designers worked to show more of Krapp's original ceiling and decoration on camera. In 2025, CBS announced that The Late Show would end its run in 2026. That decision closed a long chapter. For decades, this building had hosted the same late night franchise, broadcast across the country almost every weeknight.

The city recognised the theatre's importance well before those later chapters. In 1988, New York City designated both the exterior and the interior as official landmarks. That protection is not automatic. Many Broadway theatres have only their facades protected, or nothing at all. Here, the room itself — the space where Sullivan, Letterman and Colbert all worked — is protected by law.

As you stand here, look again at the sign and the marquee. They are the same kind of bright invitation that pulled crowds off Broadway almost a century ago. Watch the doors for a moment. Staff, delivery workers and curious visitors pass through every day. The street outside rarely feels like a historic site. It feels like working New York, which is exactly how this theatre has always lived.

When you walk away, glance back once from the corner. Picture a winter night in 1964, with teenagers crowding this pavement and police holding them back. Then picture the same spot thirty years later, with a host stepping outside to chat with whoever happened to be passing. The building has not moved. Only the voices inside it have changed... and the street carries on, as it always has.