In a Big Way

Largest, most pretentious of Manhattan's projected business-&-pleasure domes will be Metropolitan Square ("Radio City"), planned by John Davison Rockefeller Jr., National Broadcasting Co., Radio Corp. of America and Radio-Keith-Orpheum (TIME, May 18 et ante). Chastely splendorous, it will occupy most of three midtown blocks which by last week had been divested of their last tenants--lean alley-cats and stubborn bartenders--and reduced to a great expanse of rock and rubble. Excavation was begun for the first building, an enormous "International Music Hall" which will cost $7,000,000 World's largest in capacity, it will seat some 6,500 spectators, will occupy the five floors of a 31-story office building whose set-backs and roof will be graced with pools and fountains, shrubs and hanging gardens. Spectacular pageants, routs and tableaux will be staged in its auditorium, but an effect of intimacy will be sought, it was announced, in the seating arrangements. Instead of a gallery there will be a series of three shallow mezzanines. The rear seats in these will be closer to the stage than are those in many a smaller theatre.

Aiming to be more than a mere temple of mass entertainment. Radio City plans to devote some of its facilities to public culture. In the International Music Hall, it was unofficially announced last week, will be founded an institute for training in music and vaudeville. With "celebrated musicians" for teachers, it will provide instruction on free scholarships or at low tuition fees. Director will be Radio City's famed figurehead and master of ceremonies, Samuel Lionel ("Roxy") Rothafel. Last week Roxy pointed out that the nearby, dizzily rococo Roxy Theatre will have to change its name before Sept. 12, 1932, a month before the International Music Hall and a projected cinema palace are scheduled to open. Said he: "Plans for use of my name in the Radio City theatres are not ready for publication, but undoubtedly it will figure in a big way. . . ."

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