Where to sit
Operation Mincemeat seating chart — John Golden Theatre
A plain-language read of the John Golden Theatre for Operation Mincemeat. It gives facts from the sources we could read; any view of our own is labelled as ours.
About the venue
- Theatre
- John Golden Theatre
- Address
- 252 W 45th St, New York, NY 10036
- Neighborhood
- Theater District
- Capacity
- 802 seats
- Operator
- Shubert Organization
One of Broadway's smaller houses. Home of Operation Mincemeat.
The short version
The John Golden opened in 1927 as the Theatre Masque, designed by Herbert J. Krapp for the Chanin brothers with a Spanish-influenced interior of rough plaster walls, wrought-iron fixtures, spiraled columns and ceiling arches. The Chanins built it with the Royale and the Majestic as a three-theatre complex, and the Shubert Organization's page calls the Masque the most intimate of the three, designed for serious dramas. Producer John Golden took it over in 1937 and renamed it; at 802 seats, it remains one of Broadway's smallest houses. Shubert's figures put 465 seats in the orchestra and 337 on one mezzanine level, three flights up (28 steps), split into a front mezzanine (110) and a rear mezzanine (227), with no box seats. In our view, the room's size keeps the seats fairly close to the stage, so the top price tier buys less of an advantage here than in a large house, and the mezzanine and the rear orchestra are worth pricing first.
Section by section
-
Orchestra
465 seats, reached without steps; wheelchair seating is in the orchestra only (Shubert's access notes). In our view, centre orchestra is the seat to want for the quick character work, and the small room keeps the side and rear orchestra close too.
-
Mezzanine
One level, three flights up (28 steps), with a front mezzanine of 110 seats and a rear mezzanine of 227, about two steps per row, entered from behind row D (Shubert's figures and access notes). In our view, the front rows show the whole stage picture, and the rear mezzanine still feels close in a room this size.
New to Broadway seating? Here's a 5-minute guide to reading any Broadway seating chart.