Hippodrome

Marvin S. Schapiro, owner of a commercial real estate company whose holdings included the Hippodrome Theater and area shopping centers, died of pneumonia Friday at Blakehurst Life Care Community in Towson. He was 82, and had lived in the Tuscany-Canterbury section of North Baltimore. An activist in the Jewish community, he worked for the economic development of Israel and held roles in The Associated: Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore. Born in Baltimore and raised in Forest Park, he was a 1937 graduate of Forest Park High School.

The Lion King will play a 14-week engagement, the longest of any touring show in Baltimore theater history, at the Hippodrome Theatre this summer. "It hasn't played the mid-Atlantic. It has a huge following from the family standpoint," Marks Chowning, executive director of the Hippodrome, said of the musical's ability to sustain such a long run. "I think it just has the same kind of broad appeal that the really successful, long-running shows have had." The run begins June 2 and concludes Sept.

Can vaudeville make a comeback in this electronic era of channel surfing and virtual reality?That's the question facing a local group seeking to restore Baltimore's once-magnificent Hippodrome Theater to its 1914 splendor.The National Museum of Live Entertainment Inc., a private, nonprofit group headed by Donald Hicken, last week secured an option to buy the vacant theater at 12 N. Eutaw St. for "about $800,000" from an affiliate of Continental Realty.The option gives the group until early next year to determine whether it would be feasible to reopen the building as part of Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke's effort to transform the Howard Street corridor into an "avenue of the arts."

THE OLD TAILOR DOESN'T HAVE THE heart to throw away the winter coats, suits, summer dresses and trousers left behind by those who abandoned the city. Wrapped in cellophane, the garments hang from a dusty clothes carousel that stopped spinning long ago in his North Eutaw Street shop. The three-piece, pin-striped disco suit, the 1960s Gidget petticoat and the cotton seersucker dresses -- the styles of the clothing reveal when their owners left.Over the past 50 years, Sam Boulmetis watched the downtown shopping crowd thin through the front window of his tailor shop as one out of every three Baltimoreans -- 300,000 in all -- found a ribbon of new highway beckoning them to the suburbs.

IS THE restoration of Baltimore's Hippodrome Theater in trouble -- or just a pawn that Gov. Parris N. Glendening keeps using against antagonists like Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke?Late last month, the governor withheld a $1.8 million capital budget allocation for planning the Hippodrome's transformation into a performing arts center. Citing "unanswered questions," the governor asked for firmer cost figures and details about city plans to revitalize the vicinity of the theater at Eutaw and Fayette streets.

EFFORTS TO transform the old Hippodrome vaudeville house into Baltimore's performing arts center received a critical boost this week with Gov. Parris N. Glendening's announcement that he will include a $1.7 million planning grant in his supplemental budget.The long-vacant Eutaw Street theater would be the centerpiece of the $35 million cultural complex in an area that has been declining steadily but with considerable redevelopment potential. The Hippodrome's main theater could easily be renovated into a 2,300-seat venue capable of handling touring Broadway shows, smaller stage productions, dance performances and concerts.

The city's comedy fans could start getting more yuks on the west side. With the Improv shuttered and no definite plans for another in the near future, the Hippodrome is looking to attract a steady stream of nationally touring comedians. In the past two months, Sinbad, Eddie Griffin and the Bad Boys of Comedy - all major national acts - played the Hippodrome's main stage. The venue also has a smaller pavilion stage that could accommodate crowds slightly larger than those that filled the now-defunct Improv.

ALTHOUGH it is one of the smaller items in Baltimore County's $1.79 billion budget, a $250,000 grant to rebuild Baltimore's historic Hippodrome Theater has turned out to be the most controversial. The dispute over this grant reveals that despite good intentions, the smallest misstep can easily derail city-county projects. It all started when the county tentatively agreed to kick in $500,000 for the Hippodrome renovation. The money was to be paid in two $250,000 increments. But in March, County Executive C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger agreed to double the contribution after Baltimore Del. Howard P. Rawlings, the powerful chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, asked for a larger amount.

After more than a year wearing a prominent "for sale" tag, the theatrical company that manages the Hippodrome Theatre has been sold to a New York investment company, which promises to expand its stage offerings. The sale to Key Brand Entertainment for $90.4 million allows Live Nation Inc. to focus more on its core business, concert and festival promotion.

Admission was free yesterday as Baltimore's reawakening Hippodrome opened to the public for the first time since the 1914-era stage went dark in 1990. Early reviews of the grand theater's dramatic space were glowing. Scores of Baltimoreans lined up to don hard hats and tour the interior - still a work in progress - eager to see the balconies and murals some remembered from childhood, or wondering about an old popcorn stand. Others were seeing the Eutaw Street structure for the first time after hearing tales about it in city lore.