Show Business: The 7:30 Curtain

The idea seemed simple enough. Raise Broadway curtains at 7:30 p.m. instead of 8:30, and all those suburbanites and would-be theatergoers from New York's outlying boroughs could stop worrying about missing the last train and getting the baby sitter home. Still, it took the League of New York Theaters years to get the unions and the producers of all the shows on Broadway to agree.

This past December they did, and early last month the new curtain time went into effect. Despite the league's enthusiasm, early evidence suggests that the 7:30 plan made little financial difference. A comparison of last January's gross...

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