1953 Radio City Music Hall Program Booklet Glory of Easter NYC For Sale

This program booklet from Radio City Music Hall documents the venue’s programming for the week beginning Thursday, April 9, 1953, a period when the “Showplace of the Nation” balanced its signature lavish stage productions with major Hollywood releases. The cover, rendered in an elegant flowing script atop the venue’s sans-serif branding, identifies the publication as “Showplace” and anchors it to Rockefeller Center in Manhattan. The interior pages provide a complete window into the era’s theatrical and cinematic offerings, beginning with a full-page advertisement for the upcoming world premiere of George Stevens’ *Shane*, starring Alan Ladd, Jean Arthur, Van Heflin, Brandon De Wilde, and Jack Palance, a Technicolor Paramount Picture promoted as “an important motion picture experience on the great panoramic screen.”The program’s detailed listings reveal the intricate structure of a Music Hall stage show under senior producer Leon Leonidoff and producer Russell Markert. The sequence opens with the Music Hall Grand Organ performed by Richard Leibert, Ashley Miller, and Raymond F. Bohr, Jr., followed by a Walt Disney cartoon titled *Father’s Day Off*. The centerpiece production, *Glory of Easter*, featured the Music Hall Symphony Orchestra under Raymond Paige, with soloist Jacqueline Lange performing Rubinstein’s “Kamenoi Ostrow.” The second major segment, *Rainbow*, comprised six distinct scenes from a “Spring Bouquet” prologue through “Candy Cover-Girl,” “Rockette Candy,” “Spring Tonic,” and “Spring Tidings,” culminating in a finale titled “The Dancing Waters.” Costume designs by Frank Spencer, settings by James Stewart Morcom, and lighting effects by Eugene Braun demonstrate the collaborative artistry that defined these elaborate revues. The featured film attraction was Warner Bros.’ *By the Light of the Silvery Moon*, directed by David Butler and starring Doris Day and Gordon MacRae, a Technicolor musical adaptation suggested by Booth Tarkington’s “Penrod” stories.The booklet also preserves contemporary commercial culture through its embedded advertisements. Schrafft’s Rockefeller Center restaurants at 21 West 51st Street and 30 West 52nd Street promoted their soda fountain open until midnight, offering “choice food, cooked the American way,” while RCA Television in the Grand Lounge and guided Rockefeller Center tours reflect the broader entertainment ecosystem surrounding the theater. A fire notice from Commissioner Jacob Grumet instructing patrons to walk to the nearest exit adds a period-specific municipal detail, and the inclusion of the Music Hall Corporation’s officers—president E. V. Downing and vice president Irving Evans—anchors the artifact within the business history of this iconic New York City institution.