Samuel J. Friedman Theatre, West 47th Street NYC

The Samuel J. Friedman Theatre, formerly the Biltmore Theatre, is located at 261 West 47th Street in the Theater District of New York City. Opened in 1925, it was designed by Herbert J. Krapp in the neo-Renaissance style and was constructed for Irwin Chanin. It has 650 seats across two levels and is operated by the Manhattan Theatre Club (MTC). The auditorium interior was designated a New York City landmark in 1987, and the theater is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In 2008, the theater was renamed Samuel J. Friedman Theatre.

At the Susan and Peter J. Solomon Family Lounge, which opens 45 minutes before curtain, there are restrooms, concessions, coat lockers, the MTC gift shop, and the Subscriber Services office. The mezzanine lounge has restrooms, concessions, and coat lockers. The Premier Circle lounge is open exclusively for members of MTC’s Patron Program.

The theater was built by the Chanin Organization in 1925-1926, the first built on 47th Street. It had originally a capacity of 1,000 seats. Its interior is one of the historic theater interiors that symbolize the New York theater. It is based on the traditional Adamesque styles with which Herbert Krapp adorned so many of his Broadway theaters. Its horseshoe shaped plan is unusual among Broadway houses. The façade is designed in terracotta and buff-colored brick. The ground floor is shielded by a marquee. The upper stories are divided into bays separated by fluted pilasters, and the façade is topped by an entablature and balustrade. The auditorium contains neo-Renaissance detailing, a raked orchestra level, a large balcony, and a shallow domed ceiling. The modern configuration of the theater dates to a 2000s renovation, when the auditorium was redesigned to a smaller size, allowing the addition of MTC's lounges and offices behind it.

The Biltmore Theatre opened on December 7, 1925, with Owen Davis's play Easy Come Easy Go, which had previously opened on October 26 at the George M. Cohan Theatre on Broadway and West 43rd Street.

It was used by Federal Theatre's Living Newspaper project in 1936 before being acquired by Warner Bros. The Biltmore was a CBS radio and television studio from 1952 to 1961, when producer David Cogan turned the Biltmore back into a legitimate theater. Cogan sold the Biltmore in 1986, a fire partially destroyed the theater in late 1987, then the theater was closed. The theater was sold several times afterward, including to the Nederlander Organization and Stewart F. Lane in 1993.

The Manhattan Theatre Club (MTC), a nonprofit theater company, was incorporated in 1970. Its first home is a three-story space on East 73rd Street. MCT took over Biltmore Theatre by 2001 (officially acquired in 2008). It was renovated, rededicated on October 15, 2003, and reopened on November 6 with The Violet Hour, a play by Richard Greenberg. On September 4, 2008, the theater was renamed Samuel J. Friedman Theatre (1912–1974), after the Broadway publicist, whose family was a major donor to MTC.