Once again, a bleak economy has caused business partners to pave paradise and put up a parking lot in its place. The Algonquin Hotel’s famed Oak Room is closing its doors, the New York Post reports.
The plan is part of a general renovation of the aging hotel, which, when it reopens, will convert the hallowed former supper club to a breakfast nook.
The most notable part of the Oak Room’s storied past is its famed “Round Table,” which provided a home away from home for such early twentieth literary legend as Dorothy Parker and Robert Benchley.
More recently the space was repurposed as a cabaret, which hosted a star-studded roster of pop musicians, including singer Harry Connick Jr., and singer/pianist Michael Feinstein .
Feinstein is quoted by the Post as saying:
My New York career started at the Oak Room, and I can’t imagine the city without it.
An essential part of the hotel’s identity will be lost with its closure. I think they are making a big mistake.
Actress and singer Andrea Marcovicci echoed those sentiments in a written statement in which she referred to the Oak Room as “my musical home and creative inspiration for 25 years.” The statement went on to add:
From my first entrance in 1987, a jumble of nerves, to my last encore just this past Christmas, I have been blessed with the finest, warmest audiences a performer could ever hope for, and the most beautiful room in which to entertain.
The Algonquin’s general manager, Gary Budge, told the Post that the decision to do away with a piece of New York history was a result of declining audiences in recent years.
The Oak Room joins other celebrated New York landmarks to close in recent years. The celebrity haunt Elaine's closed last May following the death of owner and namesake Elaine Kaufman, and a year earlier the Central Park institution Tavern on the Green was permanently shuttered.
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