People jockeyed for limited lawn space at the HBO Bryant Park Summer Film Festival on June 25. (Photo: Hiroko Masuike for The New York Times)

July 3, 2007, 11:45 am
Life on the Line Requires Time and Patience

By Sewell Chan

Shakespeare in Central Park and film screenings in Bryant Park are among the most beloved summer rituals in New York City. The fact that both events are free is a big part of their appeal. It also explains why getting a seat or a spot can be maddeningly difficult and require hours of waiting in muggy heat.

City Room talked to officials who oversee Shakespeare in the Park, which began in 1962, and the HBO Bryant Park Summer Film Festival, which started in 1993, about the intricate array of rituals and tactics that have grown up around the two events.

Shakespeare in the Park

Shakespeare in the Park, a project of the Public Theater, is the more established of the two events and, with nightly performances, a much bigger production.

The Delacorte Theater in Central Park, where the performances are held, has about 1,900 seats. Each day, tickets for that evening’s performance are distributed starting at 1 p.m. from the Delacorte Theater and from the Public Theater, at 425 Lafayette Street, near Astor Place. One person can get up to two tickets.

More tickets are handed out at the Delacorte than at the Public, and consequently, the lines in the park are longer.

For extremely popular productions like Brecht’s “Mother Courage” last year, scores of people essentially slept overnight in the park. Central Park officially opens at 6 a.m. each day; ticket-seekers who arrive before then are sometimes asked to form a line outside the park, then to move the line to the Delacorte after 6 a.m.

Mara Manus, ????utive director of the Public Theater, said the Central Park Conservancy has not raised serious objections to the overnight activities of the theater enthusiasts. “So far it’s a partnership that’s worked pretty well,” she said.

Ms. Manus said the line has taken on a life of its own, leading to extended interactions that are unusual in the big city. “The line itself is a community,” she said. “It’s part of a total experience of the park. We in fact have a donor — a high-end donor — who took her kids for years to stand in the line, because she thought the experience was unparalleled. She said it was the greatest thing. It’s a way of getting to know your neighborhood or community in a way you don’t in New York, because people don’t have a chance to stop sand say hi, much less talk for hours.”

Ms. Manus noted: “We have found instances on Craigslist or ebay where people are offering – especially for those shows you have to sleep overnight for — their services in exchange for money. We don’t condone that.”

The Public Theater stations line coordinators to answer questions from those waiting in line — and to discourage people from waiting if they are so far back in the line that there is virtually no chance they will obtain tickets.

HBO Bryant Park Summer Film Festival

The Bryant Park summer film screenings, which begin every Monday around sundown, are a fairly new tradition, yet organizers have had to find strategies to handle the crowds.

As Dan Levin explained in The Times on Sunday, the Bryant Park lawn is closed on Mondays until 5 p.m. — a good four hours before the start of the movie. Each Monday, a crowd forms around the perimeter of the park. At 5 p.m., the words “Enjoy the show!” boom from electronic speakers, and a screaming, laughing swarm of people descends on the lawn to claim a spot, hastily laying blankets and towels out on the grass.

The lawn can accommodate about 6,000 people laying on blankets, according to Daniel A. Biederman, ????utive director of the Bryant Park Corporation. Mr. Biederman said that an employee of the organization urges people to walk — not run — when the lawn is opened as 5 p.m. Mr. Biederman conceded that getting people not to make a dash is all but impossible.

“It’s a fast race, but we’ve never had a broken bone,” he said. “I don’t think we’ve even had a sprained ankle. We saw a pregnant woman running the other day.”

Both Ms. Manus and Mr. Biederman conceded that many New Yorkers do not have the time to wait on line for hours. For a $150 donation, Shakespeare in the Park gives summer supporters access to a limited number of reserved seats. But for both events, people are often relying on friends and relatives with some spare time to get them a ticket or save them a spot on the grass.