Picture This
City Tech Professor Featured on ‘Radio City’ 75th Anniversary Television Documentary
New York City historian Jane Mushabac, assistant professor of English at City Tech, appeared in the one-hour television documentary, “Diamond at the Rock: 75 Years of Radio City Music Hall,” which premiered on NBC television in November 2007. Commemorating the 75th anniversary of this New York City landmark theater, the documentary was twice rebroadcast on the Madison Square Garden television network later that month and once in December.
Professor Mushabac was interviewed for the documentary, which weaves the social and historical context of what was happening in New York City from the Great Depression that began in 1929 through the present day into the many roles that the iconic Radio City Music Hall has played in that history. Also interviewed was Columbia University Professor Kenneth Jackson, editor of The Encyclopedia of New York City.
In his Daily News review, television writer and editor Richard Huff called the documentary “a worthwhile hour that puts the history of the famed venue into the context of the history of the city that surrounds it.” He rated the show “a quality production that provides an interesting glimpse into New York’s past.”
In the documentary, Professor Mushabac speaks of Radio City being built at a time when “millions of people were out of work and the city was on the verge of bankruptcy.” With background footage of massive crowds waiting on line for the first show held there in 1932, Professor Mushabac notes, “Think of the nerve of that, a hall with 6,000 seats being built in the depression! Think of the way audiences were stunned when they came into that hall, Radio City Music Hall.”
In a conversation about Radio City, she adds that the theater “was a huge success because it symbolized the struggle and hope that were so large a part of the lives of most New Yorkers during the long depression era.” It was “a people’s palace,” in the words of the Radio City Music Hall website, with designer Donald Deskey choosing “elegance over excess,” and creating “a masterpiece of American Modernist design” as well as a “stunning tribute to art, science and industry.” The 30 separate spaces he designed for the Hall featured murals, wall coverings and sculpture by fine artists, draperies and carpets by talented textile designers, and hand-crafted ceramics, wood panels and chandeliers. “What one New York critic reported is absolutely true,” says Mushabac, “Radio City Music Hall in itself is a grand performance.” In 1979, the interior was declared a landmark and restored.
Professor Mushabac is co-author of A Short and Remarkable History of New York City, published in 1999 by Fordham University Press. The book, selected as one of the “Best of the Best” university press books in 2000 by the American Association of University Presses, went into its 4th printing in 2006.
This year, Professor Mushabac is an Andrew W. Mellon Fellow at The CUNY Graduate School’s Center for the Humanities. She is also editor of City Tech Writer, the College’s journal of outstanding student writing from all disciplines. The journal’s third edition will be available in early May.
03/19/08
