A leading showcase theater in congested Times Square, the New Amsterdam Theater is best known as the original site of Disney's historic success The Lion King, which has garnered an unprecedented combination of critical praise and box office success since opening in 1997 (the show has since moved uptown a few blocks). When built in 1903, the New Amsterdam was the largest theater in New York -- it still boats an impressive seating capacity -- and gained a proportional reputation as a big-time stage that continued so long as the plays did. The Depression finally undid the theater business, and with it, the New Amsterdam in the mid-thirties, but the stage's revival as a similar kind of middlebrow beacon in the nineties helped signal the rebirth of Times Square as a shiny playground for visitors and New Yorkers alike.