Today the NY Times reports that Broadway Dance Center is the latest in a long line of dance studios that are being forced to move due to the ever-burgeoning real estate market.
The studio, one of the largest in the city, has been locked in a series of legal battles with its landlord, the Extell Development Company, since early September, when it received a notice of default on its lease. Studio representatives say the landlord is trying to push them out to develop the property; the landlord says it is an internal dispute over how to secure the building and nothing more.
Although I don’t really make it over to BDC, every dancer feels the pain of the potential loss of another space. My studio has gone through it with a happy ending:
Dance New Amsterdam, formerly known as Dance Space, plans to inaugurate its $5 million home at 280 Broadway in January.
But my friends’ theater is still homeless:
Last fall, the Williamsburg Art Nexus, a theater and rehearsal space in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, closed to make way for luxury condominiums
BDC has put up a new Web site SupportBDC.org with background information on the dispute, links to their Legal Defense fund, and a link to email Mayor Bloomberg, who is a well-known supporter of the arts and recently declared November 7, 2005 Dance Theater Workshop Day.
Third in the series.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aRyx5Kyv_vg