The Comedy Theatre opened in 1909, located at 108 W. 41st Street. Architect D.G. Malcolm designed the Comedy Theatre for the Shuberts. The venue, renamed Collier’s Comedy Theatre, housed Eugene O’Neill’s first Broadway production, the one-act play In the Zone. The Comedy Theatre featured talents such as Humphrey Bogart, Holbrook Blinn, Peggy Hopkins, Walter Abel, and Paul Robeson. Following the stock market crash, the theatre changed ownership several times, and it was renamed the Mercury and the Artef. Limited by its intimate size, the Comedy Theatre struggled to book major productions, and it was ultimately demolished as the Artef in 1942.