Broadway's Lyric Theater "will be dramatically reconfigured--shedding one-fifth of its seats--to create a home for the most coveted theatrical tenant of the moment: the two-part play Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, which is expected to open there in spring 2018," the New York Times reported.
Sonia Friedman and Colin Callender, who are overseeing the hit London production of the play in London, said they were "in advanced discussions" and "exclusive talks" to open the play in New York, and had been looking for a Broadway theater, but avoiding the 1,900-seat Lyric because it was too big.
Ambassador Theater Group, however, "expressed a willingness to reimagine the space completely, and that that was persuasive; the show's designer will be allowed to reconfigure the theater and bring it down to 1,500 seats," the Times wrote.
"ATG was prepared to spend millions of dollars to build us a theater within the theater, designed to meet the specifications of what we were looking for--intimate, but big enough so we can have a considerable number of low-priced seats around the house," Callender said.