The Metropolitan Room To Close 22nd Street Location with Plans to Move to Larger Venue in Midtown

The Metropolitan Room, a New York entertainment mainstay since it opened its doors in May 2006, will be moving to larger and more elegant quarters - including a restaurant, piano bar and two performance rooms - managing partner Bernie Furshpan is announcing today.

"We're designing our future Metropolitan Room in midtown to be a bigger, better and more flexible venue," states Furshpan, "but the extensive renovations will take several months to complete. Happily, when we bid farewell to our current home on September 30, the Metropolitan Room will partner with The Triad on West 72nd Street, sharing its venue until our new spot is ready to open. This will allow us to present most of our scheduled shows and continue to serve our longtime performers."

Furshpan adds, "I can't thank The Triad enough for supporting us and the cabaret world by lending a hand like this. We hope the transition period will be brief, and we look forward to announcing the date of the grand opening of the new club and restaurant."

To celebrate its storied 11-year residency on West 22nd Street, the Metropolitan Room will stage a 24-hour performance marathon featuring scores of its highly-praised headliners, starting on Sunday September 24 at 9pm, and continuing non-stop to Monday September 25 at 9pm. The event recalls the Metropolitan Room's 60-hour entertainment marathon, in January 2015, that shattered the Guinness World Record for longest variety show ever. The club's last performances at 34 West 22nd Street will be on Saturday September 30.

Known as a prime launchpad for emerging talents in jazz and cabaret, as well as a showplace for a range of established artists in the theatre, film or television, the club was dubbed "the best of New York's smaller clubs" by The New York Times's Stephen Holden. The Metropolitan Room has recently been home to Ed Asner, Leslie Jordan, Tom Wopat and regular headliner Baby Jane Dexter. Other Broadway actors who have had major engagements at the club include Liz Callaway, Vivian Reed, Linda Lavin, and Euan Morton. Actress Sheryl Lee Ralph just concluded a sold-out run at the room. The Metropolitan Room is also celebrated for re-introducing nightclub legend Marilyn Maye to New York audiences after a 15-year hiatus, and was the first to bring British singing sensation Barb Jungr to the attention of New York audiences.

The club's famed annual MetroStar Talent Challenge - the contest that helped propel prior winners such as T. Oliver Reid and Marissa Mulder to public recognition, is currently running at the Metropolitan Room. The 2017 contest - the 10th annual edition - plays Mondays at 6:30pm through August 21.