Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Musical Theatre/Templates/Archive 2

Empire Theatre of Varieties
The Empire, Leicester Square
	c.1905 The Empire Theatre
Address	Leicester Square; London; United Kingdom
Coordinates	40°45′28″N 73°59′14″W / 40.757904°N 73.987341°W
Owner	Empire Cinemas
Capacity	2000 (est. in 1884)
Current use	Cinema
Construction
Opened	April 17, 1884
Years active	1884-1924
Architect	Thomas Verity
Website
	www.example.org

Theatre infobox

I decided to take a (year-old) cue from the to-do box and update the (unused) theater infobox. There's one at {{Broadway-theatre}}, it's not on any articles, and I'm thinking that this would replace it and we could move it to {{Infobox theater}} (so it could be used for any theater). I think the headings work -- I don't know if we really need a "Country" field, but, I figured why not have it? We don't need to use the field for cities that are more-or-less self-explanatory. I'm also not sold on the "current production" field. It seems like it would be something that would simply require more work to keep updated. I didn't include something like "notable past productions" since that invites a POV inclusion.
So, you know, go crazy on that code! — Music Maker 08:10, 22 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Help

{{help me}} I can't seem to get the template to not include a link to the template. I'm not sure if this is just a product of it being in a sandbox and not in the template namespace or what. Any help would be greatly appreciated. — Music Maker 02:54, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Seems ok now, the noinclude was finishing too early. -- lucasbfr ^talk 10:41, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, thanks, much thanks.... — Music Maker 20:22, 27 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Other uses

Hi. The situation with theatres in London can sometimes be quite complex. For instance, the London Coliseum began life as a music hall, was then used for musical theatre, theatre productions, then was converted to a cinema, and is now the London home of the English National Opera - with occasional dance performances. Similarly, the Hackney Empire began life as a music hall, spent some time as a TV studio, then a bingo hall and has now reverted to a variety theatre. For former theatres, it may be useful to include a yearsactive field, in much the same way as is done for performers. Difficult to cover all situations, I know, but it may be useful to add some extra fields to the template to allow these things to be summarised. Kbthompson 17:20, 23 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

architect, often more important than ownership? Kbthompson 17:22, 23 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, it would seem to me that something like a "previous uses" field could get a little unwieldy. American theatres often have the same type of pedigree, and I would think that that's something better addressed in the body of the article.

"Architect" and "yearsactive" are both good ideas. Maybe instead of "yearsactive", we use a "closedate", as we already have an "opening"? We, technically, could add both, as it would seem that some theatres have had ranges of activity punctuated by ranges of non-activity. But we'd have to decide something: is use as a cinema or a television studio mean that it's not an active theatre?

I think, too, that if we have a "yearsactive" that that would indicate the reader to look in the article for other uses?

I included ownership because, apart from a handful of independent theatres, most Broadway theatres are owned by, maybe, three companies: the Schuberts, Jujumacin (or something like that), and another company that's escaping me at the moment. Any of the fields can be left off; if the owner is ulimately NN, it can be omitted. — Music Maker 5376 22:31, 23 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've added the new fields to the template. If you know of an example that would populate all of the fields with true information, feel free to change the example. We might want to take a look at {{Infobox Stadium}} and {{Infobox venue}}. I think they're entirely too large, but there are some interesting fields. — Music Maker 5376 22:52, 23 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for those changes. Yes, it could get quite tricky to put everything in a template. Ownership in the UK tends to be concentrated in a handful too, with the rest being in public, or trust ownership. Probably one of the more complex would be the Haymarket Theatre (1720), and there are many examples of former theatres in the List of former theatres in London - and that's what I was thinking for the years active field. Kbthompson 17:27, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Nice job. Perhaps a "currentuse" field? It would replace, at least, the "production" field. I was thinking, too, it might be beneficial to have a website link in the infobox, but I'm not exactly sure how to code that. I'll figure it out. — Music Maker 5376 21:12, 24 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Getting real good. If I actually put that up on the page concerned, the cinemophiles would string me up from the nearest lamp post, or possibly crystal chandlier! When is this proposed to go live? I don't have a lot of time at the moment, but ultimately I would be prepared to add this to London theatres and former theatres.

What were the other things floating at the back of my mind - rebuilds, refurbs, type of theatre (eg Broadway/off Broadway, West End/National/local authority/provincial), perhaps. In the UK, listed building category? Kbthompson 09:46, 25 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This can go live whenever you and I decide it's ready. I've left messages all over WP for people to come and check it out, but apparently there wasn't much interest. (Even from people who said they were looking to create this very infobox....)

I was thinking about refurbs, too, but, really, with every new production a Broadway theatre gets refurbished to some extent. I would think, too, that major reconstructions would be in the article.

Type of theatre I had left off because I was thinking mainly about American theatres. Technically, every theatre on the planet (including my high school auditorium) has a Broadway/Off-Broadway/Off-Off-Broadway designation: it's really just a capacity designation. Broadway > 1000, 999 < Off-Broadway < 100, Off-Off-Broadway < 99, but you only really use them for theatres in New York. A 1200 seat theatre in Chicago doesn't (usually) call itself a "Broadway" theatre. Sometimes "Broadway-sized". So, I figured that people who understood that distinction would be able to tell from the capacity, and people who didn't understand that distinction wouldn't miss the information. I wasn't thinking about West End, etc. I don't even know what constitutes a West End theatre or the others you mentioned. I think I'll add the field, but I'm going to put a caveat in the documentation. Check it to make sure you agree (and it's right).

And, again, I don't know what "listed building category" means.

I was noticing that the Stadium Infobox and the Venue Infobox have a field for geographic coordinates. I don't think they're particularly necessary, but, apparently, Firefox can parse them. Apparently there's a WikiProject dedicated to converting everything to be compatible with hCard. I'm going to go get the add-on for Firefox and do a little more reading about it to see how we can get the infobox inline with this new technology. — Music Maker 5376 20:59, 25 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Alright. I'm sleepy. I think I have everything, but I don't want the coordinates to be in the box: I have to figure out how to make them appear in the upper right hand corner like all the other pages. I think I know how to do it, but I have a couple of other things to get done right now. If I'm not too sleepy when I'm done, I'll fiddle a little more.

I also have to work on the documentation a little bit. Didn't get to it. — Music Maker 5376 07:10, 26 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Wow. I think I got it. Again, let me know what you mean by "listed building category". Should we add a field for MAJOR refirbs? Or maybe just rebuilds? But, then, we run into what constitutes a rebuild. I dunno. I know I'm going to bed, now. — Music Maker 5376 09:24, 26 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well done. Adding co-ords probably justifies the infobox. I think probably refurbs and rebuilds should be included, Royal Opera House for instance, three rebuilds; Drury Lane, four - including a second theatre built by Christopher Wren. The listed building status (applies, a little differently, in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland) determines the level of statutory protection afforded to the theatre from alteration - could be added as an optional comments field? Kbthompson 14:07, 26 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Alright! I think we're ready! I've added the "listed building" field -- I fear that if I use more words than just "Listed Building" that it'll wrap and be on two lines. If you have any other suggestions, I'm all ears.

I've also added a "rebuilt" field, calling for a year and an architect. I think that if we include a "refurb" field, it'll just get too large.

A little later, I'm going to add this all to the current {{Broadway-theatre}} page, then move it to {{Infobox theatre}} -- I think we're close enough to start implementing. Check the documentation to ensure that I didn't screw anything up. Pay close attention to the "type" -- make sure I didn't omit any major types of theatres. — Music Maker 5376 22:07, 26 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I should know better.... Anyway, the "finished" template is over at {{Infobox Theatre}}. I had "listedbuilding", but changed it to "designation" when I realized that it could probably be used elsewhere. It's on the article at Majestic Theatre. I haven't been able to get the website to code into hCard properly, but we can implement before that's done. I have a message at the proper WikiProject asking for help, so, we'll see.... If there are any other changes, we can make them at the infobox page. — Music Maker 5376 03:11, 27 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]