company, which they called the Mercury Theatre. The name was inspired by the title of the iconoclastic magazine, The American Mercury. "All the Mercury offerings bore the credit line, 'Production by Orson Welles,'" wrote critic Richard France, "implying that he functioned not only as the director, but as designer, dramatist, and, most often, principal actor as well. To be sure, this generated a good bit of resentment among his collaborators (the designers, in particular). However, in a more profound sense, that credit is, in fact, the only accurate description of a Welles production. The concepts that animated each of them originated with him and, moreover, were executed in such a way as to be subject to his absolute control." Welles and Houseman secured the Comedy Theatre, a 687-seat Broadway theatre at 110 West 41st Street in New York City, and reopened it as the Mercury Theatre. It was the venue for virtually all their productions from November 1937 through November 1938. Caesar (1937–38) The Mercury Theatre began with a groundbreaking, critically acclaimed adaption of The Tragedy of Julius Caesar that evoked comparison to contemporary Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany. It premiered on Broadway on November 11, 1937. The production moved from the Mercury Theatre to the larger National Theatre on January 24, 1938. It ran through May 28, 1938, for a total of 157 performances. The cast included Joseph Holland (Julius Caesar), George Coulouris (Marcus Antonius), Joseph Cotten (Publius), Martin Gabel (Cassius), Hiram Sherman (Casca), John A. Willard (Trebonius), Grover Burgess (Ligarius), John Hoysradt (Decius Brutus), Stefan Schnabel (Metellus Cimber), Elliott Reid (Cinna), William Mowry (Flavius), William Alland (Marullus), George Duthie (Artemidorus), Norman Lloyd (Cinna, the poet), Arthur Anderson (Lucius), Evelyn Allen (Calpurnia, wife to Caesar), Muriel Brassler (Portia, wife to Brutus), and John Berry (extra). At the National Theatre, Polly Rowles took the role of Calpurnia and Alice Frost played Portia. From January 20, 1938, a roadshow version of Caesar with a different cast toured the United States. The company included Tom Powers as Brutus, and Edmond O'Brien as Marc Antony. The Shoemaker's Holiday (1938) The Mercury Theatre's second production was a staging of Thomas Dekker's Elizabethan comedy The Shoemaker's Holiday, which attracted "unanimous raves again". It premiered on January 1, 1938, and ran to 64 performances in repertory with Caesar, until April 1. It then moved to the National Theatre through April 28. Heartbreak House (1938) The first