Monday-Saturday for 8pm performance, 3pm-8pm
Wednesdays and Saturdays for 2pm matinee, 10am-2pm
Sunday for matinee, 10am-3pm
Sunday for evening performance, 3pm-closing

Phone:(212) 221-0013

The TKTS ticket center is located in Duffy Square, right smack in the middle of the center island of 47th Street between Broadway and 7th Avenue. It offers unsold day-of tickets to Broadway shows at a 30% to 50% discount. The key here is this: Show up early for the best selection. If you are not time-constrained, matinee performances will give you the best seats at popular shows. Look up on the big electronic board to see what shows are available. Get in line (note that there is a separate "play-only line" apart from the combined music/dance/theater line) at the TKTS booth around 9:30am, and by 10am, you will have great tickets to a hot show at a 50% discount to box office prices. Walk around the Square for awhile, then see the show, and grab a late lunch, and you have one very full, exciting, and affordable day.

The same concept applies for evening performances, although your options may not be as great. However, if you show up early and see what’s available, you may be very pleasantly surprised, especially on a weekday. TKTS booth hours are from 10a to 2pm for matinees on Wednesday and Saturday, 3pm to 8pm for evening shows Monday through Saturday, and 11am to 7:30pm f both matinees and evening shows on Sunday. Payment is by cash or traveler’s check ONLY. For more information call, 212/221-0013.

First things first-- the line will inevitably be enormous. The best way to beat this is to get there *early*. Of course, if you only have a few days in New York, you won't want to spend several hours waiting on line. Evening performances usually start near 8, tickets for those performances don't go on sale until 3, and getting to the TKTS booth "early" in this case would mean sometime between 12-1. That gives you a 2-3 hour wait. This is important only if you want your pick of the shows, which go up on a board in front of the ticket counter shortly before tickets become available. If you are flexible about what you might see, you can afford to be a little more laid back about when you join the giant line.

I, myself, was set on seeing Suzan-Lori Parks' Pulitzer-prize winning play Topdog/Underdog (I am on a low-buget, but this was definitely worth the splurge) and I didn't want to give up several hours of my life to standing in line in a heat-wave, so I decided to go for a Saturday matinee performance. I recommend this strategy if you have a Saturday afternoon available for viewing a play, because it cuts down on waiting time, and matinees are reputedly easier to get better seats to.

I got on line at 9:30 (yes, it was already long. Apparently you need to be there at 9 to be up in front) and I had my center-orchestra ticket in hand exactly one hour later. There is a $1.75 service charge on top of your ticket charge and they ONLY take cash or traveler's checks. Bring water and a copy of Time Out New York to read up on the shows while you (inevitably) wait. If you want to go professional, read through TONY's theater directory before you get on line, and circle your top picks. Then go online to www.theatre.com and print out the seating charts for those theaters. You can find out before you hand over the money how good your half-price seat is.

Bryant Park and the New York Public Library are both within a ten-minute walking distance from the TKTS booth.