Exclusive: Barclays Inks Booking Deal at Brooklyn's Paramount — billboard.com

Barclays Center affiliate Brooklyn Sports & Entertainment has formed an alliance with Long Island University, in which BS&E will bring entertainment back to the historic Brooklyn Paramount Theatre. "This collaboration will bring the LIU Brooklyn Paramount Theatre back to life," says LIU president Kimberly R. Cline, "creating endless opportunities for LIU and our neighbors." Adds Barclays Center CEO Brett Yormark, "We felt that this would be the next step in the evolution of our partnership with LIU, that we should work collaboratively and start bringing some great content there, not only for the student body, but also for the public." The move will resurrect the 1,500-capacity venue, which opened in 1928, as an active entertainment venue for the first time in more than half a century, with the BS&E team focusing on booking emerging talent in a variety of areas, including music, comedy, and boxing. Barclays Center CEO Brett Yormark tells Billboard that the Paramount represents an opportunity in the growing BS&E portfolio, and will begin hosting shows as soon as this quarter. The Paramount deal is the latest move by this increasingly aggressive group, led by Yormark, which opened the $1 billion, 19,000-capacity Barclays Center in September of 2012 as the home of the NBA's Brooklyn Nets. By the end of 2013, Barclays Center was the third highest-grossing arena in the world for concerts and events, reporting $83.5 million to Billboard Boxscore. Post-honeymoon period, Barclays Center has remained among the busiest arenas in the world, reporting $60 million in concerts and events for the same period this year. Bruce Ratner is majority owner of Barclays Center and executive chairman of Forest City Ratner Companies, one of the partners that won the bid to redevelop the Nassau Coliseum, a $250 million project that will begin when the NHL's Islanders leave Nassau for Brooklyn following the current hockey season.

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