I pen at popular bookstore

POPULAR Bookstore | Arts, Music & Craft | Books & Stationery | Hobbies & Leisure | Junction 8

The Drama Book Shop, known for its exhaustive collection of plays and books on theater and as hallowed ground for the Broadway set, will shutter its store at W. Its owners hope to reopen—likely in a smaller space—elsewhere in the Theater District or nearby. The decision came after what has become an increasingly common death knell for beloved businesses across the city: a sharp rent increase. The year-old bookstore's lease for the space it has occupied for almost 20 years expires at the end of January. While some retail businesses around the city have been surprised by rent spikes handed to them by their landlords, Allen Hubby, a vice president at the bookshop whose aunt, Rozanne Seelen, has owned the store for several decades, said they had expected its time in the space to come to an end at the close of its lease. Not to mention salaries, the costs of buying the books, electricity, taxes.