Radio City Music Hall
1260 6th Avenue,
New York,
NY
10020
1260 6th Avenue,
New York,
NY
10020
116 people
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At Long Last Love looked great at the Music Hall. I also saw it there twice. Yeah it wasn’t very good and the performances embarrassing. But Cybil was at the height of her beauty and the production design was gorgeous. Definately the best looking new film I saw there in the 70’s(well, outside of Airport but I really consider that a 60’s film.)
The stage show was one of the worst. I remember people dressed up as bunnies doing stupid things with carrots and the like. I can’t imagine what Cybil and Peter thought. The ballet was gone by this time. I think the last decent stage show that I can recall was the Easter show with Mame(ugh.)
BoxOfficeBill I believe the stage show with “Mary Popins” Was called Fifty Happy Years a salute to the fiftieth anniversay
I actually saw this turkey twice at the Music Hall. The first time with my folks on a Sunday matinee and another as a class trip. The nuns always loved taking us to Radio City. I would sit through it again to be able to see a film with the old stage show there.
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Here’s a Program from May ’73. If you want to read the fine print, after you click on the URL you must click the image itself so that it enlarges on your screen. I’m sorry that a print-out won’t be so clear.
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My kids were three and four years old, we were visiting our families in NYC, and my mom wanted to take them to RCMH. I had never seen “Mary Poppins.†So I joined the pack. I will never forget my kids’ amazement upon entering the auditorium. I’d already dragged them to dozens of movies in small theaters on two continents, but they were not prepared for the vast space that encountered them (or they it). Beneath the tall shadowy arches, my hyperactive son stopped short in his tracks, and my fearless daughter stopped altogether, both in awe.
The stage show was the last that I saw with the Corps de Ballet (it was disbanded a year later) and the full line-up of Rockettes (subsequently cut from thirty-six to thirty). Disney augmented the cast with dozens of extras costumed in the Magic Kingdom fashion. My mom loved the show (and well she should have, after shepherding me to dozens of them when I was a kid), and my offspring relived it for months afterward with a 33 1/3 LP recording and comic books of the movie. I don’t think their trips to Disneyland would ever impress them so much.
I’m trying to determine the approximate date of Dick Leibert’s retirement as Chief Organist. His obituary implies that this took place in l971. Yet programmes from later dates still have him listed. Can anyone help with this?
You’re welcome, BoxOfficeBill. But I couldn’t figure out how to make the programs bigger just by clicking on them, the way yours did. And I used Photobucket just like you. Maybe my PC is the cause of the problem? Anyway, thanks for your great story about that particular stage show in August 1972. Stories like that are a big part of what makes Cinema Treasures such a fun site.
BillHuelbig— Thanks for the programs. I too saw “Butterflies Are Free” there, but have lost that program and am glad to see it in your post.
I was alone in NYC on a business trip. Following an afternoon of bar-crawling, I tumbled into RCMH upon some sort of atavistic reflex. Quite tipsy, I sat in the front row for the stage show and hoped that a Rockette would kick her tap-shoe into my lap, just as had happened to old geezers in 20C-Fox films two decades earlier (I was all of thirty-years-old at the time, but prematurely grey-haired and fairly depraved, so I felt ripe for the part).
As it happened, the Rockettes performed the final high kicks in their “Hawaiian Heat Wave” number on the narrow walk-way in front of the orchestra pit, and so were as close as possible to my waiting lap. As it also happened, none of them lost a shoe. I stayed for a second stage show hoping against hope for an extra-high punt that would land me some leather. No such luck. I then returned to my bar crawl and to this day do not know what occurred later. It’s a wonder I didn’t lose more than my program.
Unless the comment from rivjr stating that RCMH is dark most nights is indicative of the 70s, this is simply not true. While many on this site mourn that fact that regularly scheduled films are not shown here anymore, RCMH is usually booked with something virtually every night of the week. I know this because I see the Hall from my office every single day. And when I leave at night, I almost always see a crowd seeing one thing or another. Ok, so it’s “Yanni Live” or “Dora the Explorer”. But the place seems to me to be used quite a lot. Several NYC colleges also use the place for it’s graduations ceremonies as well.
RCMH’s mnanagement ought take more interest in their theatre. The CHRISTMAS SPECTACULAR, not as good and not as religious as it used to be, hauls in the money at $40 to $225; cheaper the 1st 2 days. That’s ALL they care about. Very few other shows are booked, the theatre is dark most nights. HIGH CRIME reduced attendance and partly motivated “THE FRENCH CONNECTION” bypass of a downtown first run. The neighborhood opening of this movie was the death warrant of all first run theatres; period. I loved seeing an A+ quality movie plus the stage show dozens of times. What I missed was the time RCMH and the ROXY opened KING KONG plus the stage show Jungle Rhythms, at the same time, two 6,000 seat theatres one block apart, 10 shows a day —– 25c till 1 pm, 55c till 6 pm, 75c evenings exc Sat-Sun. March 1, 1933. BLAME MY MOM AND DAD, I wasn’t born till 1938.
I spent ten of the happiest years of my life at Radio City Music Hall, I started out as an usher worked the exec car and finally the costume dept. I loved it then as I do now.
Thanks Bill for the great memories. I used to save those programs
but no longer have them. I am sure all of us are mentaly transporting ourselves to the great lobby where we would sit and read the programs.
The last truly great movie to play the Music Hall prior to the 1978 closing:
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“Butterflies Are Free”, featuring Eileen Heckart’s Oscar-winning performance:
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“The Out-of-Towners”. The Hall was really rocking with laughter at this one:
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The Easter show for 1970, “Airport”, in 70mm:
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I found my old Music Hall programs, 5 of them. First up is “A Boy Named Charlie Brown”:
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Veyoung: “The Happiest Millionaire” played on roadshow at the Boyd Theatre in Philadelphia from Oct. 20, 1967 to Jan. 17, 1968. I attended the Tues. 8:30pm performance on Jan. 2, 1968. Sat in Row AA of the Loge and the tickets were $2.50! I remember it was one of the first times I saw a film at the Boyd that there was considerably more empty seats then occupied ones. Still waiting to hear from you that you can receive the pictures I have to send you!
Dennis-Lancaster
Never mind! I made my post without reading or clicking on the program links, which now I realize mentioned the movie. I guessed the movie based upon the timeframe of the Nixon resignation reference.
On a visit to NYC… how could you go wrong with a Blake Edwards movie starring Julie Andrews? Boy, did I find out. …the day after I saw this show, Richard Nixon resigned from office.“ (BoxOfficeBill)
Let me guess: “The Tamarind Seed.”
Regarding the final months of the film/stage show era at RCMH. My only visit to RCMH during that era was in May of 1977. The feature was “Smokey and the Bandit”: a major box office hit that year although not during its engagement at RCMH, if my experience was any indication. I went to a Friday matinee and there couldn’t have been more than several hundred people in the audience. I remember staying for the stage show but don’t recall any specifics; it obviously wasn’t very memorable.
re the may 26 post: did “happiest millionaire” play roadshow in other cities? Yes, and so did the MGM 1960 remake of Cimarron. Played at least the Stanton in Philly hard ticket as well as (if memory serves), the Paramount in Hollywood.
Here’s a Program from August ’74. If you want to read the fine print, after you click on the URL you must click the image itself so that it enlarges on your screen. I’m sorry that a print-out won’t be so clear.
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Another fluke. On a visit to NYC, my spouse took over the dept stores and our parents took over their grandkids. That left me with the options of a bar-crawl, a library-raid, or hunkering down to some leftover work. On the other hand, how could you go wrong with a Blake Edwards movie starring Julie Andrews? Boy, did I find out. I don’t remember a single act from the stage show. The Corps de Ballet had recently been disbanded, and the Rockettes were reduced from thirty-six to thirty kickers. A fair amount of choral work appears to have taken up the slack. Of course, times were bad in general, with rampant inflation, energy shortages, and political corruption: the day after I saw this show, Richard Nixon resigned from office.
The telecast was a great way to see the hall, I don’t get there as much as I used to.I just wish they would lower and raise that curtain once in a while.
I have always loved the steamy 50’s film “A Summer Place” and just found out that it opened at the Music Hall in fall of 1959. On stage was something called Fall Frolics.
Vito: You’ve got me. I didn’t see the telecast, but they could be scenic pieces or speaker arrays. Lots of things get hung in that area including video screens for image magnification.