“They seem only interested in finding another place to fulfill their sexual desires.”
Did you get that from a 42nd Street marquee?
By the way, Bollywood is mostly run by mobsters in India and the Fair was apparently kept open, not “defiled” by the porn fans who have kept this place open this long.
Deviant behaviour is in the eye of the beholder. Have you ever sat through a three and a half hour Bollywood war musical?
This Cinema Treasures member respects his fellow member’s rights to enjoy cinemas on their own terms without imposing false moral judgement. As any true showman will tell you, you play the film your audience will buy tickets for and leave personal feelings aside.
Warren, this Easter why not try recognising tolerance, for one day, as an alternative lifestyle. You may find it oddly rewarding.
The Gables triple and the Miracle Center never did co-exists as the second theatre opened way after Winn Dixie demolished the first. Although the Gables was a very successful theatre, property values made the sale inevitable. The replacement General Cinema (not AMC)next door was a failure probably due to that steep ramp mentioned by JWX. My car was an automatic and still struggled to get in. The last time I drove by the mall was a latin American style mess of tiny discount shops.
By the way, I have your attention on the popular Ridgewood thread, I have two more Manhattan sites I cannot locate.
The TAPIA operated in the early seventies showing arthouse/soft core films. By the name I assume it was in a Puerto Rican or otherwise hispanic neighborhood.
The HARRISON advertised in 1994 for a very short time.
PKoch, PHOTO DRAMA was a common generic name for movies back then so the sign may have just meant “Deluxe Movie Theatre Coming Soon”.
The Candler name may have been hastily used as it was in the Candler building. Once Cohen & Harris plays were introduced it switched to COHEN & HARRIS and eventually HARRIS.
Silent dramas do go back to the late 1800’s but I think THE BIRTH OF A NATION introduced full time movie theatres with full-time features in 1915 for the first time giving some movies equal status to plays. Otherwise they were shorts or novelty portions of stage acts, as in the case of Vaudeville.
If that is indeed the Candler, it opened with “Antony and Cleopatra” in early May 1914, then soon switched to plays. I suspect the other titles on that sign are from the same Italian producers as a NYT article says “Antony” was “from the same director as "Quo Vadis”.
Going back to Lost Memory’s post of March 27, my guess is that it is the Candler (Harris) next to Murray’s Restaurant on 42nd street. The actual building is, how do I say this, err…conspicuous by its absence.
It was already there by 1926 so this must be an opening postcard. I believe it was always Publix with the company eventually becoming Florida State Theatres, then ABC Florida State. By the time ABC became Plitt Theatres, the Olympia was already Gusman Hall having spent a few years of Blaxploitation and horror flicks.
This marquee had a platform that you could walk on once you climbed up. It was indeed huge and wide. The Sunny Isles and Loews 167th Street along the same stretch were also large, but not quite as wide as this one and had no platform.
I do remember these three vividly as I was older then and actually managed the Sunny Isles for several years and often changed the marquee myself, a dangerous exercise on windy Florida night.
I think it was more of a sixties thing than a particular Wometco trademark.
A photo of the marquee as the THE READE can be found in a NY times article January 1, 1973 (Subway noise Threatens Read Theatre Opebing). THE READE never opened and Walter Reade theatres walked away when the subway noise problem proved impossible to solve.
According to a NYT June 9, 1969 article, a grenade was thrown at the Loews Orpheum the day before at 4:00am. Slight injuries were cause to three person passing by in a taxicab by shattered glass from six large windows.
Although the police could not prove the link, the LOEWS CINE side of the complex was showing the controversial Jack Palance film about Che Guevara, CHE!.
Cuban Nationalists had denounced the film earlier in the week and demonstrations against the film had taken place at the Penthouse Theatre in Times Square.
The name LOEWS CINE should be listed here as a previous name for twin two.
PASTOR CONDEMNS TIMES SQUARE “NUDITY” IN “SHOCKING” MOVIE ADS AND BOOK SHOPS
“The tarnished tinsel and the false glamour of Times Square were condemned yesterday by Msgr. Joseph A. McCaffrey, pastor of Holy Cross Roman Catholic Church…the monsignor looked at the "crossroads of the world” and found it a hotbed of “lurid signs” and flea circuses…He was especially critical of the theatres along forty-second Street that glorify “nudity and near-nudity” and hawk their wares by “indecent, obscene, salacious and shocking” marquee advertisements…Msgr. McCaffrey criticized the Rialto, Apollo, the Squire and the Times Movie theatres."
The film on the TAXI DRIVER marquee scene, SOMETIMES SWEET SUSAN, featured future Hollwood mainstream producer, Craig Baumgarten, so it was most probably an industry inside joke.
On April 28, 1966 a manager at the Lyric was stabbed to death in an apparent robbery attempt according to the NYT. The week before, the Bryant had been robbed at gunpoint.
I just added a third Lyric Theatre on 23rd Street which may correspond to photo posted by Lost Memory on May 3(??)
Perhaps President Guliani can find some moral loophole that will limit Bollywood to 40% of any NY venue where it does not represent community’s standards.
I am happy to see people attend the cinema to see the movie, for a change, but that many screens ALL showing Bollywood would be rare even in India.
In the late seventies/early eighties you would have found TRANS-LUX EAST, PENTHOUSE EAST, LIDO EAST, 59th St. EAST, EASTWORLD, ART EAST, TOWER EAST, UA EAST, and 86TH St. EAST. MAD Magazine ran spoof movie ads that looked like the real thing.
Chances are, if the word Village was anywhere on the page you would find a link in the NYT with CINEMA and EAST.
According to the NY times, the Central (as well as the Brooklyn Strand) were closed for a week during that 1957 run of MOM AND DAD and SHE SHOULDA SAID NO for failing to secure a license that allowed for “live” performances from the “lecturer”.
Nice punishment for showing two thirteen year old movies in the moral fifties!
Demolition was announced starting on January 2, 1956 when the Stanley and the National Hotel were both to be replaced by a 15 story textile industry building that has apparently since been demolished as well.
It apparently shows mainstream recent releases, porn and exploitation genre films.
One of the advantages of Bollywood in the US is that the DVD is often available at the same time as the 35mm release. The wholesome audiences these musicals attract could drive out the porn if it actually works here.
This has got to be one of the more entertaining threads. It has sex, drugs, violence, comedy, transvestites, the KKK, religion, a scarecrow, Italian cuisine, bus routes and finally, an act of treachery from the in-house villain. Most current FILMS aren’t anywhere nearly as entertaining!
This from the NY Times Oct. 18, 1998 confirms the suspicions raised about the programming. The ads must be intended as proof.
“And last week Judge Arthur W. Lonschein of Queens ruled that the formerly all-adult Fair Theatre in East Elmhurst, Queens, could remain open because it was now showing adult films in less than 40 percent of its theatres.“
The Bryanston West name was used by Variety, for some reason, when it reported the theatre’s weekly grosses. The “family” allegedly established Bryanston Pictures and the Pusssycat with DEEP THROAT profits.
The afternoon reception, with its bouquets and satin-gowned hostesses, had drawn 1,000 curious citizens, but now it is 8:15, curtain time. Once the lights dim, and handsome Jo (soon Joseph) Cotten, pronounces ‘'That was quite a bump,’‘ to start the first act of William Archer’s The Green Goddess, every ticket holder at Civic Theater’s ’‘modernistic’‘ new playhouse on the Boulevard at 16th Street knows this is it, the most glittery event of the season.
By this January night in 1930, the Civic is Miami’s largest, most important social/cultural organization, counting Abesses, Burdines, even Vanderbilts, among its 600 supporters, and now, after years of wandering from stage to stage, its actors have such a swanky new home even Al Capone shows up. Alas, the company falters during the Depression, but the building is resuscitated as the Mayfair Theater, a popular Wometco movie house. For $1.65, patrons can enjoy coffee and tea poured into china cups and play bridge in a room off the lobby until the main feature starts.
By the 1960s, the Mayfair reinvents itself again, this time as a beloved art-flick theater. It is razed in the early ‘70s to make room for what is now a Radisson, but five Art Deco chandeliers survive at Restaurant San Michel in Coral Gables, glorious fragments of its afterglow.
That is hilarious, Warren!
“They seem only interested in finding another place to fulfill their sexual desires.”
Did you get that from a 42nd Street marquee?
By the way, Bollywood is mostly run by mobsters in India and the Fair was apparently kept open, not “defiled” by the porn fans who have kept this place open this long.
Deviant behaviour is in the eye of the beholder. Have you ever sat through a three and a half hour Bollywood war musical?
This Cinema Treasures member respects his fellow member’s rights to enjoy cinemas on their own terms without imposing false moral judgement. As any true showman will tell you, you play the film your audience will buy tickets for and leave personal feelings aside.
Warren, this Easter why not try recognising tolerance, for one day, as an alternative lifestyle. You may find it oddly rewarding.
The Gables triple and the Miracle Center never did co-exists as the second theatre opened way after Winn Dixie demolished the first. Although the Gables was a very successful theatre, property values made the sale inevitable. The replacement General Cinema (not AMC)next door was a failure probably due to that steep ramp mentioned by JWX. My car was an automatic and still struggled to get in. The last time I drove by the mall was a latin American style mess of tiny discount shops.
So could the TAPIA be the Vandberbilt Live Theatre(1931-1933?)
148 West 48th stree??
By the way, I have your attention on the popular Ridgewood thread, I have two more Manhattan sites I cannot locate.
The TAPIA operated in the early seventies showing arthouse/soft core films. By the name I assume it was in a Puerto Rican or otherwise hispanic neighborhood.
The HARRISON advertised in 1994 for a very short time.
PKoch, PHOTO DRAMA was a common generic name for movies back then so the sign may have just meant “Deluxe Movie Theatre Coming Soon”.
The Candler name may have been hastily used as it was in the Candler building. Once Cohen & Harris plays were introduced it switched to COHEN & HARRIS and eventually HARRIS.
Silent dramas do go back to the late 1800’s but I think THE BIRTH OF A NATION introduced full time movie theatres with full-time features in 1915 for the first time giving some movies equal status to plays. Otherwise they were shorts or novelty portions of stage acts, as in the case of Vaudeville.
If that is indeed the Candler, it opened with “Antony and Cleopatra” in early May 1914, then soon switched to plays. I suspect the other titles on that sign are from the same Italian producers as a NYT article says “Antony” was “from the same director as "Quo Vadis”.
PHOTO DRAMA THEATRE DELUXE
Going back to Lost Memory’s post of March 27, my guess is that it is the Candler (Harris) next to Murray’s Restaurant on 42nd street. The actual building is, how do I say this, err…conspicuous by its absence.
What a great postcard!
It was already there by 1926 so this must be an opening postcard. I believe it was always Publix with the company eventually becoming Florida State Theatres, then ABC Florida State. By the time ABC became Plitt Theatres, the Olympia was already Gusman Hall having spent a few years of Blaxploitation and horror flicks.
Harvey,
This marquee had a platform that you could walk on once you climbed up. It was indeed huge and wide. The Sunny Isles and Loews 167th Street along the same stretch were also large, but not quite as wide as this one and had no platform.
I do remember these three vividly as I was older then and actually managed the Sunny Isles for several years and often changed the marquee myself, a dangerous exercise on windy Florida night.
I think it was more of a sixties thing than a particular Wometco trademark.
A photo of the marquee as the THE READE can be found in a NY times article January 1, 1973 (Subway noise Threatens Read Theatre Opebing). THE READE never opened and Walter Reade theatres walked away when the subway noise problem proved impossible to solve.
According to a NYT June 9, 1969 article, a grenade was thrown at the Loews Orpheum the day before at 4:00am. Slight injuries were cause to three person passing by in a taxicab by shattered glass from six large windows.
Although the police could not prove the link, the LOEWS CINE side of the complex was showing the controversial Jack Palance film about Che Guevara, CHE!.
Cuban Nationalists had denounced the film earlier in the week and demonstrations against the film had taken place at the Penthouse Theatre in Times Square.
The name LOEWS CINE should be listed here as a previous name for twin two.
The Squire was the Cameo-Adonis 693 W. 8th Ave and the Times was at (302 W. 42nd St).Both are on CT.
From the NYT, February 1, 1954
PASTOR CONDEMNS TIMES SQUARE “NUDITY” IN “SHOCKING” MOVIE ADS AND BOOK SHOPS
“The tarnished tinsel and the false glamour of Times Square were condemned yesterday by Msgr. Joseph A. McCaffrey, pastor of Holy Cross Roman Catholic Church…the monsignor looked at the "crossroads of the world” and found it a hotbed of “lurid signs” and flea circuses…He was especially critical of the theatres along forty-second Street that glorify “nudity and near-nudity” and hawk their wares by “indecent, obscene, salacious and shocking” marquee advertisements…Msgr. McCaffrey criticized the Rialto, Apollo, the Squire and the Times Movie theatres."
New Lyric trivia.
The film on the TAXI DRIVER marquee scene, SOMETIMES SWEET SUSAN, featured future Hollwood mainstream producer, Craig Baumgarten, so it was most probably an industry inside joke.
On April 28, 1966 a manager at the Lyric was stabbed to death in an apparent robbery attempt according to the NYT. The week before, the Bryant had been robbed at gunpoint.
I just added a third Lyric Theatre on 23rd Street which may correspond to photo posted by Lost Memory on May 3(??)
Perhaps President Guliani can find some moral loophole that will limit Bollywood to 40% of any NY venue where it does not represent community’s standards.
I am happy to see people attend the cinema to see the movie, for a change, but that many screens ALL showing Bollywood would be rare even in India.
City Cinema is the chain name.
In the late seventies/early eighties you would have found TRANS-LUX EAST, PENTHOUSE EAST, LIDO EAST, 59th St. EAST, EASTWORLD, ART EAST, TOWER EAST, UA EAST, and 86TH St. EAST. MAD Magazine ran spoof movie ads that looked like the real thing.
Chances are, if the word Village was anywhere on the page you would find a link in the NYT with CINEMA and EAST.
According to the NY times, the Central (as well as the Brooklyn Strand) were closed for a week during that 1957 run of MOM AND DAD and SHE SHOULDA SAID NO for failing to secure a license that allowed for “live” performances from the “lecturer”.
Nice punishment for showing two thirteen year old movies in the moral fifties!
Demolition was announced starting on January 2, 1956 when the Stanley and the National Hotel were both to be replaced by a 15 story textile industry building that has apparently since been demolished as well.
It apparently shows mainstream recent releases, porn and exploitation genre films.
One of the advantages of Bollywood in the US is that the DVD is often available at the same time as the 35mm release. The wholesome audiences these musicals attract could drive out the porn if it actually works here.
Wow! What a tragedy it must be to spend this short lifespan inside that head.
This has got to be one of the more entertaining threads. It has sex, drugs, violence, comedy, transvestites, the KKK, religion, a scarecrow, Italian cuisine, bus routes and finally, an act of treachery from the in-house villain. Most current FILMS aren’t anywhere nearly as entertaining!
This from the NY Times Oct. 18, 1998 confirms the suspicions raised about the programming. The ads must be intended as proof.
“And last week Judge Arthur W. Lonschein of Queens ruled that the formerly all-adult Fair Theatre in East Elmhurst, Queens, could remain open because it was now showing adult films in less than 40 percent of its theatres.“
I will now step outside for a smoke.
The Bryanston West name was used by Variety, for some reason, when it reported the theatre’s weekly grosses. The “family” allegedly established Bryanston Pictures and the Pusssycat with DEEP THROAT profits.
Mon, Dec. 11, 2006
Lost Landmarks | Mayfair Theater
MARGARIA FICHTNER
The afternoon reception, with its bouquets and satin-gowned hostesses, had drawn 1,000 curious citizens, but now it is 8:15, curtain time. Once the lights dim, and handsome Jo (soon Joseph) Cotten, pronounces ‘'That was quite a bump,’‘ to start the first act of William Archer’s The Green Goddess, every ticket holder at Civic Theater’s ’‘modernistic’‘ new playhouse on the Boulevard at 16th Street knows this is it, the most glittery event of the season.
By this January night in 1930, the Civic is Miami’s largest, most important social/cultural organization, counting Abesses, Burdines, even Vanderbilts, among its 600 supporters, and now, after years of wandering from stage to stage, its actors have such a swanky new home even Al Capone shows up. Alas, the company falters during the Depression, but the building is resuscitated as the Mayfair Theater, a popular Wometco movie house. For $1.65, patrons can enjoy coffee and tea poured into china cups and play bridge in a room off the lobby until the main feature starts.
By the 1960s, the Mayfair reinvents itself again, this time as a beloved art-flick theater. It is razed in the early ‘70s to make room for what is now a Radisson, but five Art Deco chandeliers survive at Restaurant San Michel in Coral Gables, glorious fragments of its afterglow.
Another link about the Miracle.
View link
An actual website page on Florida drive-in air conditioning!!!
http://members.aol.com/filmteknik70/diac.htm