Both those movies played in Cinerama at the Loew’s Capitol in New York. It was on Broadway between 50th and 51st Sts. When “How the West Was Won” played there, it was known as the Loew’s Cinerama, but it later reverted to its original name, the Capitol. It was torn down and replaced by an office tower in 1968.
Robert R: The theater in that picture isn’t the Capitol or the RKO/Warner Cinerama. It looks like the Warner Cinerama theater on Hollywood Blvd. in Los Angeles, also known as the Hollywood Pacific and the Pacific 1-2-3.
Don: I remember that console too. During a revival of WEST SIDE STORY in 1972 a guy was controlling the sound from there, and he kept making it worse. These really loud popping noises started happening – until he turned the console off and walked away, then everything was fine. I think the console is still there, only it’s boarded up.
To YankeeMike: The Arclight Cinemas Cinerama Dome on Sunset Blvd. in Hollywood can also show 3-strip Cinerama. Too bad both 3-strip theaters are on the West Coast, far away from us in the East. The closest remaining giant curved Cinerama screen is, I believe, the Uptown in Washington, DC. They played “2001” three years ago and it was overwhelming.
I made a couple goofs in my last post: the highway it didn’t face was Route 4, as Pete pointed out, and the street it did face is called Spring Valley Ave., not Road.
CConnolly: The Bergen Mall theater’s entrance was in the back of the Mall, not the side facing Route 17. It faced Spring Valley Rd. I guess it was behind Stern’s – it was near the eastern end of the mall. I guess it qualified as an art house – I saw Bowie in “The Man Who Fell to Earth” there and also “Swept Away” (not the Madonna version).
Thanks CConnolly for the info on the mural. My niece goes to school at Bergen Community and I’ll ask her about it. Alexander’s has a connection to my all-time favorite movie: when I was 13, I was there with my family the day the review for “2001” was due to appear in the New York Daily News in 1968, and I couldn’t wait for the shopping trip to end so I could get home and read that review (which was not a good one). That was also the day Martin Luther King was assassinated.
Pete, I remember the theater in the Bergen Mall. I think it was called the Mall Theater back in the ‘60s. I saw “To Sir With Love” there, and it was so small and crowded that my family had to split up and find separate seats.
The Paramus Drive-In’s entrance was on Route 4 East, across the highway from the huge Alexander’s department store (which is now Ikea). Never got to see a movie there, unfortunately, but you could see the back of the screen from the highway.
Does anybody remember the really big BIG abstract painting on the front of Alexander’s? Wonder what ever happened to that – was it destroyed when the store was torn down?
I don’t think it would be difficult to imagine the Music Hall filling up if every now and then they showed worthwhile. And I don’t mean just classic films … But what movies do you think could or would fill up the Hall enough to warrant this?
The Music Hall showed Alfred Hitchcock’s “Psycho” on a weeknight back in the 1990’s as part of a classic film festival. There wasn’t too much advertising for this event, but the word got out anyway. There wasn’t an empty seat in the house. Man, what a thrill that was!
It’s strange – when I talk about the modern Loew’s multiplexes all over Manhattan and northern New Jersey I pronounce it “Lows”, but whenever I go to the Loew’s Jersey movie palace in Jersey City, I can’t help calling it the “Loweez”, which is what I called it 45 years ago.
On Saturday, I saw my 20th classic movie on the Loew’s big screen,
SPARTACUS. Believe me, the last thing Jersey City needs is another
tacky store or office building. It’s incredibly sad how a wonderful
building like the Loew’s has to constantly struggle just to survive.
I sincerely hope Saturday wasn’t the last time I took a walk around
the beautiful lobby and its upstairs balcony, or climbed the grand
red-carpeted staircase, or sat in one of the front rows and gazed up
at the ceiling hundreds of feet above my head – all awe-inspiring
sights that can’t be experienced in any other movie theater in the New York area.
Jim: Sorry to tell you this, but Tom Pedler died on April 27, 2002. There was a memorial to him printed in the program for the James Bond festival held at the Loew’s Jersey in May 2002.
Maybe William would know for sure, but I remember giant tassels on the sides of the screen in the State 2 when the curtains were closed – unless I’m only imagining them. It was a long time ago. I saw “The Godfather” there in its opening week in 1972.
I think the Roxy Concert Hall was once the Forum 47th St. theater. At least that’s what it was called in the 1960’s and 1970’s. I think it had another name earlier than that. I saw “The Ten Commandments” and “E.T.” there.
My favorite is the Cinerama Dome. Something about that sky, and the jet plane flying overhead … it looks like a shot from Black Orpheus. One more reason: I finally got to attend a Cinerama show at the Dome last September (How the West Was Won).
The way all you guys are sharing your experience and reminiscences with us is the next best thing to having access to H.G. Wells’s time machine. Thanks!
Vito and Martin: Thanks for talking about the Fox CinemaScope fanfare. I’m grateful to George Lucas or whoever it was on “Star Wars” who was responsible for bringing it back. Speaking of Lucas, maybe it’s my imagination but has anyone else noticed that on the last two Star Wars films (Episodes 1 & 2), Alfred Newman’s Fox music sounds way too low, much lower than the Star Wars fanfare that follows it? Maybe this is Lucas’s way of keeping 20th Cebtury Fox in their place – they just distribute the movies but he creates them … I don’t know.
My favorite movie music to follow the Fox fanfare? There are two of them, both from the ‘50’s. “The King and I”, with that glorious Alfred Newman arrangement of the March of the Siamese Children, and “Journey to the Center of the Earth”, a terrifying blast of percussion and pipe organ courtesy of the Master, Bernard Herrmann.
To Will: In 1970 I can remember seeing a short subject with “The Out-of-Towners” , and a trailer for the scheduled next attraction at the Music Hall, “Darling Lili”, playing with “Airport” (even though it wasn’t the next attraction. “The Out-of-Towners” was. Don’t know what happened there – maybe “Darling Lili” wasn’t finished on time).
I saw “Damnation Alley” here in 1977, shown in something called Sound 360. This was the second-rate sci-fi movie 20th Century Fox had higher hopes for than they had for “Star Wars” before it opened and became their highest-grossing film ever.
This theater is seen in the opening minutes of Steven Spielberg’s “Duel”. It goes by fast, but after a lot of freeze-framing I got to see what was playing: a triple feature of “The Possession of Joel Delaney”, “Rosemary’s Baby” and “The Brotherhood of Satan”. And across the street at the Los Angeles Theater: “Buck and the Preacher”.
I care too, so make it six! I have an old (1972) xerox copy from microfilm of the original 1933 opening day ad for “King Kong” which gives the address of the New Roxy as 6th Ave. and 49th St. This confused me at first because I’d thought the Roxy was near 7th Ave. – this was before I learned they were two different theaters. I believe the ad lists “King Kong”’s two theaters as Radio City Music Hall and Radio City New Roxy.
Thanks, Theatrefan. Those pictures are wonderful. I also never knew that the Winter Garden ever showed movies, and good ones, too (“Stairway to Heaven”).
Hi Myron:
Both those movies played in Cinerama at the Loew’s Capitol in New York. It was on Broadway between 50th and 51st Sts. When “How the West Was Won” played there, it was known as the Loew’s Cinerama, but it later reverted to its original name, the Capitol. It was torn down and replaced by an office tower in 1968.
/theaters/522/
Robert R: The theater in that picture isn’t the Capitol or the RKO/Warner Cinerama. It looks like the Warner Cinerama theater on Hollywood Blvd. in Los Angeles, also known as the Hollywood Pacific and the Pacific 1-2-3.
Don: I remember that console too. During a revival of WEST SIDE STORY in 1972 a guy was controlling the sound from there, and he kept making it worse. These really loud popping noises started happening – until he turned the console off and walked away, then everything was fine. I think the console is still there, only it’s boarded up.
To YankeeMike: The Arclight Cinemas Cinerama Dome on Sunset Blvd. in Hollywood can also show 3-strip Cinerama. Too bad both 3-strip theaters are on the West Coast, far away from us in the East. The closest remaining giant curved Cinerama screen is, I believe, the Uptown in Washington, DC. They played “2001” three years ago and it was overwhelming.
I made a couple goofs in my last post: the highway it didn’t face was Route 4, as Pete pointed out, and the street it did face is called Spring Valley Ave., not Road.
CConnolly: The Bergen Mall theater’s entrance was in the back of the Mall, not the side facing Route 17. It faced Spring Valley Rd. I guess it was behind Stern’s – it was near the eastern end of the mall. I guess it qualified as an art house – I saw Bowie in “The Man Who Fell to Earth” there and also “Swept Away” (not the Madonna version).
Thanks CConnolly for the info on the mural. My niece goes to school at Bergen Community and I’ll ask her about it. Alexander’s has a connection to my all-time favorite movie: when I was 13, I was there with my family the day the review for “2001” was due to appear in the New York Daily News in 1968, and I couldn’t wait for the shopping trip to end so I could get home and read that review (which was not a good one). That was also the day Martin Luther King was assassinated.
Pete, I remember the theater in the Bergen Mall. I think it was called the Mall Theater back in the ‘60s. I saw “To Sir With Love” there, and it was so small and crowded that my family had to split up and find separate seats.
The Paramus Drive-In’s entrance was on Route 4 East, across the highway from the huge Alexander’s department store (which is now Ikea). Never got to see a movie there, unfortunately, but you could see the back of the screen from the highway.
Does anybody remember the really big BIG abstract painting on the front of Alexander’s? Wonder what ever happened to that – was it destroyed when the store was torn down?
CConnolly asked:
I don’t think it would be difficult to imagine the Music Hall filling up if every now and then they showed worthwhile. And I don’t mean just classic films … But what movies do you think could or would fill up the Hall enough to warrant this?
The Music Hall showed Alfred Hitchcock’s “Psycho” on a weeknight back in the 1990’s as part of a classic film festival. There wasn’t too much advertising for this event, but the word got out anyway. There wasn’t an empty seat in the house. Man, what a thrill that was!
It’s strange – when I talk about the modern Loew’s multiplexes all over Manhattan and northern New Jersey I pronounce it “Lows”, but whenever I go to the Loew’s Jersey movie palace in Jersey City, I can’t help calling it the “Loweez”, which is what I called it 45 years ago.
On Saturday, I saw my 20th classic movie on the Loew’s big screen,
SPARTACUS. Believe me, the last thing Jersey City needs is another
tacky store or office building. It’s incredibly sad how a wonderful
building like the Loew’s has to constantly struggle just to survive.
I sincerely hope Saturday wasn’t the last time I took a walk around
the beautiful lobby and its upstairs balcony, or climbed the grand
red-carpeted staircase, or sat in one of the front rows and gazed up
at the ceiling hundreds of feet above my head – all awe-inspiring
sights that can’t be experienced in any other movie theater in the New York area.
Jim: Sorry to tell you this, but Tom Pedler died on April 27, 2002. There was a memorial to him printed in the program for the James Bond festival held at the Loew’s Jersey in May 2002.
Maybe William would know for sure, but I remember giant tassels on the sides of the screen in the State 2 when the curtains were closed – unless I’m only imagining them. It was a long time ago. I saw “The Godfather” there in its opening week in 1972.
Warren is right – the theater is listed under the name Movieland:
/theaters/2925/
I think the Roxy Concert Hall was once the Forum 47th St. theater. At least that’s what it was called in the 1960’s and 1970’s. I think it had another name earlier than that. I saw “The Ten Commandments” and “E.T.” there.
My favorite is the Cinerama Dome. Something about that sky, and the jet plane flying overhead … it looks like a shot from Black Orpheus. One more reason: I finally got to attend a Cinerama show at the Dome last September (How the West Was Won).
The way all you guys are sharing your experience and reminiscences with us is the next best thing to having access to H.G. Wells’s time machine. Thanks!
Vito and Martin: Thanks for talking about the Fox CinemaScope fanfare. I’m grateful to George Lucas or whoever it was on “Star Wars” who was responsible for bringing it back. Speaking of Lucas, maybe it’s my imagination but has anyone else noticed that on the last two Star Wars films (Episodes 1 & 2), Alfred Newman’s Fox music sounds way too low, much lower than the Star Wars fanfare that follows it? Maybe this is Lucas’s way of keeping 20th Cebtury Fox in their place – they just distribute the movies but he creates them … I don’t know.
My favorite movie music to follow the Fox fanfare? There are two of them, both from the ‘50’s. “The King and I”, with that glorious Alfred Newman arrangement of the March of the Siamese Children, and “Journey to the Center of the Earth”, a terrifying blast of percussion and pipe organ courtesy of the Master, Bernard Herrmann.
To Will: In 1970 I can remember seeing a short subject with “The Out-of-Towners” , and a trailer for the scheduled next attraction at the Music Hall, “Darling Lili”, playing with “Airport” (even though it wasn’t the next attraction. “The Out-of-Towners” was. Don’t know what happened there – maybe “Darling Lili” wasn’t finished on time).
I saw “Damnation Alley” here in 1977, shown in something called Sound 360. This was the second-rate sci-fi movie 20th Century Fox had higher hopes for than they had for “Star Wars” before it opened and became their highest-grossing film ever.
David: The #102. I haven’t thought about that bus number in years. It’s the #76 now, but of course there are no more Fox and Oritani to go to.
This theater is seen in the opening minutes of Steven Spielberg’s “Duel”. It goes by fast, but after a lot of freeze-framing I got to see what was playing: a triple feature of “The Possession of Joel Delaney”, “Rosemary’s Baby” and “The Brotherhood of Satan”. And across the street at the Los Angeles Theater: “Buck and the Preacher”.
I care too, so make it six! I have an old (1972) xerox copy from microfilm of the original 1933 opening day ad for “King Kong” which gives the address of the New Roxy as 6th Ave. and 49th St. This confused me at first because I’d thought the Roxy was near 7th Ave. – this was before I learned they were two different theaters. I believe the ad lists “King Kong”’s two theaters as Radio City Music Hall and Radio City New Roxy.
My dad lived in Hoboken from 1928 to 1963. He told me this theater was so unsanitary they called it “The Scratch House”.
Thanks, Theatrefan. Those pictures are wonderful. I also never knew that the Winter Garden ever showed movies, and good ones, too (“Stairway to Heaven”).