Ridgeway Four

This website has a review of this theater. The reviewer doesn't think much of this theater.

This theatre is not as bad as that guy says. But I haven't been there in a long time. There's a Myspace account dedicated to it as well. Has lots of pictures of employees having a good time at the theatre.

"Johnny Betts is a rude 'abnoxious' jerk who needs to be 'punced' in the face."- A grammatically-challenged non-fan"

That's the teaser on the website that Lost Memory links us to. I’m laughing out loud! And yep, crackdog, you're right, it isn't as bad as the 'abnoxious' Johnny Betts makes it out to be. The Ridgeway is OLD these days: built about 1975, it's had a long hard life. It is amazing that it's still operating.

But first things first. The Ridgeway 4 was the 2nd 4-plex that MALCO built in Memphis. (The first was the Quartet, q.v.) Also, the R-4 building replaced THE MALCO (a.k.a. the 1928 Rapp & Rapp designed Orpheum) as MALCO's corporate headquarters.

It really was a new concept, an experiment in suburban theatre design. The R-4 is completely hidden - invisible from any road, in a low lying parcel with no major retail "anchors" to draw casual customers. If you were going to the Ridgeway, you knew what film you were going to see and WHERE you were going.

The auditoriums (uh, auditoria?) are absolutely standard MALCO design for the 1970's and '80's. Maroon curtains on the walls, waterfall curtain across the screen, standard seats upholstered in the same maroon as the walls, 4 channel stereo, big candy counter in the lobby.

The real kicker at the Ridgeway is the reverse slope floors. Entering at the back of the halls, the floor slopes downward toward the screen in the traditional auditorium rake- it’s a progressive curve based on sight-lines. However, somewhere around 5 or 6 rows from the screen, the curve bottoms out and begins to slope upward, tilting the seats back at a much steeper angle than usual. It’s the same idea which first gained popularity with the design of planetariums (uh, planetaria?): up close to the screen you don’t have your neck bent for the duration of the show. I’ve sat in those seats, it’s a neat idea, nobody does it anymore for a reason.

I did see many, many movies at the Ridgeway. My memories of the hall are uninspired design, worn out seats and worn out carpet and worn out curtains. But hall was always clean, the pictures were always bright, the sound good and the popcorn fresh. In the 1980’s that’s all we could hope for in a theatre.

Additional to the above: in the mid '80's Universal re-released five Alfred Hitchcock pictures: North by Northwest, Vertigo, The Trouble with Harry, Rope and Rear Window. These all played at the Ridgeway and I was there with my best pals for each one on the first day of the run. The restored prints were beautiful. Sure, it would have been fun to see them in a movie palace, but the Lightmans never let us down as far as the quality of the image on the screen.

I went there many times too, up until I left Memphis in 1983. Later when back on a visit took my wife, stepson, mother, AND mother-in-law to see Robert DeNiro in "Casino" there, thinking it would be a good movie about Las Vegas--then Joe Peschi started beating people with baseball bats, and I wanted to hide under the seat. Stepson seemed to enjoy it, though...

The mural behind the concession stand (mentioned above) was a collage of about 200 famous movie star portraits, everybody from Marilyn Monroe to the three stooges, and was a local talking point. Otherwise I agree with other reviewers that it was typical bland, uninspired Malco.

WHW, thank you. I had completely forgotten about the collage behind the concession stand. It realy was the only decorative element in any MALCO hall that I ever visited and it was WELL done.

I remember when the Ridgeway 4 opened and the mural was quite a hit. I saw many movies there, too. Always clean with comfortable seating. I liked those rows near the front.