Lunt-Fontanne Theatre

The famous duo of the stage, Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne, resided at their small estate "Ten Chimneys" in the town of Genesee Depot, about 30 miles west of Milwaukee, until their deaths. Now that estate has been preserved in their memories as a meetings and tourist spot, which has its own web site: http://www.tenchimneys.org/ The historic 1895 PABST theater in Milwaukee (www.pabsttheater.org) was their 'home' theater, and the place from which the couple began and ended their professional tours each season for almost 50 years. The PABST maintains two display cases in its lobby of the Lunts showing their many triumphs there and on the road at the hundreds of theatres at which they appeared. They are best seen today in the film "The Guardsman" which is reviewed at and available from: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021931/

What kind of a run was the Lunt Fontanne (Globe) on when it showed movies?

The Globe was turned into a movie house by the Brandt Circuit, which started with late-run double features at bargain prices like 15 cents during the day and 25 cents at night. They were so successful that they started taking over legit houses on 42nd Street and installing the same policy. Because of its prime location on Broadway, they then switched the Globe to first-run movies, though often bottom-of-the-barrel because Brandt had no affiliation with a major studio. Eventually, when Loew's gave up the Mayfair and Criterion, the Globe was able to get higher-calibre product. If I recall correctly, Fox's second CinemaScope movie, "How to Marry a Millionaire," had its exclusive first-run at the Globe.

That's right about the Globe's films. Some of its 40s films were OK. It showed first -run of Hitchcock's "Rope" before its product improved in the 1950s. It premiered Marilyn Monroe's "Don't Bother to Knock." And "How to Marry a Millionaire day-dated at Loew's State, diagonally across the street. In the mid-50s I saw (the now classic) "Forbidden Planet" there, and also "A Face in the Crowd."I believe its first play after reverting to live theater was Durrenmatt's "The Visit," with M. Lunt and Mme Fontaine themselves starring in it. I remember seeing Sid Caesar in Neil Simon's "Little Me" ca. 1963 there. Oh, and of course, the famous Richard Burton in "Hamlet" in 1964 -- yee gads, the block was lined with autograph hunters then.

In the early 1990s, City Cinemas had an architect draw up plans for the Lunt, with it divided into 4 or 5 cinemas. As I recall, the drawings showed 2 cinemas on the orchestra level, 2 in the balcony level and possibly 1 on the stage. I don't know what the deal was, but obviously it never happened.

The current W. 46th Street address was originally the side entrance for its carriage patrons.

The main narrow entrance that was used from its 'legit' theatre opening on 22nd January 1910 until it closed as the Globe movie theatre in 1957 was 1555 Broadway.

In 1964 when Richard Burton was playing in Hamlet at the Lunt-Fontaine, each night after the performance a bubble-top limo would pull up to the stagedoor and Burton would get into the car where Elizabeth Taylor was waiting. Elizabeth would give Richard a big kiss and the crowds surrounding the car would cheer.

THE VISIT, the initial production which opened the newly renamed Lunt-Fontanne Theater, had a large set which used the entire stage. Actors wishing to go from wing to the other without being seen by the audience had to go outside one stage door and around the stage end of the theater reentering at the other stage door.

"The Visit" is a startling play, as it begins with an absurd premise (an old woman demands the death of a former lover for jilting her many decades earlier) and delivers on it when the victim's friends comply with murder. Farce turns into tragedy. The Lunts were perfectly cast despite themselves, since their talent and celebrity for drawing-room comedy led audiences to expect the latter until the action veered toward horrifying drama. What I most remember about this performance in Summer '58 was a stage trick that had escaped me at the time: after Fontanne made her demand, she turned upstage and dropped her shawl, revealing that she wore a backless dress. The audience gasped. A friend explained that the aged actress, bareback in the spotlight, suddenly looked looked like a young woman. To this sixteen-year-old, a bare back was little more than a bare back.

In the early 1960s (?), I saw the original production of the "Sound of Music" at the Lunt-Fontanne. I also saw "Little Me" there (possibly the last Saturday matinee?). In later years, I saw both "Beatlemania" and revivals of "Hello Dolly" and "My Fair Lady" there.

What I found striking about the theater, especially in the early 1960s, was the quality of the remodeling job that they did when they converted it back to a stage theater from a movie theater. To my young eyes they did a really spectacular job. (But I've read some comments from the time, where some people felt they actually overdid it.) I've seen numerous pictures of the Globe / Lunt-Fontanne recently, but I'm not sure where. But I think there are pictures of it in the Dover paperback by William Morrison, "Broadway Theaters: History and Architecture," and in Robert A.M. Stern's "New York 1960."

On the outside, the remodeling incorporated two rather unusual -- and pleasant -- features: 1) a terrazzo (sp?) sidewalk (Terrazzo is a synthetic flooring that kind of looks like polished marble. Many office buildings have terrazzo flooring.); 2) a handsome, ersatz Beaux Art marquee /canopy that had built-in space heaters on its underside. (I'm pretty sure this marquee / canopy is still there.)

Across the street, the Helen Hayes Theater also had been remodeled about the same time. I kind of wonder if it was owned at that time by the same owners, because it shared some of these features. It too had the handsome, ersatz Beaux Art marquee with the built-in space heaters on the underside. (Don't recall if it had the terrazzo sidewalk.)

Between the two theaters, this street really had a great "look." Both of the theaters had unusually grand -- but, urbane -- architecture for a New York City "legit" theater, and it was like having two grand palazzi (sp?) facing each other on opposite sides of a small New York City side-street. Plus, next door to the Helen Hayes, to the east, was the almost equally handsome facade of the Gaiety (although you had to peek up behind the billboard that covered it), and next door, to the west, were one or two brownstones that had been extended out to the sidewalk and contained the original (?) "Dinty Moore's." The exterior of Dinty Moore's had lots of brass (used, for instance, in brass railings), and even in the 1960s they had someone going out there, contantly polishing the brass.

Before showtime, and during intermissions, the street took on a wonderful festive air. People spilled out onto the sidewalks (especially to smoke) and it looked like a big party! (I remember that at one time, Huntington Hartford's short-lived magazine, "Show," had a photo essay on the theater district, and one of my favorite photos in it was of people smoking outside the Helen Hayes during intermission.)

If I remember correctly, the time that I waited outside the Lunt-Fontanne during the run of Richard Burton's "Hamlet," Liz and Dick (at that time the world's most scandalous couple by far) really "went with it"! A "handsom cab" pulled up to the theater, they climbed in and were romantically wisked off by a horse and carriage! (No fringe on the top, though!)

I believe Christopher Gray, who writes the "Streetscapes" column for the Sunday "New York Times," once wrote an article about the Lunt-Fontanne. It had been rumored that the orginal Globe had what today we would call a "moon roof," which could be opened in good weather. During the various remodelings, however, the "moon roof" opening was, I believe, plastered over. But, if I remember it correctly, Gray was able to get a close-up look of the remaining mechanism from on top of the roof, and he wrote about it in the "Times."

In August, 1944, 20th-Fox's "Wing and A Prayer," a wartime epic about an aircraft carrier in the South Pacific, was declared "So big it has to play in two theatres simultaneously" in its New York premiere engagement. The lucky recipients, Brandt's Globe and Brandt's Gotham (original Central), were both in the same block on the west side of Broadway between 46th and 47th Streets. This proved so successful that the same type of booking was used a year later for UA's "Story of G.I. Joe," though in that case the Globe ran continuous at popular prices, while the Gotham was two-a-day (three-a-day on weekends and holidays) with reserved seats at a higher admission scale.

Here’s a Playbill from the Lunt-Fontanne in June 1964. 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 the print-out won’t be so clear.

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y116/petrarch/cinematreasures/lunt-fontanne-hamlet1.jpg

http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y116/petrarch/cinematreasures/lunt-fontanne-hamlet2.jpg

The show presented the celebrated Richard Burton performance of “Hamlet.” As directed by John Gielgud (whose off-stage voice supplied the part of the Ghost), the play unfolded on a bare-wall stage with the actors dressed in rehearsal tights, as though it were a first run-through. The performance was subsequently filmed live with the Electronovision process.

I saw the production, but I didn’t see Burton. It was a hot ticket for a limited engagement at a time when Burton-Taylor celebrity mania was still at its height. I showed up at the box office practically at dawn for day-of-sale standing room tickets. That evening as the house lights dimmed, the dreaded theater manager stepped out before the curtain to announce—horrors!—that Mr. Burton would be indisposed that evening, to be replaced by his understudy Robert Burr.

Next day, the NYC newspapers ran headlines on the panic at the Lunt-Fontanne that evening as angry patrons rushed up the aisles demanding refunds for their tickets. I stayed on in a less-than-half empty house, guided by the belief that the rest of the cast would turn in especially good performances to compensate the faithful who remained. That, plus the electricity in the air with an unknown actor filling the shoes of the then-most-famous actor in the Anglophone world.

It turned out, I believe, to have been the only performance that Burton missed during the run. Years passed (imagine calendar pages flipping). Just last April on a visit to Indiana, I met a fellow roughly my age, and it turned out that he too had been in the audience that evening. Small world after forty-one years. We both shoudda sat down and watched the thing on Electronovision.

BoxOfficeBill
Does anyone know if the Electronovision version exists?

Yes, Burton's Electronovision "Hamlet" is on DVD. Check www.blockbuster.com for details. I can't vouch for the technical quality. It might have been copied from a tape that Burton's widow donated to a film archive.

Thanks Warren I just ordered it.

Here is a picture when it was painted that horrible blue, thank goodness it's not like that anymore.
http://www.sachsmorganstudio.com/projects/PicPages/LuntBfr.html

When it was in its blue period I thought it one of the ugliest houses on Broadway. I have no idea what it looks like now but I'd like to know what it looked like before.

I managed to see Richard Burton as Hamlet at the Lunt-Fontanne on July 15, 1964. I remember that after the performance there was quite a commotion out front on 46th Street as Liz Taylor arrived by limo to retrieve Burton. I didn't see and haven't yet seen the Elecronovision version, but I used to own an LP recording of the play, with Burton.

Earlier in the day I had gone to the Art in Greenwich Village to see Rex Harrison in the film Major Barbara, then to the 55th Street Playhouse for a Marcel Carné double bill: Bizarre, Bizarre and The Devil's Envoy. A rewarding day.

I get the impression from various sources that when the Globe was transformed into the Lunt-Fontanne it was more than "just" redecorated. Although I could be wrong, it seems the theater was virtually gutted and rebuilt and, as can be seen from a quote later in this post, the interior design at the Lunt-Fontanne seems to have been pale-blue from the very beginning (although it may have been a different pale blue, and perhaps it might have been used more discriminatingly).

Of course everyone is entitled to their own taste, but when I first saw the interior of the Lunt-Fontanne for a 1962 (?) performance of the "Sound of Music" (orchestra level) I was enchanted. I thought the interior was magical, and a large part of its charm seemed to me to be due to the wonderful light blue color of the interior. (But then again, I was just a kid!) A year or two later I saw little "Little Me" (balcony) and felt the same way.

As I got to see more and more Broadway theaters, it seemed to me that the Lunt-Fontanne was way up in the top category in terms of beautiful interiors. (And, if I remember correctly, some drama critics like, perhaps, John Chapman of the "Daily News," felt the same way.)

However, it should also be said that in those days the competition was not all that strong because most Broadway theaters seemed to suffer from indifference and neglect by their owners. For example, if I remember correctly, the ugliest Broadway theater interior in my mind was that of the Eugene O'Neill (last matinee of "She Loves Me"), where the entire interior, ornamentation and all, seemed to be painted over with a dull grey.

So I think even theatergoers who weren't bowled over by the actual interior decoration of the Lunt-Fontanne might have appreciated the care, money and aspirations that the owner and the interior designer invested in the design -- instead of just putting together a "schlock" design, at least they tried to do something special. And even ambitious "bad" taste is better than cheap, thoughtless or callous indifference.

Also, looking back, it's seems somewhat noteworthy to me that the owner and designers tried to do a modern interpretation of an historical style rather than try to impose flashy, but poorly thought out conventional modernism -- which was oftentimes done in those days with storefronts, and sometimes even entire office buildings. In fact, I think one of the the fun things about the design of the Lunt-Fontanne is to see how the designer used historical styles in an updated modern way.

(By the way, two other renovated theaters that I thought were among the most beautiful on Broadway for similar reasons were the St. James and, to a lesser extent, the Broadway [also listed on the Cinema Treasures website]. However I don't think either of them got the same good "reviews" even at the time as the Lunt-Fontanne did.)

If I remember correctly, though, when I saw the Lunt-Fontanne again in the mid-1980s ("Peter Pan," "Beatlemania" and revivals of "My Fair Lady" and "Hello Dolly") I don't think the interior impressed me quite as much. I don't recall, however, if this was because my taste had changed or because the original Lunt-Fontanne design was not being maintained properly. (I do know, however, that the owners of the theater never bothered to take down an illuminated "Sound of Music" sign [late 1950s?] from the theater's exterior until maybe the early 1990s?!)

Thanks RobertR for the link to a photo of the most recent redesign! Judging from the photo at least (and photos can be deceiving), my feeling is that the new interior is far less attractive than the original design -- actually, it seems somewhat ugly. It's as though the celestial powder blue walls were replaced by assertive, basement rec room formica "wood" paneling -- and the magic is gone! (But, of course, in person I might have an entirely different feeling about it.)

Here's some info about the Lunt-Fontanne from "New York, 1960" (pg. 442) by Robert A.M. Stern (the famous architect) et al.:

Some existing legitimate theaters were renovated as well, most notably the former Globe (Carrere & Hastings, 1909), which became the Lunt-Fontanne in 1958. [At this point in the Stern text there is the first of about three footnotes that cite various sources, including a July 1958 Interior Design article and a May 6,1958, "New York Times" article entitled "Broadway Agog as Theater Opens"]. . . . Once the most luxurious of Broadway playhouses but used for movies since the 1930s, the theater was redecorated by the British designer Arthur Boys, who was asked by the new owner, Robert W. Dowling, to base his work on the music room of Frederick the Great's Sans Souci Palace and on Venice's Fenice Theater. Because according to Dowling, "Going to the theater should be like visiting a charming and gracious home," he wanted the redesign to have "a new elegance and comfort." Marya Mannes said that the original Globe had been considered "the most beautiful" theater of its day, "with Grecian pillars and a balcony promenade that drew such phrases as 'commodious and handsome.'" Although she acknowledged that this style was "no longer supported by public taste," she found the renovation showy, lacking the dignity required for serious drama: "Mr. Dowling has spent millions in painting the reconditioned house pale-blue and white, encruting it with rococo, stringing it with crystal chandeliers, upholstering it with damask and carpeting it in deepest pile; and what is his idea of a gracious home is my idea of an inflated poweder room."

On page 441, there is a nice photo of one of the Lunt-Fontanne's lobby areas with murals by Cosmo di Salvo.

Recall seeing 'A Funny Thing Happened...' here.

There seems to be some confusion between Robert's photo and Benjamins comment's. The blue interior of the photo is what the theater was like when I was attending it and it was the dreariest of settings. Yet Benjamin extolls this design. Then claims the photo is of its recent redecoration and not very attractive.
But this is exactly what I remember from the 70's to the early 90's!
I don't believe the theater is like this now(at least I hope not.)
So Benjamin exactly what period are you refering to?

It's not like that anymore. I think that picture was taken as the renovations were starting. Fortunately the Lunt Fonatine is painted Creamy ivory with gold gild and looks beautiful now.

I went to see Sandy Duncan in "Peter Pan" here in the 1980's (I had a seat in the balcony). If memory serves me right, the auditorium was painted a light shade of blue and I bleieve there were painted murals of cherubs and clouds on the ceiling. The auditorium struck me as being rather charming.

When I next went to see a show at the Lunt-Fontaine Theatre around 2000 ("Titanic-The Musical"), the interior had been painted matt black and there was no decorative features at all. There was a crystal chandelier in the centre of the ceiling. All very disappointing.

The Globe was apparently showing movies earlier than has previously been reported. This 1928 night view of some of the theatres on the west side of Broadway shows the Globe with William Fox's "Street Angel." Fox was also represented at the Gaiety with "Four Sons." Note in the far background the illuminated dome sign on the roof of the Capitol. And a sign for Madison Square Garden includes an arrow pointing to its Eighth Avenue location:
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/128-2816_IMG.jpg

Boy! And today we think that we have sensory overload! How glorious is that photo!

When I saw "My Favorite Spy" at the Globe in 1951, there were two balconies. During the transformation into the Lunt-Fontanne, the theater was rebuilt and the second balcony removed.

The info from the 1928 photo that shows a movie playing at the Globe is very interesting. The Internet Broadway Database has the following as the last live shows at the Globe: "She's My Baby," opened 1/3/1928; "Three Cheers," opened 10/15/1928; and "Cat & the Fiddle" (a big time production with music by Jerome Kern and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II), 10/15/31. There does seem to be a big break between "Three Cheers" and "Cat & the Fiddle" that would have allowed some movies to play at the Globe before if finally gave up live shows altogether in 1932 (according to the William Morrison book, see below) or 1935 (the introduction at the top of the Lunt-Fontanne page on this website).

Here's the link to the Internet Broadway Database. Once you are on a theater's page, if you click on the name of a show that played there, I believe it will tell you the dates the show was at that theater.

http://www.ibdb.com/venue.asp?ID=1174#Globe+Theatre1910

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Here's some more info on the Lunt-Fontanne, this time from the William Morrison book, "Broadway Theaters: History and Architecture" (pgs. 63-65).

Sadly, Charles Dillingham [the producer who built the original theater] lost his fortune in the 1929 Crash. His beloved Globe was foreclosed and converted into a motion picture theater in 1932. Thus it remained until Robert Dowling and the City Playhouses Group bought the theatre in 1957 and renamed it Lunt-Fontanne. The architectural firm of Roche & Roche was commissioned to design the remodeling. Among other improvements, they closed the Broadway entrance, installed a new box office eestibule, and reconfigured the auditorium into a single-balcony "shoebox" house . . . . The Nederlander organization purchased the theater in 1973 and still owns it today [1999].

The book has some terrific photos of both the Globe and the Lunt-Fontanne, including a slightly larger version of the photo found in the Stern book that shows the Mezzanine loung as it looked just after the 1958 renovation.

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By the way, "Broadway Theaters: History and Architecture," by Willliam Morrison, is one of those inexpensive Dover paperback picturebooks. It has many other wonderful photos of old Broadway theaters. Although the primary focus is on Broadway "legit" theaters, many of the theaters in the book also showed movies at one time or another (like the Globe/Lunt-Fontanne) and are thus listed on the Cinema Treasures website.

One Amazon reviewer said the book contained a good number of factual errors, which may be true since I believe I was able to detect a few myself. (But to be fair to the author, I don't know how the number of errors in his book compares with the the number found in other books -- all these books seem to have at least some errors. And the pictures alone are well worth the price, in my opinion.)

The list price is $17.95, but brand new copies were on sale at the Strand bookstore a few months ago for about the same price as they are on Amazon ($12.21). At the Strand, there were also used copies of "Best Remaining Seats" [didn't check the prices] and a half-priced(?), brand new "reviewer's copy" of "Cinema Treasures" ($20.00).

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When you go to the sachsmorganstudio website that RobertR links to be sure to see all the photos of the Lunt-Fontanne.

The page that is linked to is a "before" photo that is probably the theater just before the renovation. Given what's been posted about the theater at one time being painted matt black, I doubt this photo reflects the original Arthur Boys decor from the 1950s.

Click on "What Have We done" and then scroll down to the Lunt-Fontanne entry. Click on the Lunt-Fontanne entry and you will see a photo of what the Sachs Morgan Studio is apparently proud of. (Again, maybe I'd like it better in person, or maybe having seen the original Arthur Boys decoration, I would still be dissapointed.)

Also, be sure to click on the picture of the chandelier, and you will see what the new interior looks like from the left balcony (about where I was sitting when I saw "Little Me" -- on its last Saturday matinee? -- in the early 1960s).

"Street Angel" was a Fox release of April, 1928, and the Globe probably got it as an interim booking after a "legit" play flopped. That often happened with the playhouses that fronted on Broadway, especially for movies that were shown as roadshows with all seats reserved.

The oddest feature of that theater that I recall as both a movie house and as a playhouse was the downward sloping, horizontally splayed beaux-arts cornucopias on each side of the proscenium, retained after the '58 renovation eliminated the second balcony. I haven't been in that house since the '99 renovation, so I wonder what that recent job entailed. I wish there were a site like this for NYC live playhouses.

The latest version of the auditorium seems more suited to Las Vegas or Branson than Broadway. The Lunts, who were the epitome of elegance, would flip over in their graves if they saw it. What are those hideous panels along the side walls of the balcony? Are they mirrored or glass with back lighting? I would imagine that they're very distracting during a performance. Hopefully, if this theatre continues its relationship with Disney, I'll never need to attend.

In the summer of 1925, the Globe served as a cinema with a reserved seat, pre-release engagement of the Douglas Fairbanks epic, "Don Q," which ran for nine weeks from June 15 through August 12th, with 13 showings per week at a price scale of 50 cents to $2.20. Its best week was the second, which grossed $24,022, according to Variety. In September, the Globe returned to the "legit" fold with "No, No, Nanette," which proved one of the biggest hits in its history.

The full title of the 1925 movie was "Don Q, Son of Zorro." It was one of Hollywood's first sequels, in this case to Douglas Fairbanks' 1920 blockbuster, "The Mark of Zorro."

Here are two very early views of the auditorium. The orchestra floor was fairly shallow so that the rear wall could accommodate two separate balconies. As a cinema, the Globe was always so darkly lighted that I don't recall if the side boxes remained, but surely they were stripped of their funereal drapes:
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/130-3032_IMG.jpg
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/130-3057_IMG.jpg

Two weeks prior to the opening of "Bwana Devil" at Loew's State, Brandt's Globe was the first Broadway/Times Square theatre to show 3-D movies with polarized glasses. Presented by producer Sol Lesser, the program at the Globe was a compilation of five 3-D shorts that were produced in England in the Stereo Techniques process for showing at the Festival of Britain in 1951. Three shorts were in Technicolor and two in B&W, the longest being a color tour of the Thames entitled "The Royal River." The entire show lasted about 45 minutes and opened at the Globe on February 3, 1953, with continuous performances starting at 8:30 AM. New York Times critic Bosley Crowther was not impressed, and "found the glasses not only oppressive but unpleasantly odorous-- due, it appeared, to the plastic composition from which they are made."

Warren is this the 3-D show you talk about? I have been trying to find out what this show at the Rialto was?
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a13/ChmnofBrd/Triorama3D.jpg

What a beautiful auditorium the Globe had. It's hard to reconcile Warrens photos with the theater I've know since '71(The Rothchilds) always to me the dreariest of the old Broadway theaters. Though the Virginia certainly gives it a bit of competition.
People are again complaining about a lack of theaters for Broadway musicals coming in. What a joke!

No, the program at the Rialto was not the same as the Globe's. I believe that the Rialto's used the "old-fashioned" 3-D with red/blue glasses and required only one projector. The Globe's used two synchronized projectors and polarized glasses.

This is a 1930's photo of the Globe Theater.

I saw Jerry Garcia play at the Lunt-Fontanne in October of 1987 - with his acoustic bluegrass-inspired band playing "Act One" and his electric rock band playing "Act Two". Rock impresario Bill Graham booked Garcia and Company into the theater for almost a full month's engagement (including Weds and Sat matinees). Anyway, I seem to recall there being a lot of standing room at the rear of the orchestra and for some reason I seem to remember columns holding up the balcony along the far side aisles. Is this possible?

I can't recall too much detail about the decor... even though I did take my son to see Beauty and the Beast just a few of years ago. I do recall that Graham had festooned the upstairs lounge with a lot of wonderful photographs from his archives and he had the concession stand selling Egg Creams (as I believe had been his policy downtown at the Fillmore East - nee Loews Commodore). I actually met Graham during the Garcia show. But that's probably a story for a different web site.

Was the original lobby on Broadway converted to office space or otherwise demolished? At the moment, I can't think of what exactly stands on the west side of Broadway between 46th and 47th.

Look at this trashy film playing the Globe in Jan. of 1944
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a13/ChmnofBrd/Movie%20Ads/1-44.jpg

Original reserved-seat, roadshow run of "Lost Horizon" (1937):
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/globe1.jpg

Two images from 1935:
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/globeglory.jpg
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/globe12.jpg

I happened to be in the Times Square area over the weekend of 03-12-06. It appears demolition has begun on what was once the Broadway entrance to the Lunt-Fontanne/Globe Theaters. I believe this entrance was converted to retail stores back in the 1950’s. It also appears demolition is taking place at the former Howard-Johnson and Gaiety Theater building just south of the Lunt–Fontanne.

I believe an office building is slated to be constucted at the Howard Johnson's site. The rest. closed last year.

Here's an article from today's NY Times regarding the old Globe Theater entrance on Broadway. As Bobs and YankeeMike mentioned, the former Broadway entrance is being demolished along with the Howard Johnson/Gaiety site next door to make way for a new office buidling. The billboards that have obscured the facade for decades have been removed while prep work for the demolition proceeds, revealing the 4 story structure beneath - at least temporarily.

Not for nothin, but these imbeciles at The New York Times really seem to be impressed with themselves - they are under the mistaken impression that the stuff they write is worth $3.95 per article to look at online -

Also the NY Times has been for a long time a great supporter of the complete destruction of Times Square.
But I must admit its superior, hip, unctuous attitude is good for the occasional laugh.
People actually write this stuff?

I don't get it. I joined for free. What are you paying for?

Fond memory of 1958 when I was in high school. My Mom & I went to see Elaine Stritch & Don Ameche in "Goldilocks." A fun musical in a gloriously classy theater. AND --- we spoke to Margaret Hamilton at the stage door !

A wartime "B"
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I believe Warren had posted the following image here some time ago... It seems Tarzan had a previous history at the Globe some 8 years earlier and in the person of actor Herman Brix ("World's Greatest Athlete" in 1935):

New Adventures of Tarzan

1953 Cinemascope and Marilyn Monroe needed 2 Broadway houses
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a13/ChmnofBrd/Movie%20Ads/How2MarryaMillionaire.jpg

In September, 1947, the Globe presented the New York premiere engagement of "Fun and Fancy Free," now one of the most forgotten of Walt Disney's cartoon features:
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/nyc1947.jpg

Here are three pages from the New York Daily News, May 1956.

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y231/billhuelbig/fpglobe1.jpg

This ad gives away the ending of the movie:

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y231/billhuelbig/fpglobe2.jpg

Here's a dismissive, condescending review of the movie from Wanda Hale (at least she liked "2001" 12 years later). Notice the Movie Time Table. The first showing of "Forbidden Planet" at the Globe was at 9 AM. Last show: 1:20 AM! Movies sure ruled Times Square back then, didn't they?

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y231/billhuelbig/fpglobe3.jpg

Here is a vintage postcard view of the 46th Street side of the building. In the upper left corner, the Globe's opening date is reported as January 10, 1910, which is verified by the Broadway Internet Database. The inaugural booking was the musical play, "The Old Town." I'm not sure if the Globe had a Broadway entrance at this time. It might have been added later:
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/globeoriginal.jpg

In this 1945 nighttime view, the theatre is to the left (south) of the Automat. As Brandt's Globe, it is sharing the NYC premiere of "The Story of G.I. Joe" with Brandt's Gotham, which is to the right (north) of the Automat: www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/joe1945.jpg

In The New York Times of 6/24/07, a story describing the current Lunt-Fontanne's issue with the corner demolition on 46th St, mentions its past as the Globe. The problem seems to be a leftover piece of the Globe that is now in the way of the corner developers. The demolition is on hold for now...

Well the corner demolition was restarted and now it has been razed to the ground floor.

Looks like the retail store American Eagle Outfitters has signed a 15 year lease for some of the property on this site. And Levis is opening a new store in the Paramount 1501 building soon.

A Globe theatre on 46th street shows up intermittently in NYT movie ads in early 1976.

On April 2, the Robert F. Kennedy theatre on 46th street, Broadway & 8th Avenue (??) shows up in an ad for JAWS. Does anyone know if these were both the Lunt-Fontanne?

Walked past the Lunt a few times in the last few days and they have really cleaned it up and its looks great. There is a great big empty void where HJs once stood.

Al... IBDB.COM (the Internet Broadway DataBase) shows the Lunt-Fontanne as being dark for two periods in 1976 - from the December 8th 1975, until April 25th of '76 and then again from June 6th until December 8th of '76. I would think that the theatre would have been busy during at least some of this down time prepping for the next legitimate show to open and I wouldn't think that there'd have been a whole lot of time for a name change and film bookings. Surely by April 2, the show that opened on April 25th (a play called REX) would have been in rehearsals or in previews.

Here is a November 1953 ad from the NYT:
http://tinyurl.com/26m6hq

I believe it was David Merrick who called this theater a bowling alley.

Here is the website for this theater.

And according to their website, "The Lunt-Fontanne has 1,505 seats".

A very unpleasant auditorium to sit in for a show!

Here is the text of the Times article about the old Globe facade and entrance: (sorry I couldn't edit out the photo captions)


An Old Player for the Stage, Soon to Be Heard No More


By DAVID W. DUNLAP
Published: April 5, 2006

Every so often, Times Square, that most public of places, will give up a secret it has harbored for decades.
Skip to next paragraph
Keith Bedford for The New York Times

A piece of the Globe Theater on Broadway near 46th Street is visible above the present scaffolding.
Enlarge This Image
R. M. De Leeuw

The white facade of the theater entrance as it appeared in 1910, when it opened.

Now on view near the corner of 46th Street — but not for much longer — is a fragment of the Broadway facade of the 96-year-old Globe Theater, which was hidden for a half-century behind jumbo signs far taller than its four stories.

Demolition is under way on the Globe and an adjoining 111-year-old building, 1551 Broadway, the home until recently of a Howard Johnson's restaurant and the Gaiety Male Burlesk theater. They are to be replaced by a two-story store that will have large signs and lights on top. "We look at it as a premier retail opportunity," said Gerard T. Nocera, the chief operating officer of S. L. Green Realty Corporation.

The theatrical producer Charles B. Dillingham built the Globe in 1910 as an L-shaped structure with entrances both on Broadway and 46th Street. (The auditorium still exists, as does the 46th Street facade, which is a landmark.)

Today, a half-dozen windows and the trace of a cornice are all that remain of the Globe on Broadway. The pediments, garlands, cherubim, comic masks and tragic masks designed by Carrère & Hastings are nowhere to be seen. Yet this is unmistakably the "modest, jewellike front" described in 1910 by The New York Times.

It was at the Globe in 1916 that a young British-born actress named Lynn Fontanne made one of her first American appearances in "The Harp of Life," giving a performance that The Times called "notably direct, eloquent and moving." It was at the Globe that Fanny Brice sang "Second Hand Rose" in the Ziegfeld Follies of 1921.

And it was at the Globe in 1953, during its cinema phase, that New Yorkers first peered through polarized glasses at a full program of stereoscopic films. Bosley Crowther of The Times was underwhelmed and leery of the 3-D craze, asking readers to imagine Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis appearing to be "so real and close they could reach out and almost touch you!

"One-dimension is quite enough for them!"

The Broadway entrance was severed from the rest of the auditorium four years later when it was reclaimed as a legitimate playhouse. Miss Fontanne returned for the reopening in 1958, appearing with her husband Alfred Lunt in "The Visit." The theater was renamed the Lunt-Fontanne and the Globe disappeared for the first time. But not the last.

This is a May 2008 photo of the Lunt-Fontanne.

Due to excavation work on the NW corner of 46th Street and Broadway, the east wall of the building is currently exposed to view. Markings suggest that fire exits were longago removed from that wall:
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/globeside1.jpg
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/globeside2.jpg

The Globe was showing movies between shows at least as early as 1915 when it premiered 'The Whirl of Life".

a night time shot of the Howard Johnson's and Gaiety Burlesque buildings on 46th st shortly before demolition
http://www.flickr.com/photos/woody1969/73329909/sizes/o/

1971 LIFE image -
http://images.google.com/hosted/life/l?imgurl=e873ca544dfa9b87&q=new%20york%20motion%20picutre%20source:life&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dnew%2Byork%2Bmotion%2Bpicutre%2Bsource:life%26ndsp%3D18%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26start%3D162

That isn't a photo of this theater, Cosmic Ray. It looks like the New York Theater.

I just found a blurb in an old copy of MARQUEE (Volume 18, 1986) that mentions the Robert F. Kennedy Children's theatre which was showing films in 1976. It states that the RFK was actually the Walter Kerr/Ritz at 219 West 46th Street and not this location.

This site claims that the Ritz was also a porn theater in the 1960s and this site confirms what you posted, "From the late '30s and on into the '70s, the theater went through an identity crisis, being used alternately as a radio and TV studio, a performance space, and, at one point, a movie house named the Robert F. Kennedy Children's Theatre".

Porn and kids movies. Odd combination but that should qualify the Ritz/Kerr theater to be listed on CT.

Cool find, LM. It appears these facts were always there if you know where to look.

It's been submitted Al. Let's see what happens.

Porno at the Globe all right then.

Although the intro correctly states that the Globe became a full-time cinema in 1935, from 1927 to 1935 it spent more time each year as a motion picture theatre than as a live venue.

This was never a "porno" theatre. The writer of the 11/4/09 item obviously confused it with the New York Theatre, which was re-named Globe after the original Globe had been transformed into the Lunt-Fontanne. Here's the listing for that other theatre:
http://cinematreasures.org/theater/6604/