Century's Floral Theatre

If we're talking about the Floral Terrace catering hall on Jericho Turnpike in Floral Park, this was once the Floral Theater. It must have been a beauty. The outside of the building is instantly recognizable as an old movie-theater. Most of the original architectural elements appear lost in the conversion with the spectacular exception of the upper reaches of the auditorium's magnificent arched ceiling, which you can practically reach up and touch if you attend a function in the upper ballroom. The top of the proscenium arch is clearly identifiable and a serving bar is cleverly ensconced in an alcove formed by the crowning arch of what might have been a side-box? This theater must easily go back to the 1920's.

The Floral Theatre's address is 250 Jericho Turnpike and it seated 1654 people.

This was a very nice theatre but was not overly ornate. When Century first closed it they had announced quading it, but it never happened. The last thing I saw here was Eddie & The Cruisers.

The Floral must surely date from the Vaudeville days of the 20's. I remember this detail: On each side of the procenium columns about 4 or 5 feet above the stage were mounted large gold frames that were once used to hold the placards that announced the name of the currently performing live act. I don't know why but those frames along with the inverted leaded glass ceiling domes that were always softly glowing in the dark auditorium are permanent fixtures in my minds eye. Certainly the Floral was western Nassau County's grandest showplace.

longislandmovies, how did this theatre do box office wise? I know when I was going there in the 80's it was never that crowded.

In "the old days," the Floral was a loser, patronized only by locals because it had the same bookings as other theatres in surrounding Queens and Nassau County. Floral Park was then mostly a residential area of one family homes. It might still be for all I know. My only visit to the Floral was in the early 1950s. I don't recall the program, but there were only about six people there during an evening performance.

They did talk about iy being a quad but nothing ever came of it . As a single box office # were weak

There used to be a listing for Century's Bellrose but I cant find it?

Robert.....I think that this is the theater your looking for.

http://cinematreasures.org/theater/4019/

THANKS, I was spelling it wrong.

Having worked as a usher at the Floral from 1953 to 1955, I strongly disagree with the "loser" comment. The theater did well and made money! Yes, it shared simultaneous billings with Century's Queens (Queens Village) and Meadows (Fresh Meadows) theaters, but always had good crowds on Friday through Sunday evenings. And for an especially good film, SRO was the norm. Frankly, I never saw as few as six patrons in the theater, even on a weekday afternoon.

The only time we went to the Floral was to see a re-release of Mary Poppins. I was put in charge of my brother. I vividly remember a long wait for Mom to pick us up. It was raining, but luckily, it had a very big marquee.

I have very fond memories of this theatre. It was not overly ornate but was just a real nice theatre.

Every Christmas eve morning they had a free show with cartoons and a movie. After the show, they would call ticket numbers and give out prizes on stage.

The Ridgwood did this also, always sponsored by the Ridgewood Savings Bank. I remeber seeing "Santa Clause Conquers The Martians" and then Santa appeared on stage.

Thats right. Santa appeared at the floral too. Man, he is everywhere.

I lived in Bellerose from 1945 to 1953. Saturday afternoon at the Floral was the place to be for us kids. There was a children's section for the Saturday matinee and it was always full. The fun thing to do was try to sneak into the balcony which was off limits to us brats. There was a horrible woman who was in charge of the children's section and it was the mark of a hero to be caught misbehaving and be thrown out by her.

Did anyone ever encounter a matron that was not a miserable shrew?

Growing up in the late 70's until it closed in the early 80's, the balcony was closed most of the time. We always used to try to sneak up there.

Zjoe/RobertR,

Having worked in the Floral ('53-'55) and the Queens ('55-'58), I can assure you that the attitude of the Matrons off-duty was equal to that on-duty! I suspect that the more sour they were, the more likely they would be hired!

RCDTJ,

Your comment about the closed balcony is interesting. Was the Loge also closed?

Greg,
If you mean the upper lobby area, as I always called it, then no. That was open. When you went up there into the upper lobby, there were chains on the stairs leading up to the balcony.

I think the restrooms were on that level. I don't remember if the ground floor had any at all?

The restrooms were up there. I think I remember them being downstairs to the right when you walked in also.

Guys,

The ground (main) floor is called the orchestra. The "upper lobby area" is called the mezzanine. After you go through the passageways from the mezzanine, you went DOWN into the loge, or UP into the balcony.

The loge in the Floral only had about three rows of seats; but they were the best seats in the house, especially with the advent of CinemaScope. You would view the screen looking straight ahead - neither up (from the orchestra) nor down; and - unlike the first few balcony rows - you had no one walking in front of you! So you really felt you were part of the action on the screen.

As I recall, loge seats cost about a quarter more; and could be purchased at the boxoffice, or from an usher(ette) assigned to loge/balcony duty. Needless to say, part of our job as ushers was to make sure that all loge patrons were properly ticketed.

Anyway, if the passageways were chained, then the Loge had to be closed.

As for the restrooms, in the Floral and Queens, they were located only on the mezzanines. RCDTJ, you had your own potty in the projection booth (chuckle).

Greg,
When you say "go through the passageway from the mezzanine", as I remember, the passageway was about 6 or 7 steps up. When you got to the top, you had your choice to go up to the balcony seats or down a couple steps to the loge seats. Does that sound about right? Also, the Floral closed when I was 12. I didnt become a projectionist until about 6 years later. But you are right. We do have our own private little potty.

RCDTJ,

Sorry I didn't get back to you sooner. I've been in NJ for the last 36 hours, for a wake and funeral.

You are correct on both the steps in the Floral passageways, and the loge location.

In the Queens, the passageways were lengthier, and had fewer steps.

The Floral was the most beatuful theatre I've ever been in (besides
Radio City). Does anyone remember the luncheonette on the corner that was part of the building?
Growing up in Floral Park in the '60s was a blessing...

I remember the luncheonette quite well. After having seen a typical double-bill once or twice, taking my "breaks" (as an usher) inside the theater became rather boring. Consequently, I was in the luncheonette quite often.

Also, I was dating the sister of a fellow usher at the time ('53-'55), and often met her in the luncheonette.

Hands down, in Nassau, the Floral was one of the most beautful theaters in the county. How is was not landmarked it was a mystey to me. Supposedly, it was one of Long Island premiere movies houses, and when I say premiere, I mean, cast members, while promoting the movie in New York would come to the Floral because of the beauty and the way the theater was set up. When it closed I remember an article in Newsday, that I think are the Long Island opening of Mildred Pierce, Joan Crawford, came out on the stage when either before it started or ended. The unfortunate thing now, is that people in this area are stuck either going to the Clearview Theaters like the Herricks and Franklin Square which are pretty good, but nothing like the Floral. The Floral showed all the great movies, I remember, my 11th birthday, my parents took 10 friends of mine and me to see Return of The Jedi, which is the last movie I remember seeing there in 1983. And then it close for quading that never happened. This theater was so beautiful, that even quading it would have been a shame. It did look like it are one time was Nassau Counties, Radio City Music Hall. I do remember the balcony always being closed, except of course for movies like Jedi, when they needed the space. But they even had boxes if I remember correctly on the side like Radio City and other fancy theaters. They were never opened, but that is the kind of theater we are talking about.

The area around the Floral as I said has only three options the Herricks and the Franklin Six which both were single theaters divided so much, that on a busy first weekend Friday and Satuday night you are better going to the raceway because you will never get a ticket. But quading the Floral, really would have been the only way for it to survive, because this theater was huge, and even Jedi, once the balcony opened, was still not sold out. Imagine today, the new Star Wars plays on the six screens, the Floral could hold that capacity in its one theater.

In my opinion what killed the Floral and not quading, was parking, parking, parking. The Floral was built at a time when the movie theater was like the communnity entertainment center in the days before tv, but by the mid 1980's, Everyone drove there. Well you can imagine a theater with 1654 seats, even quaded, where do you park the car? It still was a busy merchant street, and there was one municipal lot that with a generous estimate, 50 cars! How can you have a theater that big and so few parking spaces. I remember, the streets around it had one hour parking, so side street parking was out of the question. I hope the owners attempted to have a garge built somewhere turn the small parking lot into multi level lot. I am sure, someone with a theater like that would have done anything to keep it open if they were going to quad it. But parking is what killed the beauty, just like when live in Los Angeles, they would knocked down old homes that were almost historic, and buidlings from the old hollywood of the 30's and 40's to make parking. That area just had no room for parking except that small lot. And the community was not helping but now allowing sreet parking. So that is how a beauty like the Floral died and Franklin Sq and Herricks are the only game in town beside the mall area. Parking. The Herricks has its own parking lot. And across Hempstead Tpk, the Franklin Sq theaters as two huge public town lots used on Sunday mornings for the hundreds of parishoners of St Catherines around the corner and during the week and rest of the weekend, the movie theater as free parking for any one, in the village park lot with no meters. So even when the FS theater is sold out as it frequently is with small theaters, the lots are never filled to capacity.

Again, though I spent much of teens at the Herrick and the Franklin to see movies, it is just heartbreaking to see a theater like the Floral be destroyed by PARKING! To me, that is a sin, and the community should have done something save the building including landmarking it. But now it is gone, and will never return. Another case where "they took an idol and smashed it!"

Ditto for Calderone's Mineola Theatre. The destruction of this gem, too, was a crime.

While I do agree that parking was a major issue with the Floral, which is by the way my favorite theater of all time, the major problem was that is was a single screen. You can not make it today with a single screen theater. It costs too much money to keep it going. I do agree that quading it would have kept it going (if you had the parking). The problem with quading it is that they would have destroyed the theater. As a service tech for many theater, I have seen the old singles that have been cut up. It's digusting what they cover up or cut apart to multiplex these places. I went to the Kenmore once in Brooklyn on a call and when they split the downstairs theater into two, they just built new side walls in front of the old walls. There was about a one foot space in between the old and new wall. You could look behind it an still see the old fabric on the walls. Thank god the Floral closed before they butchered it.

Ligg,

Parking, or rather the LACK OF PARKING, was the smallest part of the problem. The major killer of all of these small town theaters was television! (Traditional) movie theater revenue started to decline in the early 50s, as more and more families started purchasing TV sets. You are too young to remember life without television, and thus never experienced the transition.

These theaters were designed as neighborhood theaters. In their heyday, most patrons WALKED to them!

BTW, when I worked there, the balcony was NEVER closed, since smoking was permitted only in the balcony and Loge. And the "boxes" you speak of were part of the Loge area - i.e., all of the area to the screen-side of the transverse aisle. While the boxes afforded some additional feeling of privacy, they had a lousy viewing angle, especially after the CinemaScope screen was installed.

Thanks for all you responses, but honestly, I have seen theaters like this that were quaded and yes they mixed mordern walls the beauty, but that is more done to keep the original beauty intct. RCDTJ, said he thanks god it closed before they could butched it. I disagree. I would rather have a quad theater with artifacts of the past, that if the day should come to open as a vaudvile theater or such, the walls can be taken down. Working in film, tv and stage, I even seen theaters that movie theaters with a wall down the middle and when a stage show was done, the wall actually folded up.

Yes parking was a problem with all of these, but I'd rather of my old Floral in some form, with its beauty on one wall that I sit in rather than no Floral at all. Ditto for the Calderone.

If you disagree, I just want to remind you of the Landmark Sunshine Theater on Houston Street. When I lived downtown around there at NYU, when the East Village was becoming trendy but the lower eastside still was scary after dark, I remember in the day going to Schimmels and remember the warehouse next store. Who knew when the things are wiped away and restored, that old warehouse was the old yiddish playhouse! Just because they would use modern walls the quad it, the Sunshine goes to show you, sometimes not destroying and waiting for a "theaters" time again to rise, restoring the Floral is better than the present day office building and catering hall.

I miss the Floral and would have taken a quaded one anyday over closing forever and more or less butchering the theater when it moves to another use.

As for

Gee.. I remember the balcony being open in the early 80's... in fact I saw Friday the 13th from the second row of it... and Return of the Jedi quite a few times there. One of the biggest problems IMO is that they ran the same movie forever. It worked for Jaws, when people would line up with lawn chairs outside the theatre to wait for the next showing, after a week or two the current feature ran out of steam leaving a mostly-empty theatre.

Drove by a few evenings ago and took these exterior pictures at dusk. Did this theater have fly space? There appears to be a tower above the old stage area (see the last photo) that now has some kind of small observatory-like structure on its roof.

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b110/GuanoReturns/Nassau%20Theaters%202005/IMG_0995.jpg
http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b110/GuanoReturns/Nassau%20Theaters%202005/IMG_0996.jpg
http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b110/GuanoReturns/Nassau%20Theaters%202005/IMG_0999.jpg
http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b110/GuanoReturns/Nassau%20Theaters%202005/IMG_1002.jpg

As I posted way back in February 2003, I attended a party here in the main ballroom which is located on the top level and features the preserved auditorium ceiling - the only remaining interior element of the original theater. If you click this link to the Floral Terrace's website, you'll find a photo album of the Ballroom and can clearly make out the top of the proscenium arch and other ornamental detail. There is also a link to a "Virtual Tour" that would not load when I tried it.

There is also a page on that website that offers a brief and incomplete history of the Floral Theater, conveniently leaving out the part where the smashed 80% of the building's interior to smithereens.

How many floors does this place have? The top floor seems to incorporate the top of the stage and the original auditorium ceiling with dome (though I'm sure the gaudy chandelier is fairly new)...If the history is correct, Ward & Glynne was a predominantly vaudeville circuit that also built the Astoria Theatre in Queens and one in Patchogue whose name escapes me at the moment. W&G apparently sold the Floral to Century, which operated it for most of its cinematic life.

Yes the theater did have fly space. That is what was in the tower you saw. The space is now used for offices. I also went to a party there about 12 years ago. I saw the top of the arch. Another funny thing is that they converted the original 2 carbon arc lamphouses into spot lights which they use now.

Ward & Glynne also operated the Century Theater in Brooklyn on Nostrand Avenue before it went to Loew's and later in 1943 to Century Circuit under the name Linden (being located a block or two north of Linden Blvd.)

Here's a new link where the photos I posted on December 6th are now located. I broke all the old links when I reorganized my photobucket site.

Until I happened on this 1932 ad in the LI Daily Press, I'd never heard of Playco Theatres, and can't find the company listed in Film Daily Year Books. I suspect that Playco was similar to today's Creative Entertainment, providing services for absentee owners:
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/playco32.jpg

A few other side notes on the theatre. When Jericho Tpke was widened the overhanging marquee had to be removed. New "signboards" were affixed to the facade of the theatre. At the same time the, I'll call it top to bottom "floral" sign was also removed. Not to many LI theatres had this feature - the Fantasy, Queens, Valencia, and Triboro come to mind. What is the correct term for this feature?

RVB,

To the best of my knowledge, the upright electrified sign was simply called "the Vertical." See my post of 9/27/06 on the Queens page.

Having worked at both the Floral and the Queens, I never knew them by any other name. Also, they were called as such by our union electricians.

Although some people in their postings have referred to the auditorium as beautiful, the only time I was there as a young child for a mid week matinee I thought it was gray and bleak. I do remember the boxes and also little "windows" on either side of the procenium. I presume that had something to do with vaudeville where they displayed the identity of the act that was on.

Those "windows" at the sides of the stage were called "annunciators," and displayed the names of the vaudeville acts while they were on stage. After the death of vaudeville, some theatres retained the annunciators and used them to display the titles of forthcoming movies or rented them to local merchants for advertising.

The 1927 edition of Film Daily Yearbook lists an 'un-named' theater is planned by the Folpad Reality Co. at Tucson Avenue and Jericho Turnpike. This could be the Floral Theatre? Today, Tucson Avenue does not exist on maps.

Floral Park was unique in that the street names were plants, flowers and the like. The exception was on the north side of Jericho Turnpike. Since the Floral was on the south side of Jericho the adjacent street should have carried a floral related name. Therefore, my presumption is, no, this was not the same theatre.

The only "t" named street that comes to mind is Tulip Avenue which is about a third of a mile west of the Floral site. If you really want to pursue it you could contact Village Hall. They may even have a historical society

It could be Tyson Avenue which is in walking distance of the Floral

Scroll down a little more than halfway on this page for a modern photo and some information about the Floral Theater. The text with the photo claims that the Floral Theater opened on April 18, 1927.

True, I'd forgotten about Tyson, but that's east a few blocks. While on the subject of Century and Floral Park their last corporated headquarters, before they got involved in the Omni, RKO, Stanley Warner mix, was on Verbena Av in Floral Park, just off Tulip Avenue near the Long Island Rail Road.

Previously, they had been in the building which housed the Community Theatre in Queens Village before they gave up that venue and prior to that in the Farragut Theatre Building in Brooklyn.

Atruly lovely theatre, glad I got to see it before they changed it

This was the Floral in 1987.

I worked as a Doorman at the Floral in 1980. It was well-worn, but it had some nice architecture and atmosphere--not quite as grand as the Keith's, but it had some character. My manager at the time was a man named Myron Katz. Does anyone remember him? He was something of a character. I recall he used to make some awkward attempts at conversation while I was working the door. I always wondered what happened to him. I ended up being transferred to the Glen Oaks Theater, which was right around the corner from my apartment. Not as nice a theater, but it beat riding my bike all that distance.:)

Here is another 1987 photo.

This is a March 1974 ad for "Frankenstein 3-D".

Hey, Maxruehl! Myron Katz was my manager at the Bellerose for years, until he moved to the Floral (bit of a story there), and I went with him the year Jaws2 came out. We ran a Jaws2-athon back to back! Mr. Katz was a very kind and shy man, and yes, he did have difficulty with conversation. Maybe you and I know each other? Were you part of the group that stayed up in the theatre that night on the second floor, shut out all the lights, and played Simon? :>

That Frankenstein 3-D ad is from the 1983 reissue.

Hey, Kitnoir.:) I don't think I was one of the ones who played Simon. I was pretty shy and a bit younger than the others there (I was only 16).