Odeon Carlton

I think the Odeon Carlton seating of 3200 is a little generous. It was more like 2550.
I remember going to see the latest James Bond movie that always opened at the Carlton around Christmas. What a delight it was to be there. Colin Corbett provided an organ concert before the movie. The packed house cheered and clapped when the organ rose and then went back down after the performance.
The Odeon Carlton was very much like some of the larger British Odeons. The showmanship was quite good considering the union rules at the time which required a member of the stagehands union to open and close the immense curtain. The projectionist used a buzzer to let the stagehand know when to operate the curtains!

I loved the Odeon Carlton. Even in the late 60's you felt you were getting a good show in a theatre that was still quite modern.
Unfortunately the Carlton was sitting on prime property, just down the street from Maple Leaf Gardens. The land was worth many times more than the theatre. When the inevitable came I watched sadly as the wreckers ball destroyed of one of the finest movie theatres we ever had in Canada.

The auditorium held 2,300 seats (per Palaces of the Night by John Lindsay). In the auditorium, hundreds of hidden lights contantly changed colors on the smooth plastered walls. The patented lighting panel known as the 'Thyratron' ran the light show. The enormous 2 1/2 ton sculptered curtain rose slowly with each swag controlled by a separate motor.
Although Canada's most spectacular post WWII movie theatre, only a few people came to the last screening in 1974. The organist, Colin Corbett played an emotional farewell. The theatre was so well constructed that it bankrupt the wrecking company that brought it down. It was similar in design to London's Leicester Square Odeon and evoked the design of the Queen Mary and Normandie ocean liners.
There is a fantastic cross-section drawing in Mr. Lindsay's book showing its numerous and large public spaces.
The site is currently occupied but a plain office tower which houses in part, the offices of the Toronto International Film Festival (2 Carlton Street).
The 'new' Carlton Cinemas (20 Carlton Street), just East of the former Odeon site, show a good mix of first run independent and foreign movies. However, these are the shoe-box type of multiplex screening rooms built by Cineplex/Odeon in the 1980's. Projection and sound is average and the decor is awful and outdated. A few of the smaller screens are rear projection. A nearby university uses the theaters for lecture halls during th day. Definitely NOT a Cinema Treasure.

A film at the Odeon Carlton always figured into a visit to Toronto and Colin Corbett's playing into the James Bond themes was a treat. After listening to the Hilgreen-Lane pipe organ I would head down the street to the Royal York Hotel and try to coax theatre-organ sounds out of the 5-manual, 105-rank Casavant pipe organ in the Concert Hall. Sadly both of those organs are gone from Toronto now and the fools of Toronto are spending millions of dollars to build an opera house when they could have had the magnificent Odeon Carlton for a mere dollar!

I recently found a 1968 newspaper interview with Victor Nowe, the manager of the Odeon Carlton for 15 years at that time.
Nowe said the Carlton box office would net one million dollars that fiscal year......more than any other movie theatre in Canada.
He said the Carlton took in $79,000 in one week when "Thunderball" played there. That was also a record at the time for a single film in any Canadian movie theatre. The record before that of just over $59,000 was also set at the Carlton for "Goldfinger".
Nowe also mentioned that the restaurant in the theatre was closed in 1964 because Ontario's archaic liquor laws back then prohibited theatres from having a liquor licence. He wanted to run a "class" restaurant and said that could not be done without a liquor licence.
I also found a clipping in a 1976 Theatre Organ magazine about the Odeon Carlton's organ. The original plans were to buy and re-build a Wurlitzer from the Metropolitan Theatre in Boston but the article says internal politics and Odeon's supply house made it impossible to do anything other than buy a new instrument. Bids were received from several companies and eventually Hillgreen-Lane won the contract. Stewart Duncan, the writer of the article, says the Carlton had four organists from its opening in 1948 to when it was closed: Al Bollington, Bobby Jones, Dorothy Bromby and Colin Corbett.

Here is a link to some photos of the Odeon Carlton:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/theatrebuff

Photo sources: Province of Ontario Archives and the Globe and Mail newspaper.

Here is a 1948 interior view.

Here is a rare view of the auditorium from the stage:

http://s19.photobucket.com/albums/b189/mrchronoman/Odeon%20Carlton/?action=view¤t=OdeonCarltonauditoriumfromstage3.jpg

Have a look at a quick writeup about the Odeon Carlton over at 32 Elvis Movies.

Here is an image from 1972

http://i41.tinypic.com/v7d2tw.jpg

The Odeon-Toronto was featured in an illustrated article in the April 2, 1949, issue of Boxoffice Magazine. This Odeon, like many others of the period, was designed by architect Jay I. English, who died before its completion.

The Odeon opened September 9, 1948. The first film shown was "Oliver Twist." Boxoffice, in its issue of September 11, 1948, gave the seating capacity as 2,400, but the 1949 article said the auditorium seated 2,231.

I recently found a postcard of the Odeon Theatre. You can view it at http://www.flickr.com/photos/asylumbythelake/3796492292/ The postcard indicates that the address was 20 Carlton Street.