Little Carnegie Playhouse

Sorry, the Carnegie Hall Cinema, with which the Little Carnegie is not to be confused, was around the corner on 7TH AVENUE.

The theatre was located at 146 West 57th Street, and originally had 460 seats. It first opened in the 1930s, and until the end of WWII specialized in revivals of the better American and foreign movies. If I recall correctly, it was first known as just the Little Carnegie, and then the Little Carnegie Playhouse. I don't remember Cinema ever being part of the name, but maybe it was. In the 1970s (or maybe 80s), the theatre closed temporarily for a complete modernization, with the seating capacity raised to about 750.

Yes, you may be right. I have in front of me the program notes the theatre gave out when I went there to see Antonioni's ECLIPSE in December, 1962. It states simply "Little Carnegie" on the front, as do most of the ads I have. The now very amusing first paragraph of the notes begins, "Man's inability to cummunicate and his sense of alienation continues to concern Antonioni..." That theme rather defined much art house fare of the period, and it was perfectly complemented by the then-free espresso so many of those places offered patrons to help them survive their angst.

Remember seeing Antonioni's The Passenger there in 1975...In its waning days of the 70s Walter Reade would day date this theatre a lot with the Coronet or Baronet on the East Side

I may be confused with another theatre that Walter Reade owned that was sold to Cineplex Odeon which in turn renamed it Biograph Cinema. is this the same theatre, because that theatre if it's the same one it became an art house when Cineplex operated it and renovated it only to close it down only a few years later. I saw a couple of private screenings there. This theatre was gutted and reopened as an Associated Mortan Willams supermarket with absoulutley no trace of movie theatre inside.

No, Savage, the Biograph was further west from the Little Carnegie, on 57th near Broadway and right near Hard Rock Cafe'. I believe it started out as the Lincoln Art in the 1960s, and I remember seeing a good number of movies there in my visits to New York, including Fellini's THE CLOWNS. For a long stretch it was the Bombay Cinema, showing films from India. The Little Carnegie was a block east, a couple of doors down from Carnegie Hall.

The Biograph ended its life as The Angelika West playing one of the films day and date with The Angelika in the village. Hd it done better they had plans to multi-plex it.

I don't recall the original Lincoln Art as the Angelika West, but perhaps it was at one time. I lived in the same block at 205 West 57th Street, and remember a time when the theatre turned to showing male porno. The management of our apartment building complained that it was ruining the reputation of the neighborhood, and the theatre was soon shut down.

When the people who ran the Angelika Film Center at the time purchased the lease for the former Biograph Cinema (which I believe was previously known as the New Carnegie), the moniker they gave it was Angelika 57, not Angelika West. (The last feature to screen at the Angelika 57, BTW, was Jean-Luc Godard's 'Good Bye Mozart'.)

Since there is so much discussion here of the Lincoln Art/Angelika 57/Bombay/Biograph, I'm adding that theatre as a new posting under "Angelika 57".

According to a review of "Ten Days that Shook the World" in the New York Times, the theatre opened on November 2,1928 with that silent Russian film by Sergei Eisenstein. The review by Mordaunt Hall bears the heading "New Little Cinema Opens" and mentions that part of the theatre was once Roger Wolfe Kahn's Le Perroquet Club de Paris, with an entrance on 56th Street. The space was expanded to create the cinema and the entrance was transferred to 57th Street, just a few yards from Carnegie Hall.

Gerald, you saw Eclipse there as I did (I also saw La Notte there)but you don't have it on your list of favorites???) I think it is my favorite of all time. This was a very nice theatre with a nice peacful atmosphere, and usually had nice still shot displays outside.

Barton, I placed "Eclipse" on my list recently. I keep adding. I love the movie a great deal and showed it when I used to run the Italian Film Society of RI from 1981 to 1996. I still have the little four-page program booklet the Little Carnegie distributed at that film. Martin Scorsese includes a nice tribute to "Eclipse" in his "My Voyage to Italy," now available on DVD. Another thing I liked about the Little Carnegie, besides what you mention, was the very plush and spacious lobby/waiting area. It began to the rear of the auditorium and then went left along the side.

I moved to NYC in March 1982. I don't remember this cinema. When did it close?

In 1939 when the Wizard of Oz left the Capitol it moved here.

I doubt that "The Wizard of Oz" ever moved directly from the Capitol to the Little Carnegie. It probably opened at the Little Carnegie after "Oz" had moved from the Capitol onto the Loew's circuit and finished its run there. In those days, the Little Carnegie was similar to the Plaza, Sutton, and other subsequent-run theatres, although the Little Carnegine sometimes showed first-run art films. Often, films from the Capitol had a move-over to Loew's State after going onto the Loew's circuit, but I don't know if that happened with "Oz." But I would be willing to bet big bucks that it didn't move directly from the Capitol to the Little Carnegie.

I just looked at a program booklet in my files (actually a collection of beautifully printed individual booklets) of the "Salute to Italian Films Week" at the Little Carnegie October 6-12, 1952. This was a series of seven films shown before their regular releases.

The booklet stated it was an I.F.E. (Italian Film Export) Unitalia event. Bosley Crowther of the Times provided a long essay extolling "the great renascence of cinema art and expression in Italy." On the lengthy list of sponsorship credits were included names like Ralph Bellamy (Pres. Actors Equity), Rudolph Bing (Director Metropolitan Opera), Moss Hart (Pres. Dramatists Guild), Helen Hayes (Pres. American Theatre Wing), Ronald Reagan (Pres. Screen Actors Guild) et. al.

The seven films programmed (I cannot speak to any eventual changes) were: The Overcoat, Times Gone By, Umberto D, Anna, The Little World of Don Camillo, Europe '51, Two Cents Worth of Hope. All received later distribution, several under I.F.E.'s distribution wing. De Sica's Umberto D did not get a regular release until three years late in 1955. Rossellini's Europe '51 was retitled "The Greatest Love."

That's a wonderful program! "Anna" received a big distribution in (was it?) '54 when it had been dubbed and circulated across the RKO nabes circuit. I remember seeing it at the RKO Dyker, against my parents' wishes ("All those Italian films are immoral"--that about the land of the popes). I told them I was going to the Alpine to see "I Love Melvin," or something like it, but went to the steamy Dyker instead. Hot stuff. A clip from it surfaced in "Cinema Paradiso" decades later, suggesting that it was a big hit in the papal territories as well. By the time "Umberto D" came to Brooklyn (to the venerable Astor on Flatbush Avenue), I was in h.s. and a regular patron of that theater.

Anna starred the luscious Silvana Màngano of Bitter Rice fame, and the two films later played together in some engagements. Here she was a woman with a tainted past who decides to become a nun...for a time. There is a famous song/dance scene in the movie when Mangano sings the catchy "El negro Zumbon," a bajon sung in Spanish. It became a popular song hit on records even in America. The movie played many drive-ins. I don't think a subtitled version played widely, if at all, though I have one on video.

Circa 1952-53, architect John J. McNamara did a total gut renovation of the Little Carnegie, which included the take-over of an adjoining building for a spacious lounge area that ran parallel to the auditorium. The 560 extra-wide seats (22" and 23") were installed in a staggered arrangement to insure best possible visibility of the screen:
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Warren--

I'd forgotten about those Baro-coco feathers at the sides of the proscenium! The old Globe (now Lunt-Fontanne) had similar decoration that survived that theater's transition from movie to legit in '58.

And, yes, "Rashomon played there when it opened in '50 (though I was too young to see it at the time: I recall, however, that a dubbed version of the latter went on to travel through the RKO nabe circuit). Among films I recall seeing at the Little C were "Tunes of Glory" and "Frantic," the latter Louis Malle's first feature, with a very young Jeanne Moreau and a suspenseful scene with her stuck in a tiny French elevator.

By the way, the correct name of this theater is "Little Carnegie Theater," not at all to be confused with "Carnegie Hall Playhouse" around the corner. Warren and Gerald: You both make different points in your posts of 18 March 2004. Hagstrom's Atlas of 1961 identifies those theaters (at least at that time) by the titles I have given. "Cinema" might have been attached to one or the other at some later period. But "Playhouse" was definitely the handle of the theater on Seventh Ave. in the early '60s.

Bill, Frantic (Ascenseur pour l'échafaud) is now right now in re-issue with its original title, in translation, Elevator to the Gallows.

Gerald--

Thanks for the info: ars longa, vita brevis, so I'll probably not get to view this film again.

Corrections to my post above: I just consulted the NY Times of 12 June '61 with its review of "Frantic." The film pre-dated Malle's "Lovers," but the latter raeched NY first. According to the plot summary, the person stuck in the elevator was not Moreau, but her lover who had just murdered her husband; while he was stuck there, a couple of kids stole his car and then murdered someone else, thereby making him the prime suspect in that crime. Gee, but those New Wavers loved Hitchcock!

About the Playhouse/Cinema handle: Though Hagstrom's Atlas names the theater on Seventh Avenue "Carnegie Hall Playhouse," the NY Times on the above date advertises "White Nights" playing there at the "Carnegie Hall Cinema." So, Gerald, at least for the time-frame recounted here, you are right. I don't know when "Playhouse" got attached to either that theater or to the Little Carnegie on E 57 Street.

The Carnegie Hall Cinema on 57th Street was called that from its inception with the 1961 opening program of White Nights, and as far as I can determine, was called only that in its entire life as a movie theatre.

Excuse me, that's the Carnegie Hall Cinema on 7th Avenue AT 57th Street.

Does anyone have a memory or a record of Chaplin's The Great Dictator playing at the Little Carnegie (perhaps as part of a special Chaplin program) in the mid- to late-1970s? Just curious...thanks!

Paul, that Chaplin re-issue series played at the Plaza, not the Little Carnegie. I remember seeing a number of them there, including City Lights at a late show. And I believe it was in the 1960s.

Here is a 1938 ad for "Peg of Old Drury"
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Two early views as late-run "nabe";
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1942 sizzler: www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/littlec.jpg

Woody's most cerebral comedy went wide along UA's "Red Carpet" on 12/12/80 while continuing at the Little Carnegie and other select theaters:

Stardust Memories

I saw this one at the Century's Meadows Twin and I can recall a sequence wherein Woody's character (a famous director being fetted to a weekend retrospective of his work - particularly the "earlier funny ones") is shot by a fan with a gun ... and there was an audible gasp from the audience as John Lennon had only been gunned down by a crazed fan days before.

Reminds me of a time I saw "How I Won the War" - featuring Lennon in a supporting role - at the Hollywood Twin on 8th Avenue in the very early '80's. There's a scene in that film where he is felled by schrapnel and the audience reaction revealed how fresh and raw the psychic wounds of his death still were at the time.

The "Stardust Memories" ad mentions a sneak preview at 8:20pm that Friday night. Here is the ad for the movie being previewed:

Night Moves Sneak

Back when your admission covered the preview film as well as the regular feature booked at the theater!

I mistakenly labeled the ad "Night Moves", when the name of the film was obviously "Inside Moves". That film, by the way, would replace "Stardust Memories" at the Little Carnegie the following week where it day-and-dated here and at the 34th Street East as well as at the Baronet starting 12/19/80.

The day-and-date policy between the 34th Street East and Little Carnegie was alive and well in March of 1982 when Burt Lancaster watched Susan Sarandon bathe her breasts with lemons in this melancholy Louis Malle film:

Daily News 3/6/82

Wasn't the Little Carnegie theater with an entrance on 56th street also...where "And God Created Woman" debuted with Bridget Bardot in the late 50's?
Ritch

Why would watching Susan Sarandon bathe her breasts with lemons be melancholy? I think it would be kind of sensational and inspiring.

Ritch, And God Created Woman played at the Paris on 58th Street for over a year, not at the Little Carnegie. The review of the film the day after it opened at the Paris appeared in the New York Times on October 22, 1957. Reviewer Bosley Crowther mentions the Paris by name. You can Google that review as I just did.

Vincent... those two scenes were certainly sensational and inspiring! But I wouldn't apply those adjectives in a blanket description of the film as a whole!

57th Street has some wonderful theaters. Now execept for the Director Guild theater there is nothing. Same for Third Ave. The lone survivor being the Cinema 1, 2& 3. At the Little Carnegie I remember seeing among others Taxi Diver, Juliet of The Spirits, Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex..., The Garden of the Finzi Cantinis and Stardust Memories.

The Garden of the Finzi-Continis opened at the Plaza, where I saw it in December of 1971. Might it have moved over to the LC?

Gerald - I may be wrong about seeing at the LC. Can anyone confirm if it ever played here? If not, then it was the Plaza.

John: Well, I know it played the Plaza. I have the New York Times review. And Juliet of the Spirits opened in three theatres: (New) Embassy, RKO 23rd St. Cinema, and RKO 58th St., not the Little Carnegie. Though, again, it may have moved over there.

Gerald - I probably did not see "Juilet" until sometime in 1966. I started coming into "The City" to see films sometime in '65 or '66. I was living in Brooklyn at the time and started coming to Manhattan to see films that rarely would make it to the outer bouroughs.
It probably was a move over as you suggest. I'll have to get down to the library one day and search.

Found an article on the NY Times' online archive, dated June 12, 1941, about the planned conversion of the Little Carnegie Playhouse into "an intimage-type newsreel and television house." The article mentions that the theater had just ended its "thirteenth season as an art cinema specializing in foreign films when it closed on June 1" and that it had been leased by Carnegie Hall, Inc. for a period of ten years to Jack Davis. Davis is described as "the managing director of the British newsreel theatre chain known as the Monseigners, operators of twelve houses in London and Scotland." The renovation plans were being drawn up by the esteemed Thomas Lamb and plans were to have it open around Labor Day.

Davis revealed plans to not only provide American newsreels but hoped to negotiate an arrangement with the British Minister of Information to import English newsreels. With WWII raging across Europe by this time (and with the U.S. not yet an active participant), Davis was quick to add that a "conscientious effort would be made to avoid propaganda films." Tickets would sell for 25 cents.

I wonder if those plans ever came to fruition, if even for just a short period of time. I see Warren had posted a 1942 ad back on March 29th, but the image is no longer available.

NY Times Nov 3, 1928
By MORDAUNT HALL

THE SCREEN; New Little Cinema Opens.

"The Little Carnegie Playhouse, the newest, cinema in the Broadway realm, situated a few yards from Carnegie Hall, opened its doors last night to a fashionable audience. Part of this theatre was at one time Roger Wolfe Kahn's Le Perroquet Club de Paris. It has since been enlarged, and the entrance instead of being on Fifty-sixth Street is now on Fiftyseventh".

"Salute to Italian Films Week," October 1952.
PRINTED PROGRAM FLYER

The Italian film of Rossini's comic opera Cenerentola (Cinderella) played here in 1953.

I think that for most of its lifetime, this was called Little Carnegie or Little Carnegie Theatre, and not Little Carnegie Playhouse. When it first opened, it was known as Little Carnegie Playhouse, but "Playhouse" eventually fell by the wayside.

Was this a WALTER READE THEATER?

THIS CLOSED MID TO LATE 80s..........

Over the years, the Little Carnegie had numerous managements, including Walter Reade towards the end of its lifetime.

The program booklet for the American premiere of Antonioni's Eclipse in December 1962 at the Little Carnegie.

Here are new direct links to images of a gut renovation circa 1952-53. Please see my post above of 9/4/05 at 5:27am for more details:
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http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/137-3752_IMG.jpg

Great illustrations, Warren. Just to see the interior brings back vivid memories. On a 1973 visit to Little Carnegie, I caught a small film called "I Love You, Rosa" at a crowded weekend performance and sitting close to the right front exit gawking at wall ornament looming over the exit. At the time I saw "Faces" there, I remember reading a John Cassavetes interview in which he said he wanted to book his pride and joy there because he had worked in Little Carnegie many years earlier. - Ed Blank

This is from Boxoffice magazine in May 1943:

NEW YORK-Martin J. Lewis and Erwin Lesser, operators of a chain of art houses here, and Goldberg Brothers, operators of the Studio Theater, Philadelphia, have jointly purchased the Little Carnegie Theater, West 57th St., from Jack Davis, former British theater operator. The new management will take possession at once and will operate it as a first-run art theater.

Robert C. Spodick has resigned as manager of the Ascot, first-run foreign film house in the Bronx, to become manager of the Little Carnegie. Spodick has been manager of the Yorktown and publicity man and assistant at various Loew houses.

I found this website after doing a search for information about the little Carnegie and the Thalia. I lived in New York for a year in 1980 and attended the Little Carnegie only once, to see the Woody Allen film Manhattan. What a wonderful experience, to see that film on the big screen with a New York audience. At the end the film got a standing ovation from the audience. This Seattle boy was impressed.

Henry Smith

Saw Louis Malle's "Murmurs of the Heart" there. Enjoyed the movie, but hated having to leave the plush and comfortable lounge area.

Renewing link.

"I am a Camera" was playing at the Little Carnegie in October 1955. Click on the ad for an expanded view.
http://tinyurl.com/m8paqx

A photo of the auditorium of the Little Carnegie as remodeled by John McNamara was featured on the cover of Boxoffice, October 4, 1952. Two giant salamanders, cleverly disguising themselves as Art Moderne ornamentation, waited on either side of the screen to pounce upon and devour arriving audience members.

The Little Carnegie closed in April 1982 after an extended run-in with Susan Sarandon's aforementioned lemony breasts.

"Atlantic City" was not a bad way out for this classy venue.