Stanley Theatre

Great set of photos
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I have the original opening article and ad for this theatre and it states that there were 3500 seats, unless they padded the facts.
Who knows for sure?

Warner Brothers theatre division, from 1930 to the late 1940’s-early 1950’s, was Stanley Warner (after buying Philadelphia, PA based Stanley Company of America, started by Stanley Mastbaum and Jules E. Mastbaum). It was through the Paramount Decree that Warner Brothers split into two companies: Warner Brothers Inc. and Stanley Warner Corp.

It was in the 1960’s when Pacific Theatres acquired Stanley Warner Corp, and later RKO Theatres to form the RKO Stanley Warner Theatres division (the other two were Pacific Theatres and Pacific East Theatres). Stanley Warner/RKO Stanley Warner was the biggest theatre chain in Philadelphia, PA, before being surpassed by Budco Theatres Corp. and Sameric Theatres Corp.

There is also a high school in Philadelphia, Pa named after The Stanley Company’s co-founder Jules E. Mastbaum, called Mastbaum Technical High School (built near the site of the former Stanley Warner’s Allegheny Theatre)

In 1981, Pacific Theatres sold RKO Stanley Warner to Almi-Century Theatres, forming RKO Century Warner Theatres.

That is a VERY RECENT PHOTO. THANK YOU!!!!

Wait ‘til you see the chandelier inside, and the beautiful new stagehouse and loading dock.

Mr G Waterman, from the posts above, come and take a look!
The loading dock is a thing of beauty.

Ziggy

As part of the restoration of the facade and marquee, the original green paint color of the marquee was restored (similar to the color in the postcard at the top of this page).

In doing the work on the marquee— on the front, the WB circle was also found and put back on the front of the marquee .. the Stanley was a Warner Bros. theatre from about 9/14/08 ‘til it became a Stanley Warner Theatre later on.

Someone posted that link yesterday.

What a very nice website!

A 1986 view of the Stanley Theatre in Utica here and here.

I went home to Rochester for the summer and toured around Central NY and the Adirondacks with a friend who was visiting from Tennessee. We stopped and took a tour of this theatre. Upon entering the auditorium my friend became very quiet. When we returned to our vehicle he stated that he stopped talking during the tour because he was choking back the tears. For the next few hours all he could talk about was how blown away he was by the Stanley, and how he had never seen such a beautiful building in all his life.

By the way Geo1 (and I smile as I type this) you definitely show your NYC roots when you describe Utica as an “upstate village”. It is in fact a city, and is in Central New York, not Upstate. (of course I realize that, to an NYCer anything north of the Bronx is upstate).

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Thanks for the grand photos of this grand lady in Utica NY. I just love that grand “Titanic” stairway!

The name of the theatre chain that was started by Stanley and Jules Mastbaum was not called “Mastbaum', but was called "The Stanley Company of America”. It was this chain that opened several theatres that were called “Stanley Theatre”: This one in was Utica, as welll as 2 theatres in Philadelphia that were called “Stanley Theatre”. The first one opened in 1910, and was renamed to “Stanton Theatre” in 1921, when the second “Stanley Theatre” opened.

Both of these Philadelphia theatres were closed by the sucessor chain to Stanley & Jules Mastbaum’s company, (in 1968 and 1970), that sucessor chain was RKO Stanley Warner (and after other mergers, was also known as RKO Century Warner, Cineplex Odeon, Loews Cineplex, and AMC Theatres)