Madison Theater

You’re welcome! I was very surprised to find it, and only by chance. I should be so lucky in the Mega Millions lottery.

Described and pictured in this 1915 trade article: archive

No, Keith’s acquired the Bushwick much earlier. It also operated the Monroe and Madison for periods of time.

I have a copy of the 1928 Brooklyn Red Book. It lists the Madison, without Keith’s, KA, etc. prefix, at Broadway and Madison as a Vaudeville house (and the Monroe at Broadway and Monroe as a Motion Picture house). Perhaps Keith’s had leased it out at this time to a cut rate operator ?

Keith’s owned this little theater? I guess it closed it when it got involved in the Bushwick Theater next door?

I think the answer may be something along these lines. In 1922 the Bushwick was Keith’s primary house and featured Vaudeville in a deLuxe setting. The Madison and Monroe were also under Keith’s management, both with identical in seating capacity and somewhat spartan, all very close to one and another, but with latter two catering to the low end of the market in terms of price.

The market for entertainment in this neighborhood at that time was great as is attested to by the large number of theaters we can see listed on CT. Economies of scale in management and film rentals were obvious. The assistant manager of the Bushwick could cover all the houses. The film program could be staggered so if the same program was scheduled, only one set of prints were needed and reels could be hot swapped, a common practice in Brooklyn among theaters under the same management in Teens and early Twenties.

Something happened before December 18, 1922 when the second ad appeared.
Could it be that management of the two small houses passed from Keith’s Bushwick team to a new entity with the new Madison team becoming responsible for the satellite Monroe as an annex ? Perhaps the name change reflects this. Is there any further ad for the Madison in 1922 ?

No, this was a seperate theater. I remember before it was added, there was a whole controversy, but it was heavily researched, and I have seen it confirmed in publication, as well as it’s address on Broadway., and that this was right next to the RKO Bushwick, to it’s left facing the Bushwick. It was a silent movie house, and didn’t last long, and was closed by the 1920’s already.
The Monroe is on the other side of Howard Ave, and doesn’t front Broadway at all, as it’s at the corner of Howard and Monroe.

I believe that this is the same theatre listed here as the Monroe. One of the listings needs to be removed. The original name was Madison, and changed to Monroe in 1922. For a time during the transition, it was advertised as the Madison Monroe Theatre.

“The Brooklyn Eagle Almanac” was published yearly from the 90’s up until at least to 1929. I have hard copies of 1900, 1910 and 1927. The 1922 edition is available online as Lost Memory points out.

Some editions contain seating plans of some theaters. Another source of infomation are the various Brooklyn Street Guides such as Woolworth’s, the Red Book, etc. Another book to look for is the “Long Island Almanac and Year Book” published by the “Eagle”.

Among the seating plans featured in the 1927 edition of the Brooklyn Almanac are the Bushwick and Greenpoint Theaters.

Bway….Here is the link to the 1922 Almanac. You can read it online or you can download it. It is a pdf file almost 47 megs. Don’t download if your on a dial up modem. There are only two pages that I have found concerning theaters. The rest of the book is standard almanac stuff. It might come in handy if your going to be on the tv show Jeopardy. LOL

Thanks, Lost Memory.

I don’t know if the non-RKO Madison had a balcony or not. Perhaps only a small one like Loew’s Trylon had.

Thanks for these facts, Bway and Lost Memory. Interesting that the two Madison Theatres never operated at the same time.