Cinema 23 Fiveplex
Route 23,
Cedar Grove,
NJ
07470
Route 23,
Cedar Grove,
NJ
07470
1 person
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You are correct misterrick It was closed by Reagal Cinemas shorty after taking over UATC
My mind is totally spacing and I could be wrong but I seem to recall that Cinema 23 like the Colony in Livingston was originally part of the United Artists Theatres circuit?
Right on Alex,Had VHS been around in the seventies all those great Late Shows we booked would have died.
Well, I’m sad to see another part of my youth vanish. I must admit, I hadn’t been there in a couple of years. Not because of any problems with the theatre, but because I could usually find the same films playing at a theatre closer to home. I think the last film I saw there was THE HULK with Ed Norton.
My favorite memory of Cinena 23 comes from the mid-1970s when for two – and possibly three – summers in a row, they held Disney festivals. Every week throughout the summer they presented a Disney double-feature, usually a classic accompanied by one of Disney’s lesser efforts. It was because of those festivals tha I finally saw FANTASIA, and ALICE IN WONDERLAND, and PETER PAN. I also got to see CINDERELLA and SLEEPING BEAUTY on the big screen again. And it was at the Cinema 23 that I go to see re-releases of DR. ZHIVAGO, BONNIE & CLYDE, and 2001. Of course, the advent of the VCR put an end to such re-releases.
Yeah,I could only think to put Steve Martin on the Marquee,but even his name did not help.I can’t believe it played anywhere over three weeks.Not including get dumped on a Drive-in in the same city.
Well remember Mike that producer Robert Stigwood was coming off two Big music hits in a row. “Grease” 1978 and “Saturday Night Fever” 1977. So Universal was hoping for a third music hit with “Sgt. Pepper” with music by the Bee Gees and in 70MM 6-Track Dolby Stereo. Well you know the rest of the story.
Are you telling me someone approved “Sgt.Pepper’s” to be processed in 70mm! That was suppose to be our BIG summer Hit.I think we played maybe two weeks.
The theater should have closed long ago…completely outdated.
Sorry that this theater closed but I could only tolerate going there once. The closet-sized theaters and the overall tacky environment made other alternate locations worth an extra 10 minutes of travel time.
This was at Route 23 just south of Harper Terrace in the Pilgram Plaza.
The theatre opened with Woody Allen’s “Take the Money and Run” on Nov. 23rd. 1969 in 35mm.
The theatre had a limited 70MM life.
1970
“Gone With The Wind” 4/29-5/5 1970
“Doctor Zhivago” 5/6-5/12 1970
“The Sand Pebbles” 5/13-5/19 1970
“2001: A Space Odyssey” 5/20-5/26 1970
1977
“Star Wars” 12/23 1977
1978
“Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” 7/21 1978
1979
“Alien” 7/27 1979
1981
“The Empire Strikes Back” 7/31 1981
1982
“E.T.” 2/18 1982
“TRON” 7/9 1982
1983
“Brainstorm” 10/21 1983
1984
“Starman” 12/14 1984
Wow – I haven’t been to this one in about two years (last flick I saw there was The Assassination of Jesse James…. ), last I saw two weeks ago when I was driving past from the Clairidge in Montclair it was open. The theater did big business pre-Essex Green’s move to a 9-plex in the 1990’s, but I’m not sure if this is one Clearview got around to upgrading yet with new seats – a 3+ movie wasn’t comfortable here. If I recall the theater was most likely a chop shop: one theater to the right, one to the left and a hallway to 3 in the back, small concessions and bathrooms.
I wonder if CJM who is still active would acquire it back (if they legally can, I remember there was a fight over the Caldwell Theater a few years ago which led to CJM functioning as Clearview’s landlord). Who knows, I didn’t particularly dig this theater but it served as an occasional move over house for successful art films from Montclair.
Yes, tlsloews, there are photos. Scroll up to my comment from Jan. 16, 2007, where you’ll find a link to a page of photos and ads.
No photos?
This theater is now closed: View link
If you visit Michael and Bill’s website and scroll through the year-by-year listings of New York-area 70mm engagements, you’ll see that the Cinema 23 actually had a 70mm festival in 1970, and also ran “2001” in 70mm. So the theatre didn’t have to upgrade to 70mm projection to book “Star Wars” in late ‘77, as I had thought at the time. The website also makes it clear that Cinema 23 was one of several NYC-area theatres outside Manhattan that were equipped for wide-gauge projection in the '60s or pre-“Star Wars” '70s, even if many of them rarely used this capability.
Incidentally, at one time there was another theatre known as Cinema 23—in Montague, NJ, in the northwestern part of the state. Anybody have info on that?
Thank you Micheal Coate and Bill Kallay. WOW! What a COOL website you guys have. I expecially love the New York 70MM pages because I grew up in that area (well, OK, New Jersey) and have a hard time remembering whether something I saw was 70MM or not because I really didn’t know the technical details back then. Now I don’t have to worry about remembering cause you guys have documented it for me! I even found the answer to my E.T. question.
BTW, how was the screening of Star Wars at Cinema 23 compared with the Route 4 Tenplex? It must’ve been different because the screen was a bit smaller and the sound different. Does this theater still make money even though it’s facing competition from Kinnelon and Wayne?
On our website, Bill Kallay and I have posted a page of photos and newspaper ads from the CINEMA 23. I took the photos a few years ago when I was visiting the NYC area. One of the ads is (in my opinion) a really cool one for the theatre’s upgrading of their sound system to accommodate a run of “Star Wars” (which I believe was a moveover of the ROUTE 4’s print).
View link
This is the theater where I saw E.T. I don’t remember if it was shown in 70mil or Dolby 6 track or any thing. I do remember vividly that my dad cried at the end! I thought that was funny since I never saw him do that any other time.
One of the saddest chop-ups I’ve seen in a movie theatre. As a single-screen house, which at various times was owned by GCC and UA, this originally had a very large Panavision screen (although the aspect ratio only seemed to stretch to full 2.39:1 width in the last couple of years; before then, widescreen movies seemed to be projected at about 2.2:1) and a roomy, ‘60s vintage auditorium that probably seated about 800. For the first couple years that I went there, it was primarily a sub-run house, but then was modernized with 70mm projection and 6-track Dolby in time for Christmas 1977, when it played “Star Wars” to a packed house (it had played “Damnation Alley”—which was supposed to be 20th Century-Fox’s big sci-fi hit for '77, rather than the afterthought called “Star Wars”—in 4-track Dolby a couple months before). That sound system was always a little funny, though: it didn’t have good bass even in the subwoofer channel and the surrounds (all two of them) were always too obviously “on,” so that the sound coming from them didn’t blend with the sound coming from behind the screen. Even so, aside from this I never encountered subpar presentation there.
The last movie I saw in the original single-screen Cinema 23 was “Casualties of War” with Sean Penn and Michael J. Fox. Next time I went back was 1990, after it had been carved up into five very small closets. Even the “main” auditorium was tiny, and evidently none of the theatres had ‘scope screens (and from what I hear, still don’t). After two or three visits (I remember the two-hour “Pretty Woman” stretching out to two-and-a-half hours because the projector kept breaking down), I gave up on the place. It’s been operating ever since, so I assume it does business, but it won’t get any more of mine.
Clearview bought this cinema in 1997 from Jesse Sayegh of Cedar Grove.