Community Theater
373 Main Street,
Catskill,
NY
12414
373 Main Street,
Catskill,
NY
12414
1 person
favorited this theater
I found the Community Theater on a real estate website. The website is at the link below. There are two photos of the Community Theater. Click each one to enlarge it.
Contributed by
Lost Memory
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Recent comments (view all 12 comments)
The Community theater was bult in 1920 after a fundraising campaign as the theater down the street burned in a fire. It was run as a Fabian theater until 1960 when the Maselli family bought it. in the early ‘60s it was again sold to George Thornton the father of the present owner Thomas Thornton. This theater used to have a fly screen as it was also used for vaudville. The dressing rooms in the back are used for storage. In 1968 there was a fire which resulted in a huge amount of smoke damage which is why a lot of the decorative work was covered. Gangster Legs Diamond had a favorite seat in the balcony. Franklin Rooservelt then Governor of NY State once spoke there. My father Dominic J. Cornelius began his employ there in 1935 and became manager when he returned from WWII he continued to work ther until 1960 when he went with Klein Theaters. I know quite a bit if you have any questions let me know
driveindaughter, please contact me. i have some questions regarding that theatre. Thank you,
Is this theatre still up for sale? This posting says the theatre is a movie theatre…yet the link points to pictures and a description that says it is a live theatre. I would assume that it is both, but would rather hear it from someone who is familiar with the theatre. While I am interested in this building, the $450k price tag seems a bit pricy for a theatre building in a predominately seasonal area. Being that that website is old, hopefully the price has been ‘adjusted’ by now…if it is still for sale.
Any info would be appreciated.
Thank You,
JG
I just attended the “Independent Film” showing on wednesday night. the theatre is now under new management and is part of a city wide revival in Catskill New York. Nice old town struggling to come back from many rough years.The town was used as a major location in the film “Cake Eaters ” . Nice theatre with positive and creative owner. robbie dupree
Here is a website for this theater. This link should replace the dead link in the Related Websites above.
This is from Boxoffice magazine, January 1960:
Continuing his theater expansion, Paul Marcelli, who served as a projectionist at the Leeds Drive-In in 1958, took over the Communnity in Catskill. He previously acquired the Leeds, then the Vanderbilt in Greenville, the latter from Mrs. Harry Lemont. Marcelli reportedly did good opening business at the Community with “A Summer Place”. That 1200-seater was under the management of Brandt Theaters for about nine years.
Btw, Lost Memory, the link for the above-mentioned theatre doesn’t seem to work.
The new link from 7/16 works fine. As he pointed out, the link in the related sites is defunct.
MPol….Make sure that your clicking on the blue highlighted word “Here” in the July 16, 2008 comment.
The year given for this photo is 1981.