UA Midway Stadium 9
108-22 Queens Boulevard,
Forest Hills,
NY
11375
108-22 Queens Boulevard,
Forest Hills,
NY
11375
16 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 154 comments found
Early shows are $10 here, just checked this morning for the weekend.
Saw a lot of great movies here.
Are you kidding me, $13.50 non matinee showings. I think this is even more expensive than Manhattan.
The Queens Ledger-/Forest Hills Times features “Midway Theatre 70th Anniversary Benefits Alzheimer’s” by Michael Perlman: http://www.foresthillstimes.com/view/full_story/20349385/article-Midway-Theatre-70th-Anniversary-Benefits-Alzheimer-s On 9/24, patrons saw Hitchcock’s “Rear Window” (1954) & the proceeds benefited the Alzheimer’s Association (NYC Chapter). The Midway opened in 1942 & was named after WWII’s Battle of Midway. It was designed in the Art Moderne style by America’s foremost theater architect, Thomas W. Lamb. Please share & feel free to post a comment on the article link.
when the midway closed in 1997 it was a quad (two downstairs and two upstairs). the only thing remains from the original is the staircase and screen 5 and 9 is the original balcony
Used to be able to find some parking on the side streets north of Queens Blvd, paktype. But you had to be very lucky. I think this theater has been one that called for use of mass transit for many years, now – unless you live within walking distance.
If you’re going to see a movie there today, take the subway if possible. The traffic in that area is terrible and unless you want to put your car into a garage and pay $20, there is very little on-street parking available because of all of the apartment buildings in the neighborhood.
Perhaps, but it may be hard to locate a showable print; in addition, the film does not appears to have been released on any form of home video to-date, which suggests that the rights may be entangled.
Here’s a trade ad for the Midway’s very first main feature. Perhaps they could still book that for the anniversary event instead of “Rear Window”: Boxoffice
Couldn’t they have selected a film that actually played at the Midway? I don’t think that “Rear Window” ever did, unless as a reissue years after its original release.
It’s official: The Midway Theatre 70th Anniversary film to be shown is Rear Window! Admission is $10 with the proceeds going to charity.
http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20120919/forest-hills/historic-theater-celebrates-70th-birthday-with-hitchcock-flick
First plexing briefly described in top left column of this page from a 1977 trade journal: Boxoffice
Thanks, Tinseltoes, for unearthing this material. Michael Pearlman may want to add this to the Midway site.
The new RKO Midway was spotlighted in this 1942 trade article: boxofficemagazine
If I recall correctly, the Midway showed the Rocky Horror Picture Show at midnights on Saturday for a number of years, when it was still a quad.
“Coming Attractions: Legendary Midway Theatre To Turn 70” in the Forest Hills Times/Queens Ledger by Michael Perlman.
Mark your calendar for a 70th anniversary celebration, likely on September 24, 2012. Let’s preserve & commemorate our Art Moderne theater designed by the great Thomas Lamb, & named after WWII’s Battle of Midway.
If you would like to share your theater memories or experiences or any comment, please feel free to post on the article link:
http://www.foresthillstimes.com/view/full_story/18969666/article-Coming-Attractions—Legendary-Midway-Theatre-To-Turn-70
A thank you to all who contributed to my article’s interviews.
Just fascinating that Murray the K may have emceed; a moment poised on the verge of Beatlemania hitting our shores just over a year later.
Fabian and company were probably part of a whirlwind promotional tour of neighborhood theatres in behalf of the movie. Practice happened often in those days, especially for shlock movies that needed all the help they could get.
I worked as an usher at the UA Forest Hills Twin on Continental in the early 80s….I’ve got a question: In my collection, I have a ticket on yellow stock, about the size of an index card, that says:
Skouras Air Conditioned Midway Theatre, In Person – On Stage, Sunday, August 26th at Approximately 5 P.M., Sensational Star of “5 Weeks in a Balloon” Fabian Extra Guest Star Peter Lorre, Plus! WINS’s Fabulous Disc Jockey Murray The K, – On the Screen – ‘5 Weeks in a Balloon’ plus Swingin' Along'
There’s no year, but imdb has 1962 for the release. Does anyone know if it was common then for the Midway, or the Forest Hills Theater on Continental, to host such live appearances? Appreciate it if anyone has any info. Thanks!
This the theater where my family and I saw “Operation Crossbow” when we came to NYC primarily for the World’s Fair in 1965.
Here’s a 1980s tax photo which gives a side view of the original auditorium housing: lunaimaging
Ed, you read my mind! That’s how I also remember that it was a quad, as as a kid we would do the same thing there. I remember the ornate railing on the left that used to go up to the second floor. On the second floor landing up there, there were a bunch of video games, and I remember playing them when waiting for the movie to end prior to the time we were going. We also would try and sneak into one of the other theaters afterwards. I remember the Midway to be very clean and well kept at that time (at least next to my home theater, the Ridgewood). We would make the trek from Ridgewood on the subway to the Midway or Continental over on Austin St. While both were better kept than the Ridgewood, i think half the fun was riding over to the Midway on the subway “by ourselves”. I would usually just tell my mother that we were going to a movie at the Ridgewood.
Nice catch, Bway. I recall sneaking around to various films after seeing the film for which I paid admission. Sometimes a tricky task because there were one or two old timers on patrol in the lobby watching for such shenanigans. It was actually easiest when there were crowds queued up in the ticket lobby for popular films. My friends and I would casually exit from one auditorium into the lobby and visit the men’s room and then wait until we could filter into the crowd as it was allowed to proceed into their auditorium. This sort of thing is so much easier now, with the standard multiplex practice of ripping tickets right by the entrance to the lobby – not to mention the young minimum wage staffers who, by and large, could give a damn if you spend the whole day there migrating from one theater to the next.
Anyway, I was particularly fond of the two upstairs theaters, where we used to sit in the first row with our feet up on the railing due to the comfortable distance to the screen from that vantage point.
I also recall during midnight showings of “Rocky Horror Picture Show” that folks would run out onto the floor beyond the railing in front of the screen to participate in some of the usual audience rituals for those viewings (such as jumping up to “touch” the image of Susan Sarandon’s breasts during the “Touch Me” number). Looking back, I realize now that the floor between the seats and the screen was just a false ceiling erected to seperate the balcony theaters from the orchestra level. It’s a wonder none of the “Rocky Horror” participants ever fell through onto whatever was screening below!
The original description for this theater is incorrect. The first line says “Located in the Forest Hills section of Queens. After decades as a single screen movie palace, the 1942 built; Midway Theatre (named for the famous Battle of Midway) was sold in June 1997 to the Heskel Group……The theater was closed two months later and completely renovated into a nine-screen multiplex.”
While that is true, it did NOT go from a single screen theater “after decades of being a single screen movie palace” to the 9 screens it has today. From the mid to late 80’s to 1997, it was cut up into a quad, with two movie auditoriums in the old balcony, and two movie auditoriums in the orchestra level. I saw many movies in that theater in the quad set up, particularly in the late 80’s and early 90’s.
Just went here for the first time in my 13 years living in Queens, saw Bucky Larson, Born to be a Star. Big crowd, 2 people myself included. Theater was quite nice, spiral staircases to the upper theaters, concession stands and bathrooms on both floors. Could never tell theater was 69 years old. But the admission prices compare to the Atlas Mall theather in Glendale. Matinee was $9.50! Nighttime showings are $13.50 with $17.50 tops for 3D!