Calderone Theater
145 N. Franklin Street,
Hempstead,
NY
11550
145 N. Franklin Street,
Hempstead,
NY
11550
5 people
favorited this theater
Named after its owner, the Calderone Theater was the last to be constructed by this family chain on Long Island, around 1948-49.
Over the years it operated dually as a movie house and concert venue. Throughout the 1970’s and into the early-1980’s, the Calderone Theater played to packed houses, booking the likes of The Dead, Aerosmith, etc. As the neighborhood fell under bad times, so did the Calderone Theater.
The theater went through a series of uses and operators over the last 20 years, ultimately getting split up into a 7 screen multiplex. It has most recently been taken over by a local church that is in the process of restoring the auditorium for their congregation.
Contributed by
SteveSmith
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Recent comments (view all 46 comments)
Never was in the theatre but went for a job interview in office space which was included in the theatre complex. I was negatively impressed by the apparently cheap construction. The floors in the hallways actually moved underfoot.
If the floors were carpeted, that might have been the reason, rather than cheap construction of the building. It could have been the carpeting or padding underneath it.
It was cheap carpet too.
in 1979 I appeared in a live stage show here. It was sort of odd being on the stage after having seen movies here
used to go there in the 50s, brings back memories.
When the Skouras Calderone had its grand opening on the night of June 21, 1949, Newsday described it as “America’s largest postwar theater,” with a construction cost of about $1,350,000. Proceeds from that night’s gala were contributed to the Hempstead Community Chest. 20th Century-Fox, which had a corporate connection to Skouras Theatres, provided a sneak preview of its Technicolor musical, “You’re My Everything,” which was due to open later that summer in NYC at the Roxy Theatre. The Calderone opened to the public the next day, with a double feature of MGM’s “Take Me Out to the Ball Game,” a Technicolor musical with Esther Williams, Gene Kelly, and Frank Sinatra, and Screen Guild’s B&W “I Shot Jesse James.”
Before wide-screen, movies tended to appear lost in the vastness of the new Calderone Theatre: boxofficemagazine
From the photo above it would seem that the screen must have been very small in the beginning. Since the proscenium was very small what did they do to accommodate CinemaScope and the like?
@robboehn One of the pictures shows the front all draped for the wide Cinemascope screen
Described in this 1949 trade article: boxofficemagazine