Hollywood Twin Cinemas
777 Eighth Avenue,
New York,
NY
10036
777 Eighth Avenue,
New York,
NY
10036
4 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 79 comments found
The Night Shift had a separate address upstairs but the Moulin Rouge (3 screens, 1985) may have encompassed both.
As far as I know, the Night Shift Theater was a separately run theater above the Hollywood Twin.
This theatre should be merged with the Night Shift listing or added to the AKA, it’s the same facility.
Thanks.
I find viewing the new replacements on 8th to be dull because you don’t see any characters hanging around. The old shots of the Hollywood are cool because you can see how the surrounding area is a real red-light district with either characters, or no one there (‘cause many didn’t go there 'cause it was unsavory) and trash in the streets
The Hollywood Twin is featured in this recent New York Times article and slide show about cinemas converted to retail space: View link
View link
gotta remember the fire house across the street from the Hollywood. attached to the fire house was a row of dingy tenements and the upper windows were abandoned. there was some kind of nasty bar at 772.
Thanks for the pictures.
the guy wearing the brim hat standing next to the prostitute, would you say that could be a pimp(didn’t they wear such hats back in the day?)? the 3 of them seem huddled close together hard to tell if the prostitute is moving about her business or if she/he is hanging with the other 2 guys
excellent photo do you have more of this section? should be 1971 or after as the H'wood opened in 71
The marquee can be seen in the background of this photo, which is dated “circa 1965” but might be of a later date: View link
was the street activity and street people at 47th and 8th similar to 5 blocks to the south at 42nd and 8th? or was it any tamer? would one be using the same level of caution at 47th as they would at 42 street?
2008 photo of the former Hollywood Twin.
View link
www.frankjump.com/youngschmuck.html
this is that spot across the street from the Hollywood Cinema. The structure was abandoned for years for as long i can remember. There had to be some kind of hotel or meeting spot in there because there were always down and out people hanging there
if you look at my link to the glennkenny post that shows Robert DeNiro walking in front of the theater you will see the bldg that the Arby’s became is overflowing with trash in 1976. looks like maybe the Arby’s came later in to replace that mess.
so it was an Arbys in 1979? I wonder how long for because B Smith’s opened in 1986. Take a look at the little doorway under the marque it’s in a tawdry blue. There’s some kind of lettering it looks like it may say “all” so my next guess is does it say “all girls”? it definitely has that kind of look.
The orange awning next door was an Arbys. The China Club across the street just had a stabbing in January.
I remember reading in one of the Manhattan papers that the Nightshift (described in 1982) was a dangerous place, especially at night, something about junkies
The theatre’s marquee made a brief appearance through a recreation in last year’s Watchmen (which is set in 1985).
al-I zoomed in as close as i could on your american classic images post—the street looks filthy and it looks like a real red light district street. i could read the sign on the marquee about the new nightshift theater “coming soo ” it reads (it’s missing a letter). God does this take me back in time.
Would you say the hotel at 790 between 48th-49th (a Loews Motor Inn in the 60’s, a Ramada Inn up to 1994, a Days Inn up to 2005, and currently a Hilton Garden Inn) had security and safety problems plaguing the hotel because of it’s location back in the days as a Ramada Inn? or did the bad guys tend to stay away from the tourist/traveller hotels that technically were not fleabags?
I think the riff-raff and the porn followed the anonymity made possible by the massive subway exchanges of Times Square. As you moved away from the Deuce it all dissipated.
since the last XXX theater on 8th was the Adonis at 50th, was this the reason why there was no more Minnesota Strip north of 50th? I have actually seen things that said the MS went from 34th street to 59th street but 8th in the 50’s to me was just bland and dull, and i have never seen any action in the 50’s. '
In other words, when the porn disappears, so does the riff- raff?
It was always better on 7th Avenue.
The area declined rapidly after the US entry to WW II when the soldiers boosted the local street prostitution and gay cruising trade, but this was indeed the border of Hell’s Kitchen, a crime ridden Irish slum during the best of times. The Deuce started declining during the depression when the theatres all switched over to film and burlesque.
Although hard-core porn theatres like the Hollywood were a seventies invention, skin flicks and brothels were always around at some area locations.
when you crossed 7th avenue over by Duffy Sq by Tad’s was it any better or safer since you were getting closer to the “domino” skyscrapers along 6th avenue?
i had read an article that sometime around 1972 the cops had put up police barriers along 8th between 45th and 48th streets due to intolerable street conditions and that the owner of the old Acropolis restaurant had lost a significant chunk of it’s business because of the street conditions.
was it the closing of the old MSG in 1968 that caused this area’s decline?
It was almost everywhere but if you didn’t show a key, the hotel security would not let you past the front door after dark. There were small porn theatres and seedy bars down most side streets next to places like Sardi’s and the Edison.