Patio Theatre
574 Flatbush Avenue,
Brooklyn,
NY
11225
574 Flatbush Avenue,
Brooklyn,
NY
11225
3 people
favorited this theater
The Patio was supposed to be the crown jewel of the Century Circuit, and was the largest and most luxurious by the company’s usual architect-designer team of R.Thomas Short and William Rau. The highly gilded and ornamented auditorium was described as “Old World Spanish”. The ceiling had an octagonal dome at the center, hung with a chandelier equipped with special lighting effects. The theatre took its name from a spacious patio in the center of the lobby. Surrounded by white marble columns, it had a large, three-tier fountain and reflecting pool.
The Patio first opened on November 2, 1928, with John Barrymore’s silent “The Tempest” on screen and a musical program featuring the theatre’s resident orchestra, conducted by Howard Emerson, and the Kimball organ, played by Emil Velazco. The Patio did not present vaudeville due to nearby competition from three theatres that did—the Flatbush, Kenmore and Albemarle.
In another year, Loew’s Kings would join that group, so the Patio would never prosper, even after the decline of vaudeville. The Kings and RKO Kenmore became the leaders for the Flatbush area, with the Patio playing its movies several weeks behind them. The theatre benefited from the WWII attendance boom, but went into a decline afterwards and was hard hit by the arrival of home TV.
Century gave up on the Patio and leased it to the cheapjack Springer Circuit, which tried a policy of double-feature foreign movies before giving up. The Patio was sold for demolition and replaced by an apartment building in 1960 or thereabouts.
Contributed by
Warren G. Harris
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Recent comments (view all 14 comments)
What an incredible place, Century’s never had anything even close to this as far as opulence goes. Thanks Warren for those pictures.
A Kimball was installed in the Patio Theater in 1928.
Though the largest and most sumptuous of all the Century circuit’s theatres, the Patio was always an also-ran in the Flatbush area due to competition from Loew’s Kings and the RKO Kenmore. In May, 1949, with home TV proving a new threat, Century started adding stage shows to the Patio’s programs, some with well-known headliners like singer Georgia Gibbs, comedian Wally Brown, and recording stars The 3 Suns. In the beginning, the stage shows were presented nightly and all day on Saturdays and Sundays, but at the end of the summer they were reduced to Saturdays and Sundays only. To save money, the bookings rapidly descended from the well-known to novelty acts such as mind readers, fortune tellers, and hypnotists. The policy finally ended in January, 1950, when the Patio resumed its usual late-run double bills. Here’s a typical Century ad for its Brooklyn theatres from November, 1949, with the Patio in the top slot. During the week, the Patio had been showing “The Window” & “Adventure in Baltimore.” For the weekend run of the stage show, those films were replaced by a single feature revival, in this case “The Crystal Ball”:
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/patio49.jpg
New direct links to images of what was one of Brooklyn’s most sumptuous theatres and probably the masterwork of architect R. Thomas Short. The first shows the white marble enclosed patio and fountain in the lobby that gave the theatre its name:
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Here’s a new link to the posting above of 10/3/07 about weekend vaudeville at the Patio Theatre: View link
Brooklyn’s very own Frances Faye, who was known as “Queen of Clubs” due to her popularity on the nitery circuit, topped a weekend vaudeville bill at the Patio in April, 1949, with the late-run “A Letter to Three Wives” on screen. Frances Faye’s career and private life as a lesbian would later be spotlighted in Bruce Weber’s feature documentary, “Chop Suey,” which had a brief theatrical release before vanishing into limbo: View link
Exterior photos of the Patio and rival Loew’s Kings can be viewed here:
http://brooklynboard.com/pgal.php?p=6&b=b
Century advertised the Patio, singularly in the mainstream NY papers when they had stage shows. As a child I remember seeing an ad for Joey Adams. Only in later years did I know who he was so that must have been early in his career.
Just looked at the exterior photos. A double vertical. Wow!
The Nrooklyn Yheatre Index references a 1958 closing date and prints a notice “to our patrons”, dated October 31 of that year, that regretfully announces the closure and offers a free pass to the neighboring Linden and Midwood Theatres …… It is interesing that a theater as ornate as the Patio has received so litte xommentary on CT. (It would be great if someone would re-link the old pictures of the place that have been lost) …… Since, unlike the King and the Kenmare, the Patio was not situated in the busy Flatbush/Chauch Avenuw commercial district, it would always have been at a financial disadvantage to them.