Strand Theatre
900 Boardwalk,
Ocean City,
NJ
08226
900 Boardwalk,
Ocean City,
NJ
08226
8 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 96 comments found
Wow this is great news that at least 2 theaters are opening.
the Strand re-opens for Memorial Day weekend 2013, with 2 of its 5 showrooms having digital projection.
The other 3 showrooms will not open this summer due to damage from Sandy.
Article with new ownership being featured here
http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/news/breaking/movies-at-the-shore-ocean-city-theaters-get-latest-technology/article_e466a8fc-bcaa-11e2-a657-001a4bcf887a.html
The last I heard the Frank Company had sold it (and the Moorlyn) to an investment group who then sold the Moorlyn to the Ocean City Tabernacle. I don’t know the plan for the STRAND but I would like to find out.
Is this theater open? Not on Frank theaters web page.
Is it still closing at the end of this season?
Can anyone tell me if the theatre has been sold? And why did it open so late this year? I think it was June 29.
I lived in OCNJ the summer of 89, lived on 8th street above a breakfast shop, owner owned the building, cannot remember his name though…I got a job at the Strand as the ticket girl. I loved the job and I worked in the ticket booth that appears to still stand vacant. I called it my vertical coffin but man what a view. It was the best summer of my life and I miss it. We showed Lethal Weapon 2 amongst others, The Abyss, Weekend at Bernie’s….all still some of my favorite movies of all time and I probably saw them 50 times each that summer. LOL So glad to find this page….Havent been there since 89 but I am in Sea Isle every summer with my family. It makes me sad that the theater didnt survive the times.
For sale, asking $5.5 million. The Moorlyn is also listed at the same price. Frank Theatres still plans to operate both theaters for the 2011 summer season. Video story from NBC Philadelphia here.
Another 2008 photo of the Strand Theatre.
View link
Photo of the Strand Theatre courtesy Nick’s Classic American Theatres.
View link
Closed for the season. Here is a recent photo.
Wow. That is a great photo. I had taken one around the same time, but this one is much better. And that site has the Moorlyn and Village theaters too.
Thanks for the link!
1981 Photo
Here is a clip of me doing a changeover at the Strand in 1988…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbknFBC0IsI
Those were still the original Peerless arc lamps, with 1950’s Simplex XL’s. Arcs were powered by a Hertner Transverter (generator) in an adjacent room. Rewinding was still done by hand.
This is a 2008 b/w photo.
The name should be Strand 5 Theatre which is the name given on their website.
They just ran a report on ABC’s World News Tonight earlier tonight (today being July 18, 2008) about how business is really booming at the box office this year. Check out the following link:
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/story?id=5387182&page=1
So if Ocean City, New Jersey’s Strand is in a slump this year in the face of this smashing movie theater success going on everywhere else, it makes a very loud and clear statement about the klutzes now running Ocean City. I also caught on the local news in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania tonight (WPVI Channel 6) a piece about how this weekend, while there’s a heatwave going on all throughout the tri-state region, there’s a ban on swimming in the Atlantic Ocean in Ocean City in the vicinity of 8th and 9th street (where the Strand is located) due to a sewer malfunction or whatever. See the following link:
View link
On the news report they showed the lifeguard stands there with signs attached to them saying swimming is prohibited, and police in uniforms patrolling the water line on ATVs to make sure the ban is upheld — as in, is this a scene straight out of THE PLANET OF THE APES or what?!
But that said, Jim-L, if Ocean City was being run right, and of course it hasn’t been for many many years now, you’d have absolutely no problem eating off the salary you’d make working at the Strand. For you’d be making that and then some right now, believe me. Most people who go to Ocean City nowadays, as well as many well-meaning people who try to operate businesses there, are not aware that as seashore resorts go Ocean City has been being run illegally for many many years now, and unquestioned at that. I stopped going there years ago in response to how it was illegally changed around, but was astonished how those who continued to go didn’t riot at some point. If it could be possible to round up the current Ocean City movers & shakers and lock them up in prison where they belong — and there certainly is the legal basis for doing this — Ocean City could be brought back to being a really beautiful seaside resort once more, complete with movie theaters galore. Right now all Ocean City is is a testament to how gullible and obsequious some American vacationers can be, apparently a sociological experiment of some sort in the eyes of those who refuse to intervene. I told the authors of THE SOPRANO STATE: NEW JERSEY’S CULTURE OF CORRUPTION not long ago that if they plan to write a sequel, Ocean City should be made a major chapter.
Anyhow, thanks to the Frank’s mismanagement, or whoever it is that’s mis-running it now, it can’t be enjoying the box office boom that other movie theaters throughout the U.S. are enjoying right now.
Rahn,
Thank you very much for your comments. I am thrilled there is someone else who appreciated those old movie houses. I often think that I would do that boardwalk job as a career, if I could eat off that salary—and if the theaters were still intact.
I remember Rollercoaster. That might have been my first or second year there. The general manager had me help remove a bunch of seats so that the sound guys could install the giant speaker boxes that made the “Sensurround” rumbling. A lot of us wondered if the old building would survive that movie, but it did, of course.
And thanks for your comments on the Strand. I also remember the seaside, musty smell of the Strand. Each theatre was a little different. The Strand was the nicest and cleanest. And that, of course, was my favorite too. And although my memory isn’t real clear, if it was the projectionist who let you take pictures, then it was probably me, or I was probably there. I’d love to see them.
And those seats were pretty cool. I was able to snag one before the sale and it is in my basement.
Anyway, thanks for your comments.
Jim
Here is another 2008 photo.
Jim,
Thank you for identifying “Adventure Village”. Until recently, I never knew that it was back there with all of the trees and undergrowth obscuring it. Driving past there for so many years, to and from Ocean City, I would have thought that I would have known it was there.
Thanks also for all of your hard work in creating and maintaing the Ocean City theater website. I loved all four of the theaters on the Boardwalk and truly miss that none are as I remember them. I had a special fondness for the interior decoration of the Village. I saw the movie “Rollercoaster” in “sensesurround” I believe it was called, and how it shook the building.
My favorite theater, though was always the Strand. It was so beautiful! I believe it was you that allowed me to photograph the interior one evening after the show. I still treasure those pictures. Looking at them I can almost smell the inside of the Strand and feel the fabric of the seats against my bare legs as I stared up at the screen.
Thanks again for keeping wonderful memories alive.
Rahn
Jim, thanks for the photos. Brings back many fond memories.
Ken,
Yes I think they have torn down all the Adventure Village buildings now. I stopped by there not-too-long-ago and snapped a few pictures of what remained:
http://www.smugmug.com/gallery/4965167_VGtDq
It was funny because the demolition guys there didn’t look very friendly at first and probably didn’t want someone poking around their project. But when I said Hi and showed them the old postcards of the place, they really took an interest and let me take all the pictures I wanted.
Lost Memory,
Yep. 70 years old. I almost forgot this is a big birthday year. It opened on August 11, 1938.
http://www.moorlyn.com/Strand.htm
Mike,
Technically, that is the same boxoffice out in front, but it isn’t used. They had promised the Planning Board and Historic Commission years ago that they would keep it. They covered the surfaces with stucco and it has been rotting for a while now (unless someone recently repaired it).
I believe tickets are sold at the side entrance (which was originally the rear auditorium exit).
Jim
Looking at the picture, is that still the box office in the front? I know the enterence is now on the side like the Moorlyn. It’s amazing how the Frank’s ruin every theatre they get their hands on.
Jim, you mentioned Adventure Village back in February. The old buildings were being demolished when I drove by there last month.
The Strand Theater will be 70 years old.