Lane Theatre
550 West 181st Street,
New York,
NY
10033
550 West 181st Street,
New York,
NY
10033
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Discussions of the Lane Theatre on Staten Island reminded me of the larger Lane Theatre in the Washington Heights section of uptown Manhattan. I know little about this Lane (I doubt that they had any connection) except that it was always a late-run movie house.
Contributed by
Warren G. Harris
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According to the Washington Heights/Inwood Online web site, the Lane Theatre was located at 550 W. 181st Street and closed its doors in 1959 with ‘The Ten Commandments’. Prior to the Lane’s opening, the building in which it was located was home to an indoor ice skating rink that extended into what is now the Washington Bridge Post Office on 180th Street. The theatre site is now occupied by Glauber’s Gift Shop.
In a 1947 ad the Lane invited people to “sit and smoke in our newly redecorated loge section”.
The Lane was part of this 1954 double bill
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Prior to its closing, the Lane usually showed pictures that were running in the Loew’s theaters in the Bronx and Queens. These pictures usually were shown two weeks earlier at the Loew’s 175th Street Theater a few blocks south of the Lane. On the same side of 181st Street on the same block to the east of the Lane was another theater called the Empress. Its name was changed to the Astral in the late 1950’s or early 1960’s. This theater was unique in the sense that you entered it at the side of the auditorium in the middle.
Is the same theatre advertised as Cinema 181 in the mid sixties?
For many years, the Lane used this distinctive logo for its ads in the daily newspapers. In this one from 1947, I think that “NU-SCREEN” means nothing more than that a new screen had been installed. I doubt if there was an actual brand called “NU-SCREEN,” but I could be wrong:
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/lane181.jpg
The Lane is already listed in the 1937 Film Daily Yearbook.
2.5 years late, but here ya go Warren:
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