Crest Theater
244 Main Street,
Binghamton,
NY
13905
244 Main Street,
Binghamton,
NY
13905
3 people
favorited this theater
Operating by 1941 as the 1,015-seat Suburban Theatre, a name it retained until at least 1950. This big old classic movie theatre was destroyed to make room for a drug store which never opened. It was the site of the world premiere of “The Twilight Zone” movie.
Contributed by
H Rahner
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Recent comments (view all 20 comments)
My family owned this theater and I was very very sad to see it go. It really signified the end of era for me. I have so many childhood memories of countless hours spent here in the 1970s and 1980s. I made a number of friends with the staff then too. At that time it was run by chains, Cinema National, and later USA Cinemas. I was young, but I still think it was one of the largest screens I have ever seen and quite a large number of seats for a movie theater. I’d love to hear more about its early history. Here are the only photos that I have. The only piece of memorabilia I own is of the glass name plate from the original Peerless projector.
-jk
Projector name plate:
I think this one is from its final years as a $1 theater:
This one is probably circa 1985 as I can make out a poster for “Teen Wolf” displayed.
Here’s an article in The Binghamton Press newspaper about the Twilight Zone: The Movie premiere on June 11, 1983:
jkoffman: Great post and a great family theatre legacy!
The Crest had the best movie theatre sound system in the Binghamton area. I saw Earthquake, Midway and Rollercoaster, all in SENSURROUND here. I also saw Halloween on opening weekend in 1978. I remember it as if it were yesterday. Many others, too. Great memories!
Never knew that Rod Serling of Twilight Zone fame was originally from Binghamton.
Rod Serling was BCHS’s most famous alumnus. Around 1977-1978, the auditorium in Binghamton Central High School had a major electrical fire one night. My homeroom was on the 2nd floor, right across the hall from the doors to the balcony. Over the years, everyone who was ever on stage crew carved their names into the wood trim backstage. The auditorium took over a year to renovate and when it was finished, all of the names were painted over with white paint EXCEPT Rod Serling’s! I know the school underwent a major renovation in the early 1980’s. Don’t know if they saved it.
Sure hope they did, if they had regard for….history!
…..or any degree of regard for…history! Let us know if you can!
1986 Photo
1986 Photo
1987 Photo
Was this theatre previously known as the Suburban ? I have aquired some movie flyers from 1938 “West Side Famuly Theatre” W. H. Manny- Manager. There is no address on this
Yes, jeffret … The Crest Theatre was originally The Suburban Theatre. I am unclear as to when the name changed. I am currently working on a Triple Cities theatres history project involving going through the microfilms of the newspaper in the Broome County Library to gradually gather all this information. But it is a very long slow process. It takes me about 3 hours to look through each month of microfilm !!! When I come across the definitive information, I will let you know !!