St. Marks Cinema
133 2nd Avenue,
New York,
NY
10003
133 2nd Avenue,
New York,
NY
10003
6 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 30 comments
Ed, I won’t claim that my recollection is perfect, but I believe that you walked into the theater in a straight line from the street (i.e.: heading West) with the screen in front of you, and that once in the theater you could turn around and ascend a couple of steps to a small, slightly elevated “smoking” section behind you (not a balcony, because not suspended above other seats) or walk forward into the “regular” seats.
It is also possible that there was no such section behind the entrance level and that I’m thinking of some other (also long-gone) theater.
Ed, on December 24 and 25, 1978 the Cinema Village was showing two other made for TV Beatles movies (“BEATLES AROUND THE WORLD” and “WHAT’S HAPPENING! THE BEATLES IN THE USA”) at 2:55pm only.
This thread has been dormant a few years, but if anyone still getting notifications remembers the theater, did the auditorium have a balcony? I’ve been trying to figure out the cinema where my dad took me to see a triple feature of Magical Mystery Tour, One Plus One, and An American Band around New Years of 1978/79. I remember it being a downtown theater and also remember we sat up in an actual balcony (not a raised loge at the rear).
June 25, 1934 photo added, photo credit Percy Loomis Sperr.
Loved the double bills and the midnight shows. I saw the original Blade Runner (with narration) here several times.
Saw a midnight screening of ‘The Shining’ here in ‘81 and thought it was awesome. Always wondered where this place disappeared into.
Phyllis Nagy, who wrote the screenplay for Carol, just gave a shoutout to this theater in her NYFCC award acceptance speech.
1963 photo added. Peter Falk in a scene from TV’s “Naked City” Photo courtesy of Bob Greenhouse. St. Marks marquee in the background.
Circa 1930’s photo added, Ottendorfer Branch of the NYPL. Photo credit Victor Volnar/NYPL
The St. Marks can be seen in Paul Mazursky’s “Moscow on the Hudson”. The two films on the marquee were “Exposed” and “An Unmarried Woman”. I’m not familiar with the first, but the second was also a Mazursky film.
I went to Stuyvesant High on 15th between 1st and 2nd, and used to go to the St. Marks for a double feature every now and then in the late ‘70’s / early '80’s – it was 25 or 50 cents to get in, no tickets, you walked through a single turnstile past the box office. Always double features, and the bill changed every week on Thursday.
Saw Monty Python and the Holy Grail there.
Made out with my first girlfriend in the back row one afternoon – ‘till we got the flashlight from the usher.
It still feels wrong every time I walk past where the marquee used to be.
Drinks at St. Marks Bar & Grill, then on the St. Marks Cinema for double-feature picture show! Early 80’s on Lower East Side a vague but happy memory…the air just smelled and felt different there than the rest of the city. Sigh.
We lived on the Bowery near the St. Marks from the 60’s thru the 80’s. It was fondly nicknamed “The Itch”. Nobody dared sit in the front row because it was reserved for the “Hell’s Angels” who occupied a whole tenement on 5th St. and 1st Ave. Everyone was stoned. I remember a triple feature of “Eraserhead”, “Freaks”, and at midnight “El Topo” ( or El Poto"). After the show we staggred out and had cabbage soup at the Kiev. Those were the days.
I went to the St Marks in the 1950’s. The cost was 25 cents. We lived at 144 east 4th street until 1959. Every Sunday we first went to 9:30 services at St Marks on 10th street. Then it was home for lunch. After lunch it was off to the movies. I have many fond memories growing up in that area.
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The theatre closed in late April or early May 1985. The final double bill I believe was The Killing Fields and Wim Wenders' Hammett.
And the second film that played with Return Of The Jedi was Max Dugan Returns with Jason Robards and a young Matthew Broderick just before he did WarGames.
Lived a couple blocks away in the early-mid ‘80s. Think I recall seeing DAYS OF HEAVEN there just before the St Marks’ demise around 1984 or ‘85. TAXI DRIVER was a midnight perennial on the weekends, as was A CLOCKWORK ORANGE, for the NYU crowd. I remember an old-fashioned somewhat roccoco water fountain in the back of the auditorium. We who lived in the 'hood were very sorry to see this theater go to be ignominiously replaced by a GAP (which justly died about 10 or 12 years ago).
Back when we had so many one-screen theaters, we had no way of knowing that eventually they’d be all but extinct and that we’d never get in them again. St. Marks Cinema may not have been special, but like all theaters a few years ago, it was one of a kind. Each had a feel all its own. – Ed Blank
Attended St. Marks only once, in the 1970s, for a sensational double bill of “The Last of Sheila” and “Strangers on a Train.” – Ed Blank
I moved to NYC in 1986. I have heard about the St. Marks over the years and guess I missed it by a year or two. By the time I got here The Gap was already in place, the one corporate blemish on the block and probably the entire East Village at that time. The irony is…now that it’s gone, the rest of the block is now super corpo. Anyway the question is for anyone who might know: the building that the St. Marks Cinema formerly occupied…is that the building that’s there now or did they tear it down and put up the current structure?
Fond memory: a double bill of Anne Bancroft in “Garbo Talks” and Jeff Bridges in “Star Man.”
I remember seeing a few films here back in the day when I lived in the West Village. I remember seeing THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKEROO BONZAI, the film with Richard Farnsworth where he played a train robber, THE BOUNTY w/ Mel Gibson, MR. MOM on a double bill with another film I can no longer remember.
I patronized the place from ‘82 to '85. I think they also had midnight movies. I can’t remember if they were every night or just on weekends. I never went to any of those, though.
I was the Manager of the St. Marks and the Bleecker St. Cinema back in 79, 80, & 81. The owner of the Bleecker did not own the St. Marks at that time – of course I knew both owners. The St. Marks actually had three owners/partners. I had the job at the Bleecker first, then left, then took the job at the St. Marks. The Bleecker was a very hip place for people to hang out – as Manager, I was privileged to have been introduced to several celebrities during my tenure there – including the model/actress Lauren Hutton, actor Cliff Robertson, and journalist/photographer Susan Sontag. When we exhibited the movie LOLITA there, we were mobbed by Russians who were not permitted to see it in the Soviet Union. The St. Marks was a different story. It was two dollars to get in for a double feature – so many down and out people took advantage of the opportunity to sit in the air conditioning for four or five hours for that small price. The St. Marks was quite a circus.