Ziegfeld Theatre
141 W. 54th Street,
New York,
NY
10019
141 W. 54th Street,
New York,
NY
10019
131 people
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The ArcLight complex is better kept than many of the NYC complexes. That’s upstairs (booth) and downstairs (public).
Bill: Admission for the smaller theatres at Arclight is $14.00 during the weekend and $11.00 during “non-peak” hours, which I presume means the weekdays.
Howard: The smaller theatres at Arclight, seem to be better kept, cleaner, and have better presentation than the average multi-plex.
JSA
Just says “new print”– it does happen to be booked around the same time as the final cut’s dvd release- so maybe this is the exclusive NYC theatrical run of The Final Cut?
sounds cool…I would love to see Blade Runner on the big screen besides buying it on Blu Ray…will it be the original version or the director’s cut of the movie?
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Blade Runner will be running here first week of October. I’m guessing after SNF, we will have the usual 3 films a week till Blade Runner unless they are running a first run release in between.
The Ziegfeld is splendid enough to be easily worth $11. I resent paying prices like that for small auditoriums with small screens in megaplexes, but not for the Ziegfeld! And, the Ziegfeld staff including those taking the tickets, try extra hard to welcome you.
As to the curtain, sounds like the main one is broken, but I’d guess it will be repaired no later than the next film premiere.
When I go to LA, I want to see movies in the flagship screens like the Cinerama Dome so I haven’t seen a movie in one of the smaller auditoriums in that megaplex. I hear the quality is very, very good. When I poked my head in a few for a few seconds, they looked like any other megaplex auditorium- not like the main Dome auditorium which is huge and special.
Warren, thanks for the very interesting information as to the Ziegfeld’s origins! I would also bet Clearview is leasing, not owning.
I’d gladly pay $14 for the Cinerama Dome in the ArcLight complex – and I wish we had one of those here in New York – but how about the rest of the theaters there? That’s a high price for a multiplex (although I’m sure it’s a nice one).
Los Angeles has a $14.00 high at the ArcLight in Hollywood.
Justin: I think the Empire has morning bargain matinees on weekends, but like we said up above, they can afford it. I’ll always go out of my way and pay the extra few dollars to see something at the Ziegfeld, though. At least you still get something for your money – the theater itself – even when the movie is bad. That’s why “Hairspray” was like a breath of fresh air … a new movie that was really, really good. A rarity these days.
The Empire has bargain matinees “Early am Cinema” Fridays, Saturdasy, Sundays and Holidays for all shows before 12 noon! Its only 6.00! A real bargain for Manhattan!
$11? Brother.
The theater I was referring to is this one:
Wayne Preakness Cinema, also run by Clearview
/theaters/11614/
I guess that would be the Empire 42nd St., with all those elevators that seem like they’re never going to arrive.
I posted the same thing while you posted that info, Bill. That sucks that the Z has no matinees. They should have bargains at this theater once its lease runs up in the future.
It’s $11 general admission (the priciest venue from Clearview), with $7.50 for seniors and children. The only downside is that this theater, unlike other clearviews, is not recommended for those who sit in wheelchairs. Which theater is the closest near the Z for those handicapped people?
$11.00 for adults, I think $7.00 for children under 12 and seniors. No bargain matinees.
What’s the cost of a ticket? I’m just curious. I happened past a small multi-screen theater in Wayne (Preekness) NJ this past weekend and all seats were $9.75! $9.75, to see the junk they put out today? At that theater? Holy-molly.
There were no doubt more people seeing “Hairspray” at the Empire last night than there were at the Ziegfeld, but discriminating moviegoers will always be glad to make the extra schlep up to 54th St.
To reach one million customers the Ziegfeld would have to sell an average of 2,740 tickets per day, which is possible but not probable. I bet the AMC does that easily.
How many people visit the Ziegfeld theater each year? I would like to know if it’s by the millions since the busiest theater in America is the seven year old AMC Empire 25 plex.
Only the see-through curtain was used last night – better than nothing. But the movie “Hairspray” was sensational. Projection and sound were perfect. A movie like that was made to be shown at the Ziegfeld. The audience ate it up. The best new movie I’ve seen there in several years, since at least “Master and Commander” and “Chicago”.
“Dirty Dancing” (20th Anniversary) coming in for one week starting 8/24. Followed by “Saturday Night Fever” (30th anniversary) for one week starting 8/31. Hopefully more Classics will follow.
As long as the studios get 75-90% take for the first few weeks, and the theater’s take is the remainder + Concessions, you won’t see excess money going to “extravagances” like the curtain repair, Neon, etc.
Even at my favorite Lafayette, they took out the neon, and replaced it with an easier to maintain row of lamps. Reason: cost.
And, since that system isn’t going to change and go back to the way it was in the old days, don’t expect much to change.
In fact, it may get worse.
A couple of weeks ago the Ziegfeld used the curtains for a Friday night showing of “Ratatouille”. I’m going there tonight for “Hairspray” – I’ll let you know.
When I was at GCC in Los Angeles, there was a few older deluxe houses that had curtains. When they started selling ad time, we still used the curtains between ads and shows. But not long after that GCC told us to stop running the curtains on regular shows. It was a money issue and time for the maintenance crew that serviced the theatres. Over at Pacific Theatre’s Hollywood Pacific Theatre (aka: Pacific 1-2-3). We had two old radio towers that spelled out Pacific in neon tubing. Pacific dropped the contract to service the tower because it costed $10,000 a year for the contract to service them. Over at Mann Theatre’s they had the projectionist trained to handle PM maintenance on A/C, light plumbing, popcorn poppers and aisle lighting and ice machines to save on service contracts they had. Today it’s all about money and what they can save on that location, whether it’s one or two less staff members on a shift. Or them starting to use management in the booth on slow weekday shifts. Maybe the bean counters are showing the execs how much they can save in maintenance by them not using the curtains. I’m all for using them the presentations. It costs a lot of money to maintain and operate the Ziegfeld Theatre. Those special premiere screenings does not pay for the full bills of that theatre. Maybe they will start renting out the theatre on Sunday’s for church services like the Uptown Theatre in D.C. has started doing.
Cineplex Odeon contemplated removing it for that very reason. For months at a time it was indeed not used. Clearview changed that.
Radio City has a team of stagehands that can handle such emergencies. Movie theatres don’t use stagehands anymore as it is expensive overkill. The full-time “stagehand” man they had when I was there would not touch the curtain anyway. I personally tried to budge it with some ushers and it would not move even when not wrapped around a drum.
Chalk it up to poor installation, safety breaks, heavy fabric, or lazy stagehands, the fact remains that it was more trouble than it was worth often cost more to fix than what the Ziegfeld had grossed that week. Be thankful it is still there at all.
Jeff, as far as the motor drum is concerned, we had many like that. It was a simple matter of disengaging the drum from the motor and then pulling the curtain by hand. In some cases the drum could be made to be free-wheeling which allowed easy pulling of the curtain.
The “waste of money” issue sounds more like it, when it comes to puttin-on-a-show, they just don’t get it.
Come on Craig, lets put some showmanship back into the Ziegfeld,
try it, you just might like it.