This old postcard image also comes from around 1907. It was mailed in 1909. Notice the signs for the Imperial on the left. The Imperial itself is on the right, decked out in the colors.
The Embassy opened on March 7, 1947 and drew approval for owner William C. Purcell Sr. Ther opening night audience included Mayor Grant. Rev. Frederick M. Brooks Jr., rector of the Church of the Ascension, offered invocation. The first program was Her Sister’s Secret with Nancy Coleman, Margaret Linday and Philip Reed, directed by Edgar G. Ulmer. The policy of the theatre would be continuous performances from 10:30 A.M. Seats could be reserved daily, except Sunday, after 4:30 P.M.
The theatre had an intimate lobby, embellished with red and gold carpeting, and walls covered in blue damask. There were twin staircases on opposite sides of the lobby, with an octagonal window over each. The Embassy had a small but elegant balcony. At 813 seats, the theatre was considered small in those days. It is generally said that the place had a cozy charm.
One of the biggest hits at the Embassy was the 1948 Johnny Belinda with Jane Wyman, who won an Academy Award for her performance. The film had played for a week at the Durfee, moved over to the Capitol for another week, then moved to the Embassy. After playing a week here, it was held over for another. That made it the longest playing movie ever in Fall River up to that time, four weeks.
The Embassy, like other theatres, had promotional gimmicks. They gave out dishes, later phonograph records. There were weekend “Small Fry Matinees”. Children generally walked to the theatre, often followed by their dogs. The dogs would then patiently wait patiently outside the theatre for their masters to come out at the end of the show!
(Synthesized from Fall River Herald articles)
Some history of the Empire:
The Empire was formally opened on November 18, 1918, practically at the start of America’s entry into World War I. An earlier theatre, Rich’s Theatre, going back to around 1882, had existed on part of the same land with an entrance a block over on Second Street. It had been razed along with some tenement property for the construction of the Empire. The Nathan Yamins interests were the new owners. The James H. Kay was mayor of Fall River at the time and attended the opening night presentation of D.W. Griffith’s Hearts of the World with Lillian and Dorothy Gish. Premiere-goers paid the very high price of between $1.00 to $1.50. There was one sour note at the opening. The cement had not fully hardened and some seats were starting to move about. The following week a policy of vaudeville combined with film fare became the standard for the Empire for about a decade and a half.
The theatre had a 32-foot frontage on South Main Street. Second Street frontage was 143 feet on the west side, giving the place a total area of 15,444 square feet. The Empire was the only theatre in the United States without outside fire escapes, because all the exits were directly on the street. Some of the rear exits provided means of entering without paying for young boys who would help each other gain admission. The Empire was generally considered a misshapen monstrosity and many joked that it had been designed by Edgar Allan Poe and Charles Adams. Actor Cary Grant actually played the Empire as a stilt walker in a company of acrobats! Other live performers here were violinist Fritz Kreisler,German contralto Madame Schumann Heink, Guy Kibbee, Irene Rich, The Three Stooges, the Mills Brothers, Cab Calloway, Dick Powell. The Empire stage was one of the largest on New England and with the asbestos curtain down, the stage and the auditorium became two separate buildings.
In a 1990 Fall River Herald article, John McAvoy recalled a number of things about the Empire. In the 1930s it had its box office on the south side of the lobby and was in the wall. There was a girl named Julia Lawlor who worked in the box office and another girl called Ellen McCoomb. He recalled several of the stage shows and reviews such as the Jimmie Evans Revue, Billy Rose’s Sweet and Low.
He wrote of another unusual feature of the Empire, the candy man. He always wore a white jacket and he could not talk. He was mute. He would sit in the rear at a small table or else walk the aisles with a tray of candy suspended from his neck. Everyone called him “the dummy”, not unkindly but in affection and would say “let’s buy a bar of candy from the poor dummy.” He was part of the mystique of the Empire and well-respected, according to McAvoy, who later became assistant manager at the Empire.
In November of 1953 the Empire closed for one week for the installation of CinemaScope. November 26th saw the opening of The Robe, projected on the new screen in that new process. The dimensions of the Empire’s new large screen to accomodate CinemaScope were 26 feet in height and 40 feet in width.
The theatre would survive less than ten more years. Demolition of the Empire began the last week of December, 1962 and for a time the site was turned into a parking lot, expanding one that was already there.
(Compiled from information in various articles in the Fall River Library’s clippings-file entitled “Theatres.”)
When the great blizzard of the millenium struck the Northeast on Tuesday, February 6, 1978, people came in off the street seeking refuge in the Center lobby. Saturday Night Fever with John Travolta was on one screen, Heroes with Henry Winkler was on the other. As the weather worsened, the few customers were sent home. The Center Twin closed for three days. After that, with a city still under snow, it re-opened with Walt Disney’s Candleshoe on one screen and Saturday Night Fever on the other. The next day The Betsy replaced Fever. The theatre was extremely busy that weekend. Cars were banned from the streets but the theatre was very crowded as people walked in droves to see movies there and escape cabin fever. The Sunday-after-the-storm audience was extremely rough and tough but the manager could not hire a policeman since they were all busy with emergency work related to the snow.
(Adapted from a full story in the Fall River Herald News, April 9, 1983.)
The Park Theatre, built by Nathan Yamins, opened on December 13, 1920 and supplied the residents of Globe Corners with a movie house of their own. The first film shown was the tear-jerker Everybody’s Sweetheart, with Olive Thomas. South End postmaster James Arkinson addressed the first audience at the Park. The Park was completely renovated in the fall of 1942 and was said to be one of the most modern theatres in southern New England. The Park had push-back seats so that patrons would not have to get up to let someone pass.
In later years manager Joseph Gosciminski drew larger crowds through promotional ideas such as “Ladies' Dish Night” on Wednesdays. For 35c admission, women would see the show and receive a dish to add to a set.
It was not uncommon to have up to 1800 children in the audience watching Shirley Temple or a western on Saturday afternoons. For 10 cents kids would get an admission and a free five-cent ice cream. The theatre was like a baby-sitter for parents. Their kids could be safely sent off to a matinee at 1 P.M., with a bag lunch, and remain at the movies until 8 P.M. through two complete shows.
During the showing of All Quiet on the Western Front, manager Gosciminski rented a shotgun, which he would fire into a barrel, making a sound like a cannon…and creating holes in the floor!
Joe also would let a child in for free if the kid approached him and said he had no money to buy a ticket.
(Information synthesized from various articles in the clippings file on Fall River theatres at the Fall River Library.)
The Center Theatre opened on Friday , October 16, 1940. The feature presentation was The Howards of Virginia starring Cary Grant and Martha Scott. The style and structure of the theatre was like that of the Cinema de la Cour in Paris. Its front facade was meant to give the appearance of a pipe organ. It had the widest aisles between rows of any theatre in the city. The scenic decorations in the theatre were the work of the Spanish artrist Juan y Alonzo. The theatre’s three-week engagement of Gone With the Wind was the longest running movie in Fall River up to that time. There were two staircases leading to the mezzanine and balcony. The murals on either side of the auditorium were 14 feet wide and 30 feet tall. One depicted War and the other Peace. Screen star Diana Lynn, who appeared on the Center stage, said that the Center was the ideal motion picture theatre.
The theatre was renovated in 1968 with a new facade, marquee, and refurbished lobby and a relocated boxoffice. Projection was upgraded and permitted the showing of 70MM prints.
In 1970 the theatre was converted to a twin facility and became Center Cinema I & II. The inaugural films for the twinned Center were Goodbye, Mr. Chips for Cinema I and M.A.S.H. for Cinema II.
The Center closed in May, 1977. The last films were shown on Sunday, May 1st and were Freaky Friday and Black Sunday. Edward Lider, president of the Allston-based Fall River Theatre Corporation that ran the theatre, cited the doubling of taxes in the previous five years after renovations. Surrounding businesses had either closed of been torn down and the theatre had been left all alone, according to Lider.
City Councillor Roderick led a fight to save and re-open the Center Twin Cinema. “The closing deprives the city of its only family theater. A city with only two X rated movie houses and nothing else doesn’t set a good precedent.”
The Center never re-opened.
(Information synthesized from various newspaper reports found in the “Theatres” Fall River file in the Fall River Library.)
The Bijou’s seating capacity was 1400. It opened in 1904, closed in 1929, and was sold and converted to other uses in 1933. The year that it closed saw the opening of the Durfee Theatre, further down the street.
The Harbour Mall 6 opened on February 16, 1984. House manager was Dewey Mitchell. The venue was owned by Lockwood-Friedman Theatres, the same company that ran Cinema 40 in New Bedford and other areas.
In a 1990 Fall River Herald article on the city’s theatres, John McAvoy wrote, “The Royal Theatre (capacity 500) was located on the south side of Brightman Street near the railway tracks. I was only in the Royal once, but I remember when a train passed by you could feel the vibrations in the theatre.”
The actual date that Lillian Gish appeared at the Durfee to show some of her films was November 5, 1969. The Fall River Herald had an ad that day which said:
ON STAGE
Tonight at 8:30 P.M. LILLIAN GISH &
THE MOVIES
with Miss Gish in person and in a program of rare early films.
A dramatic and exciting performance.
See Way Down East, Blood and Sand, Broken Blossoms, Keystone Cops and a Host of Others. You’ll Roar at Chaplin and Keaton. You’ll Thrill to Valentino —– An Evening of Unsurpased Fun and Delight.
(Note that the Fall River Library clippings-file has an abundant amount of material on the Durfee in its “Theatres” folder.)
The Strand Theatre opened on Tuesday evening, March 13, 1918 and was Fall River’s first neighborhood movie house. The opening film was The Turn of a Card, starring J. Waarren Kerrigan and Lois Wilson. The reporter who covered the Strand premiere was so impressed by the excellence of projection that he commented, “…a great deal of eye strain was saved by the absence of the exhausting quiver whjich accompanies most motion pictures.” Guest speaker at the opening was William C. Gray, president of the Board of Aldermen.
The Strand was remodeled during the summer of 1922. In 1948 the Strand was completely remodeled and redecorated and furnished with new equipment. The modernistic lobby with marble and formica terrazzo floor had reputedly the largest mirrored wall in Southern New England. New push-back seats were installed in the auditorium. The new theatre was entirely on one floor. Six solid glass doors were installed. The first program for the “new” Strand on September 4, 1948 was Fighting Father Dunne and The Noose Hangs High The Strand was then a Nathan Yamins theatre under the supervision of Norman Zalkind as director and Herman Duquette as house manager. Israel T. Almy of Fall River was the architect, and William Riseman Associates of Wrentham the designer and decorator. (Information gleaned from articles in the Fall River Public Library “Theatres” folder.)
Ritch, And God Created Woman played at the Paris on 58th Street for over a year, not at the Little Carnegie. The review of the film the day after it opened at the Paris appeared in the New York Times on October 22, 1957. Reviewer Bosley Crowther mentions the Paris by name. You can Google that review as I just did.
For the record, Street of Shadows was actually Salonique, nid d'espions, also called Mademoiselle Docteur, 1937, a French film by the acclaimed German director Georg Wilhelm Pabst. HERE’S THE FRENCH POSTER.
This FIRST PHOTO shows the Bijou around the year 1906 as the Westminster Theatre, a vaudeville-burlesque house commonly called “The Sink."
ThisSECOND PHOTO shows the Bijou, after being named the Empire for the second time, in preparations for demolition in 1950. The fire curtain carries promotions for local businesses including the renowned Harry’s Lunch/Deli.
Without any real certainty I might surmise that that Lyric/Princess Theatre located “on the bridge” between Pawcatuck, Connecticut and Westerly, RI, was this building on the left in the postcard photo. (Expand for better resolution.) Perhaps the second floor was used as the theatre. That was certainly true of similar small early movie theatres in the region. If true, then the theatre was not demolished but closed and converted. Does anyone know???
Here is a photo of Mathewson Street taken between 1910 and 1914 (expand the image for clearer detail). In the distance you can see the twin towers of Bullock’s Theatre at the corner of Pine and Richmond Streets. In the foreground, circled in red, are the Casino Theatre and on the right the Scenic Temple, later known as the Rialto.
Here is a photo of Mathewson Street taken between 1910 and 1914 (expand the image for clearer detail). Circled on the right is part of the entrance to the Scenic Temple, which became the Rialto in 1919 with an added façade which still remains. Circled on the left, behind the dentist and lunch signs, you can make out part of the vertical marquee of the Casino Theatre. As of today, this is the only known photo of the Casino Theatre! The Casino was converted to the Shepard’s Tea Room after the theatre closed sometime around or soon after 1919. In the distance you can see the twin towers of Bullock’s Theatre, a former church that became an early movie theatre at the corner of Pine and Richmond Street. The Casino and the Scenic/Rialto were two of the only three movie theatres on Mathewson Street. The third one was the Emery, built in 1914, which became the Carlton, ceased operations in 1953 and was demolished in early 1954.
Here is a photo of Mathewson Street taken between 1910 and 1914 (expand the image for clearer detail). Circled on the left, behind the dentist and lunch signs, you can make out part of the vertical marquee of the Casino Theatre. As of today, this is the only known photo of the Casino Theatre! The Casino was converted to the Shepard’s Tea Room after the theatre closed sometime around or soon after 1919. Across the street, to the right, is circled the sign of the theatre called Scenic Temple, which later became known as the Rialto Theatre.
This World War I era photo shows the Dreyfus Hotel at the corner of Washington and Mathewson Streets. Next to the Dreyfus can be seen the Emery Theatre, behind the lamp-post.
There was no Carlton on Weybosset Street, ever. Period. The only Carlton was on Mathewson Street, number 79, built in 1914 as the Emery Theatre, closed in 1953, demolished in 1954. Period.
This old postcard image also comes from around 1907. It was mailed in 1909. Notice the signs for the Imperial on the left. The Imperial itself is on the right, decked out in the colors.
The Embassy opened on March 7, 1947 and drew approval for owner William C. Purcell Sr. Ther opening night audience included Mayor Grant. Rev. Frederick M. Brooks Jr., rector of the Church of the Ascension, offered invocation. The first program was Her Sister’s Secret with Nancy Coleman, Margaret Linday and Philip Reed, directed by Edgar G. Ulmer. The policy of the theatre would be continuous performances from 10:30 A.M. Seats could be reserved daily, except Sunday, after 4:30 P.M.
The theatre had an intimate lobby, embellished with red and gold carpeting, and walls covered in blue damask. There were twin staircases on opposite sides of the lobby, with an octagonal window over each. The Embassy had a small but elegant balcony. At 813 seats, the theatre was considered small in those days. It is generally said that the place had a cozy charm.
One of the biggest hits at the Embassy was the 1948 Johnny Belinda with Jane Wyman, who won an Academy Award for her performance. The film had played for a week at the Durfee, moved over to the Capitol for another week, then moved to the Embassy. After playing a week here, it was held over for another. That made it the longest playing movie ever in Fall River up to that time, four weeks.
The Embassy, like other theatres, had promotional gimmicks. They gave out dishes, later phonograph records. There were weekend “Small Fry Matinees”. Children generally walked to the theatre, often followed by their dogs. The dogs would then patiently wait patiently outside the theatre for their masters to come out at the end of the show!
(Synthesized from Fall River Herald articles)
Some history of the Empire:
The Empire was formally opened on November 18, 1918, practically at the start of America’s entry into World War I. An earlier theatre, Rich’s Theatre, going back to around 1882, had existed on part of the same land with an entrance a block over on Second Street. It had been razed along with some tenement property for the construction of the Empire. The Nathan Yamins interests were the new owners. The James H. Kay was mayor of Fall River at the time and attended the opening night presentation of D.W. Griffith’s Hearts of the World with Lillian and Dorothy Gish. Premiere-goers paid the very high price of between $1.00 to $1.50. There was one sour note at the opening. The cement had not fully hardened and some seats were starting to move about. The following week a policy of vaudeville combined with film fare became the standard for the Empire for about a decade and a half.
The theatre had a 32-foot frontage on South Main Street. Second Street frontage was 143 feet on the west side, giving the place a total area of 15,444 square feet. The Empire was the only theatre in the United States without outside fire escapes, because all the exits were directly on the street. Some of the rear exits provided means of entering without paying for young boys who would help each other gain admission. The Empire was generally considered a misshapen monstrosity and many joked that it had been designed by Edgar Allan Poe and Charles Adams. Actor Cary Grant actually played the Empire as a stilt walker in a company of acrobats! Other live performers here were violinist Fritz Kreisler,German contralto Madame Schumann Heink, Guy Kibbee, Irene Rich, The Three Stooges, the Mills Brothers, Cab Calloway, Dick Powell. The Empire stage was one of the largest on New England and with the asbestos curtain down, the stage and the auditorium became two separate buildings.
In a 1990 Fall River Herald article, John McAvoy recalled a number of things about the Empire. In the 1930s it had its box office on the south side of the lobby and was in the wall. There was a girl named Julia Lawlor who worked in the box office and another girl called Ellen McCoomb. He recalled several of the stage shows and reviews such as the Jimmie Evans Revue, Billy Rose’s Sweet and Low.
He wrote of another unusual feature of the Empire, the candy man. He always wore a white jacket and he could not talk. He was mute. He would sit in the rear at a small table or else walk the aisles with a tray of candy suspended from his neck. Everyone called him “the dummy”, not unkindly but in affection and would say “let’s buy a bar of candy from the poor dummy.” He was part of the mystique of the Empire and well-respected, according to McAvoy, who later became assistant manager at the Empire.
In November of 1953 the Empire closed for one week for the installation of CinemaScope. November 26th saw the opening of The Robe, projected on the new screen in that new process. The dimensions of the Empire’s new large screen to accomodate CinemaScope were 26 feet in height and 40 feet in width.
The theatre would survive less than ten more years. Demolition of the Empire began the last week of December, 1962 and for a time the site was turned into a parking lot, expanding one that was already there.
(Compiled from information in various articles in the Fall River Library’s clippings-file entitled “Theatres.”)
When the great blizzard of the millenium struck the Northeast on Tuesday, February 6, 1978, people came in off the street seeking refuge in the Center lobby. Saturday Night Fever with John Travolta was on one screen, Heroes with Henry Winkler was on the other. As the weather worsened, the few customers were sent home. The Center Twin closed for three days. After that, with a city still under snow, it re-opened with Walt Disney’s Candleshoe on one screen and Saturday Night Fever on the other. The next day The Betsy replaced Fever. The theatre was extremely busy that weekend. Cars were banned from the streets but the theatre was very crowded as people walked in droves to see movies there and escape cabin fever. The Sunday-after-the-storm audience was extremely rough and tough but the manager could not hire a policeman since they were all busy with emergency work related to the snow.
(Adapted from a full story in the Fall River Herald News, April 9, 1983.)
The Park Theatre, built by Nathan Yamins, opened on December 13, 1920 and supplied the residents of Globe Corners with a movie house of their own. The first film shown was the tear-jerker Everybody’s Sweetheart, with Olive Thomas. South End postmaster James Arkinson addressed the first audience at the Park. The Park was completely renovated in the fall of 1942 and was said to be one of the most modern theatres in southern New England. The Park had push-back seats so that patrons would not have to get up to let someone pass.
In later years manager Joseph Gosciminski drew larger crowds through promotional ideas such as “Ladies' Dish Night” on Wednesdays. For 35c admission, women would see the show and receive a dish to add to a set.
It was not uncommon to have up to 1800 children in the audience watching Shirley Temple or a western on Saturday afternoons. For 10 cents kids would get an admission and a free five-cent ice cream. The theatre was like a baby-sitter for parents. Their kids could be safely sent off to a matinee at 1 P.M., with a bag lunch, and remain at the movies until 8 P.M. through two complete shows.
During the showing of All Quiet on the Western Front, manager Gosciminski rented a shotgun, which he would fire into a barrel, making a sound like a cannon…and creating holes in the floor!
Joe also would let a child in for free if the kid approached him and said he had no money to buy a ticket.
(Information synthesized from various articles in the clippings file on Fall River theatres at the Fall River Library.)
A capsule history of the Center Theatre:
The Center Theatre opened on Friday , October 16, 1940. The feature presentation was The Howards of Virginia starring Cary Grant and Martha Scott. The style and structure of the theatre was like that of the Cinema de la Cour in Paris. Its front facade was meant to give the appearance of a pipe organ. It had the widest aisles between rows of any theatre in the city. The scenic decorations in the theatre were the work of the Spanish artrist Juan y Alonzo. The theatre’s three-week engagement of Gone With the Wind was the longest running movie in Fall River up to that time. There were two staircases leading to the mezzanine and balcony. The murals on either side of the auditorium were 14 feet wide and 30 feet tall. One depicted War and the other Peace. Screen star Diana Lynn, who appeared on the Center stage, said that the Center was the ideal motion picture theatre.
The theatre was renovated in 1968 with a new facade, marquee, and refurbished lobby and a relocated boxoffice. Projection was upgraded and permitted the showing of 70MM prints.
In 1970 the theatre was converted to a twin facility and became Center Cinema I & II. The inaugural films for the twinned Center were Goodbye, Mr. Chips for Cinema I and M.A.S.H. for Cinema II.
The Center closed in May, 1977. The last films were shown on Sunday, May 1st and were Freaky Friday and Black Sunday. Edward Lider, president of the Allston-based Fall River Theatre Corporation that ran the theatre, cited the doubling of taxes in the previous five years after renovations. Surrounding businesses had either closed of been torn down and the theatre had been left all alone, according to Lider.
City Councillor Roderick led a fight to save and re-open the Center Twin Cinema. “The closing deprives the city of its only family theater. A city with only two X rated movie houses and nothing else doesn’t set a good precedent.”
The Center never re-opened.
(Information synthesized from various newspaper reports found in the “Theatres” Fall River file in the Fall River Library.)
The Bijou’s seating capacity was 1400. It opened in 1904, closed in 1929, and was sold and converted to other uses in 1933. The year that it closed saw the opening of the Durfee Theatre, further down the street.
The Harbour Mall 6 opened on February 16, 1984. House manager was Dewey Mitchell. The venue was owned by Lockwood-Friedman Theatres, the same company that ran Cinema 40 in New Bedford and other areas.
The Broadway was built where the Açoreana Club would later be located.
In a 1990 Fall River Herald article on the city’s theatres, John McAvoy wrote, “The Royal Theatre (capacity 500) was located on the south side of Brightman Street near the railway tracks. I was only in the Royal once, but I remember when a train passed by you could feel the vibrations in the theatre.”
The actual date that Lillian Gish appeared at the Durfee to show some of her films was November 5, 1969. The Fall River Herald had an ad that day which said:
ON STAGE
Tonight at 8:30 P.M.
LILLIAN GISH &
THE MOVIES
with Miss Gish in person and in a program of rare early films.
A dramatic and exciting performance.
See Way Down East, Blood and Sand, Broken Blossoms, Keystone Cops and a Host of Others. You’ll Roar at Chaplin and Keaton. You’ll Thrill to Valentino —– An Evening of Unsurpased Fun and Delight.
(Note that the Fall River Library clippings-file has an abundant amount of material on the Durfee in its “Theatres” folder.)
The Strand Theatre opened on Tuesday evening, March 13, 1918 and was Fall River’s first neighborhood movie house. The opening film was The Turn of a Card, starring J. Waarren Kerrigan and Lois Wilson. The reporter who covered the Strand premiere was so impressed by the excellence of projection that he commented, “…a great deal of eye strain was saved by the absence of the exhausting quiver whjich accompanies most motion pictures.” Guest speaker at the opening was William C. Gray, president of the Board of Aldermen.
The Strand was remodeled during the summer of 1922. In 1948 the Strand was completely remodeled and redecorated and furnished with new equipment. The modernistic lobby with marble and formica terrazzo floor had reputedly the largest mirrored wall in Southern New England. New push-back seats were installed in the auditorium. The new theatre was entirely on one floor. Six solid glass doors were installed. The first program for the “new” Strand on September 4, 1948 was Fighting Father Dunne and The Noose Hangs High The Strand was then a Nathan Yamins theatre under the supervision of Norman Zalkind as director and Herman Duquette as house manager. Israel T. Almy of Fall River was the architect, and William Riseman Associates of Wrentham the designer and decorator. (Information gleaned from articles in the Fall River Public Library “Theatres” folder.)
Here is a nice old photo of the Lyric in Warren with a view of Miller Street, possibly from the 1930s.
Yes, Tess moved over to the Little Carnegie. Per my film log, I saw it there on December 26, 1980…I believe at a midnight showing.
Ritch, And God Created Woman played at the Paris on 58th Street for over a year, not at the Little Carnegie. The review of the film the day after it opened at the Paris appeared in the New York Times on October 22, 1957. Reviewer Bosley Crowther mentions the Paris by name. You can Google that review as I just did.
For the record, Street of Shadows was actually Salonique, nid d'espions, also called Mademoiselle Docteur, 1937, a French film by the acclaimed German director Georg Wilhelm Pabst. HERE’S THE FRENCH POSTER.
No one seems to have mentioned yet that this is where, appropriately, the current Robert Altman movie A Prairie Home Companion was filmed.
This FIRST PHOTO shows the Bijou around the year 1906 as the Westminster Theatre, a vaudeville-burlesque house commonly called “The Sink."
ThisSECOND PHOTO shows the Bijou, after being named the Empire for the second time, in preparations for demolition in 1950. The fire curtain carries promotions for local businesses including the renowned Harry’s Lunch/Deli.
Without any real certainty I might surmise that that Lyric/Princess Theatre located “on the bridge” between Pawcatuck, Connecticut and Westerly, RI, was this building on the left in the postcard photo. (Expand for better resolution.) Perhaps the second floor was used as the theatre. That was certainly true of similar small early movie theatres in the region. If true, then the theatre was not demolished but closed and converted. Does anyone know???
Here is a photo of Mathewson Street taken between 1910 and 1914 (expand the image for clearer detail). In the distance you can see the twin towers of Bullock’s Theatre at the corner of Pine and Richmond Streets. In the foreground, circled in red, are the Casino Theatre and on the right the Scenic Temple, later known as the Rialto.
Here is a photo of Mathewson Street taken between 1910 and 1914 (expand the image for clearer detail). Circled on the right is part of the entrance to the Scenic Temple, which became the Rialto in 1919 with an added façade which still remains. Circled on the left, behind the dentist and lunch signs, you can make out part of the vertical marquee of the Casino Theatre. As of today, this is the only known photo of the Casino Theatre! The Casino was converted to the Shepard’s Tea Room after the theatre closed sometime around or soon after 1919. In the distance you can see the twin towers of Bullock’s Theatre, a former church that became an early movie theatre at the corner of Pine and Richmond Street. The Casino and the Scenic/Rialto were two of the only three movie theatres on Mathewson Street. The third one was the Emery, built in 1914, which became the Carlton, ceased operations in 1953 and was demolished in early 1954.
Excuse me, the correct link to the Scenic Temple (later Rialto Theatre) across the street from the Casino is this link.
Here is a photo of Mathewson Street taken between 1910 and 1914 (expand the image for clearer detail). Circled on the left, behind the dentist and lunch signs, you can make out part of the vertical marquee of the Casino Theatre. As of today, this is the only known photo of the Casino Theatre! The Casino was converted to the Shepard’s Tea Room after the theatre closed sometime around or soon after 1919. Across the street, to the right, is circled the sign of the theatre called Scenic Temple, which later became known as the Rialto Theatre.
This World War I era photo shows the Dreyfus Hotel at the corner of Washington and Mathewson Streets. Next to the Dreyfus can be seen the Emery Theatre, behind the lamp-post.
There was no Carlton on Weybosset Street, ever. Period. The only Carlton was on Mathewson Street, number 79, built in 1914 as the Emery Theatre, closed in 1953, demolished in 1954. Period.