Atlantic Theater
5870 Atlantic Avenue,
Long Beach,
CA
90805
5870 Atlantic Avenue,
Long Beach,
CA
90805
8 people
favorited this theater
Showing 26 - 50 of 71 comments
If I get some advance notice I can be there when they start the demolition.
Don’t know when they are going to demolish it, but I wish they would let someone get some pictures. Don’t know if the murals of Neptune still exist, but it would be nice if someone would get some photos.
Article with some pics: http://www.lbpost.com/ryan/9526
When is this theater going to be demolished?
We lost yet another theatre in Long Beach today :–(
Saving the tower and the terrazzo will be a reminder to all of Long Beach of the many theatres of significant beauty and importance they took down in the name of progress! I think I will go place flowers at the theatre this afternoon With a tear in my eye for sure.
The RDA Board voted 4-0 for demolition; the tower, terrazzo, and a fountain will be saved for re-use.
Story here: http://www.presstelegram.com/news/ci_15006335
The theater probably will soon be demolished; the Long Beach redevelopment agency will decide on May 3, 2010, but the staff recommendation is that it be razed: http://www.presstelegram.com/news/ci_14986898
What memories! Those were the days of popcorn made fresh right there in the theater and ice cream Bon Bons. I remember going to Thrifty’s Drug across from the Towne and getting a malt at the snack bar. There was also a really great place across from the Crest for burgers and pie. I think the place was called Brad’s? Those were theaters!
Another north L.B. theatre may bite the dust. Anyone remember the Crest and Towne just a few block down from the Atlantic. I saw several films there including A Man Called Horse, Napoleon and Samantha and Those Calloways.
I read that article at lunch. Apparently this hasn’t been a church for several years.
Here’s an LA Times article from today about the theater:
View link
HELP! They want to demolish The Atlantic Theatre! Please help!
From Facebook “Save The Atlantic Theatre: Preservation of historic buildings achieves more than just communicating the past. When we save an important piece of our heritage, we energize the local community with pride, with identity, with foundation, with roots——-thereby allowing a ‘blossom’. These types of buildings, this theatre, play a unique role by defining the distinctive character of every individual neighborhood or community—-North Long Beach in this case."
Facebook page: http://tinyurl.com/yjzqg7t
What you can do to help: Write letters!
Letters of support for the adaptive reuse of the Atlantic Theater should be addressed to the Redevelopment Agency and Councilman Val Lerch from the 9th District, where the Atlantic Theater is located. Please request that staff distribute copies of your letter/email to the RDA Board.
Long Beach Redevelopment Agency
333 West Ocean Blvd.
3rd Floor
Long Beach CA 90802
Phone: (562) 570 – 6615
Fax: (562) 570 – 6215
Val Lerch 9th District Council Member
Letters: Val Lerch, Vice Chair City Council
333 Ocean, 14th Floor
Long Beach , CA 90802
E-mails:
Even though the Atlantic Theater (5870 Atlantic Avenue) is eligible as a city and state landmark and is eligible for the National Register of Historic Places, and even though the EIR on the project declares adaptive reuse of the theater as a viable, and in some respects, preferable option, the City and the developer support a development alternative that would result in the theater’s demolition.
Keeping this landmark structure will enable this North Long Beach neighborhood to use its architecture and history as a unifying theme for economic and civic revitalization. Many cities across the nation are fostering civic and neighborhood pride by utlizing that unique sense of identity based on the city’s historic built environment.
Please help and write a letter or email! Meeting is on Dec. 7th 2009. I will repost as soon as we know more about what will happen next.
Here is a January 1975 ad from the LA Times:
http://tinyurl.com/oj52ka
Here is a 1983 photo, when the theater was showing Asian films:
http://tinyurl.com/d3sb5l
Vince Pierce: You manager was very lucky. I have heard several stories of people stepping off the catwalks in theatre attics and falling partially or completely through. It is usually not pretty, as the metal mesh sandwiched in the layer of plaster does awful things to the person as they rip through it. The pastor who rather unsuccessfully tried to maintain a church in the since-demolished Broadway (Encore) Theatre in Burlingame did this, but was relatively unharmed, but the ceiling had to have major work, which was done very carefully by expert plasterers. I have been told that in 1927, as the seats were being installed in the California Theatre in San Jose, a workman stepped off the attic catwalk and went completely through the decorated ceiling, landing on the main floor seat standards which had just been installed immediately forward of the balcony overhang on the Auditorium Right side of the theatre. It is said that he survived the night, bent and broken over the seat standards, but died the next day. I am told that until the ceiling was repainted in the late 1970s, the repair to the ceiling could be faintly discerned. I am also told that some people who sat in that area as late as the 1970s experienced odd occurrances, including having their clothes tugged-at down near the floor by unseen hands. As the floor of the California’s auditorium was completely dug away for new basement dressing rooms and a change in rake during its 2000-2004 renovation and restoration, I can only speculate as to whether this phenomenon may still happen.
So, to repeat, your manager was indeed fortunate.
Some entrepreneur could re-open this as a porno theater again; why not?
I worked at this theatre when i was 15 yrs old. I got to make the phone recordings “hello and thank you for calling the Long Beach Big Screen theatre. Located 5870 atlantic ave. 1 blk north of south st in the city of long beach.” I had a wonderfull time working here for Ray and C.C. they were the owners. I remember one night we were showing Friday the 13th part 6 I was on the phone while the movie was playing i heard this loud noice and it turned out to be a crowd of people running out of the theatre durning one of the scary scenes, it turns out that the ceiling above the theatre is false and the manager decieded to walk along the beams and fell through the ceiling he caught him self on the beam and was able to pull himself up but it was still really funny when you think about it your watching a scary movie and something like that happens. lol
Here are some October 2008 photos:
http://tinyurl.com/3uyx9q
http://tinyurl.com/43gcbn
http://tinyurl.com/44jrvg
http://tinyurl.com/3w2r7u
http://tinyurl.com/4lvqor
http://tinyurl.com/4u4ncs
http://tinyurl.com/42xfpn
http://tinyurl.com/45pgxj
http://tinyurl.com/4fcqby
Here is a May 1975 ad from the LA Times:
http://tinyurl.com/2ymod8
I will use my discretion.
Ken, post those ads! If they were Ok for the newspapers to print, our delicate sensibilities here should be able to take it.
Maybe they’re pagans.
The murals of Neptune, in waves holding a trident, were inside the theatre on the side walls. They were huge and glowed during the movie. I would imagine unless the church worshipped Roman mythology, they would have them covered these days.
Regarding LMs question of 7/13, I can now put the ads on CT, but I doubt if they want me to post some of these ads for porno films. Probably the same prohibition as linking to adult sites, which I can understand. Too bad as some of the ads from the sixties and seventies are very creative without being obscene.
Where was the Neptune mural inside the theater? I’ve seen pictures of the interior while it operated as a church.
I remember the Atlantic. I believe that the first film I saw there was “Journey To The Center of the Earth.” Probabaly was about 1960. I also remember a showing of the 1939 cartoon feature, “Gulliver’s Travels” for a special kiddie show.
For a while, in 1968, they showed old Warner Bros. flicks. I can remember seeing “Petrified Forest” on a double bill with “Arsenic and Old Lace” in the same week I saw the revival of “Gone With the Wind” at the Carthay Circle.
I think my last trip there was in about 1969 for a double bill of “Paper Lion” and “Salt and Pepper.”
The Neptune murals freaked me out as a kid, and I’m not sure I would be all that comfortable with them as an adult.