Durfee Theatre
30 N. Main Street,
Fall River,
MA
02720
30 N. Main Street,
Fall River,
MA
02720
3 people
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Showing 26 - 32 of 32 comments
Jim, that is an utterly hilarious story. It could be part of a movie. If you have other stories and recollections of Fall River movie theatres, please post them. That’s what this site is all about.
Gerald, My strangest memory of the old Durfee Theatre is the near kiddie riot when the “Howdy Doody Road Show” came to town in the early 50’s. The newspaper ads featured pictures of Howdy, Buffalo Bob Smith, Clarabelle and other characters of the NBC show. We school children were thrilled that we were going to see the show’s stars in person right on the Durfee’s massive stage. But wait! What’s this? That’s not Buffalo Bob—it was his “brother Bill”. And that’s too tall to be the real Clarabelle. And Princess Summer Fall Winter Spring looks suspiciously like the guy who just played Chief Thunderthud. Our loudness and booing cut the show short…very short.
Roger, regarding Hartford, you are correct. But those two are in neighborhoods away from the center and I knew about them. What I was thinking was DOWNTOWN Hartford. There are no more there.
The last photo I saw that related to the old Durfee Theatre was a line up of ushers in their dress uniforms as published in the “Fall River Herald News”.The exterior of the Durfee was very deceiving. It looked rather small from the outside, but once inside, the massive lobby was art deco at its best. The regal staircase was truly majestic. I can still smell the popcorn pouring out of the cast iron popper, and I can still hear the head usher shouting, “Immediate seating in the balcony, folks!” Sadly, that beautiful lobby was converted for a time into a Chinese restaurant in the 70’s.
“Just like Hartford.”
FYI, Hartford still has 2 old theatres open. Granted, one now shows adult movies (Art Cinema) and the other hosts live concerts (Webster Theatre), but nevertheless they are open.
One of the many regrets of my life was that I never visited the Durfee, although I lived in nearby Providence. That’s why I submitted this theatre to begin with. I knew about and could have gone to see Lillian Gish in her 1970s nostalgic appearance/film presentation. I don’t feel like looking up the details right now, but I chose to see something else in Providence that night, at Brown University (thanks, W.C. Fields.) I did see Gish in the audience at Radio City Music Hall in a restoration/revival of “A Star is Born” several years later, but never the Durfee, though I drove by it many times. Why have ALL the old theatres of Fall River been closed or destroyed? ALL OF THEM! Just like Hartford. Surely one could have been used today as a theatre and concert venue like Providence’s Performing Arts Center (Loew’s State) or New Bedford’s Zeiterion. Jim Isadore, you seem to be familiar with the Durfee. Do you know of any surviving photos?
This beautiful art deco theatre’s lobby featured a black marble fish pond with extremely large gold fish. A former vaudeville theatre, the Durfee is where W.C. Fields once angered audiences by proclaiming, “Providence, Rhode Island without Brown University would just be Fall River, Massachusetts."
The Durfee was the second stop for vaudeville acts after first playing Fay’s Theatre in Providence. That theatre was the first to utilize an hydraulic-operated stage microphone. The microphone would rise from the stage floor or disappear into it with a push of an of-stage button.