Seth, thanks for the great information. Where precisely was it located? Was it on Madison Avenue at 85th Street? I have an address of 1144 Madison Avenue for a Trans-Lux theatre.
I believe I visited this theatre only once, in November of 1974, for a special revival engagement of the 1953 film THE LIFE AND MUSIC OF GIUSEPPE VERDI, presented by Opera Presentations, Inc.
And that wasn’t the end of it! From the Normandie I went to the New Yorker to see A CHAPLIN REVIEW which consisted of the three films: SHOULDER ARMS, A DOG’S LIFE, and THE PILGRIM.
One great day I spent at the Normandie, as it was known in 1964, was watching five great French films in a row. They had a French classic film marathon which was, I think, sponsored by distributor Brandon Films. So on March 31, 1964, from morning until evening, I watched Marcel Carne’s PORT OF SHADOWS, Rene' Clair’s LE MILLION, Robert Bresson’s LES DAMES DU BOIS DE BOULOGNE, Jean Renoir’s LE CRIME DE MONSIEUR LANGE, and finally Maurice Cloche’s MONSIEUR VINCENT. One after the other! I don’t know when or what I ate that day, but it was one of the best movie days of my entire life.
Richard, I think you are wrong. The Pilgrim was in the center of town, in the so-called Combat Zone on Washington Street. There is a listing for it. The Olympia was out further at the corner of Massachusetts Avenue, a neighborhood theatre that ended its life as the Olympia and was never called the Pilgrim.
No, it was not not previously listed. I found that appalling. I checked every Manhattan theatre first before posting it. It certainly ought to be listed, and now I’ve done it. I have seen some great films here over the decades! It’s a truly important art house in the history of international film exhibition in New York City!
A truly lovely theatre in New Bedford and the last surviving of its downtown theatres. It does not have a balcony. This is the theatre where, appropriately enough, John Huston’s whale of a movie MOBY DICK, with Gregory Peck, had its world premiere in 1956.
I just found a fascinating little wallet-size flyer from October, 1970 that was issued by the Farnese. It refers to itself as the “Farnese – petit d'essai”, French for “little art house” and adds “nel cuore della vecchia Roma”—–“in the heart of old Rome.” The flyer asserts that the cinema was at the time aligned with AIACE, Associazione Italiana del Cinema d'Essai or Italian Association of Art Cinemas. Upcoming series planned for the cinema were listed. Among them were: Aspects of Italian cinema of yesterday and today (15 films), Power and repression in the trilogy of M. Jancso (3 films), Some problems of South America (3 films), Homage to Akira Kurosawa (3 films) Swedish Cinema Week (7 films). Admission prices were 300 liras (general), 200 liras (AIACE members) or from 30 to 50 cents, from what I can remember of exchange rates at the time.
Can any Roman film buffs or others acquainted with the history of this interesting theatre in its magnificent historic location provide further information?
This description reminds me of the hilarious 1957 British movie THE SMALLEST SHOW ON EARTH (called “Big Time Operators” in the U.S.), directed by Basil Dearden. In it Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna are a young couple who inherit a dilapidated cinema and try to make a go of it. It is called the Bijou but commonly referred to by locals as the Flea Pit. Situated near train tracks, the theatre shakes when trains roar by; so the couple try to program a lot of westerns with train scenes! As dilapidated as the theatre are three attendants, played by Peter Sellers (the tipsy projectionist!), Bernard Miles, and Margaret Rutherford. Every self-respecting movie theatre buff has the obligation to see this rib-tickling comedy.
One of the films that has been often shown by Silvano Agosti at his theatre is, understandably, his own 1984 D'AMORE SI VIVE (“One Lives by Love”), started as a film series made for television (and running about nine hours) and later edited into a shorter feature length movie. Shot in the city of Parma, the movie examines in slow precise details the workings of love, especially among society’s rejected, physically and mentally challenged, socially excluded and otherwise loveless. It does this with a spirit of affection and not pity.
One has the sense in watching this film that one is peering surreptitiously into the privateness of others, their near-masturbatory ecstasies and very private joys. But instead of shock, the feeling is one of overall tenderness for love in all its varieties. Who does not deserve love? The almost voyeuristic nature of the movie aroused antipathy in some quarters.
It is worth a trip to the Azzurro Scipioni to see this film if it is ever being re-programmed, as it is from time to time. I saw it in a video projection of its shorter feature-length version at this cinema. I do not believe the movie has ever been shown in the United States.
Interesting that the Metropolitan right now is showing Mel Gibson’s LA PASSIONE DI CRISTO on one screen and a revival of Pier Paolo Pasolini’s 1964 IL VANGELO SECONDO MATTEO (THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. MATTHEW) on another. So two films about Jesus are playing the same Roman theatre at the same time. Interesting also that both movies were shot in part in the southern Italian village of Matera. My own feeling is that the Pasolini film is infinitely superior both as a movie and as a portrait of Jesus.
This theatre has some of the best programming in American, much of it under the tutelage of Bruce Goldstein. I should add some accolades to the ones above by mentioning the enormously popular and virtually complete Fellini festival they put on, the retrospective of the films of Frank Capra…which included an exceedinly rare 1929 film called THE DONOVAN AFFAIR, for which the soundtrack was lost. It was shown here anyway. I believe that the dialogue was read aloud from a script! The Film Forum is not a trend follower but rather a trend setter.
I think I was only there once, in August of 1970 to see Samuel Fuller’s UNDERWORLD, U.S.A. That kind of auteurist favorite defined the programming of the Mac Mahon. I’m glad it’s still around!
Happy to read about this. Nothing against churches, but why aren’t more churches converted into theatres rather than the other way around? The now-closed Exeter Street Theatre in Boston used to be the First Spiritual Temple. I would be interested in hearing more about such church-to-cinema transformations.
The play SHOULD have been presented as written. It’s the right of authorship and should be respected. Can copyrighted plays be rewritten at whim to reflect particular sensitivities, biases? Can they be altered to change political content? I really think not.
Funny how I remember this…and I did check, but the only film I ever saw at the Kips Bay was in July of 1966. It was Bruce Brown’s surfing film THE ENDLESS SUMMER, which I believe had its first New York run here.
The address for the Gayety/Publix is 659-65 Washington Street. The spelling was Gayety, with a “y”, as evidenced by the exterior photos of painted wall-lettering in the www.cinematour.com photos. The theatre is only one block away from the beautifully restored Cutler Majestic on Tremont Street. Would that Emerson College could buy and restore this treasure as well. Alas, that is wishful thinking.
The theatre opened in 1953 and continued into the mid-1980s. I remember seeing a number of Italian-language films here around that time when a local Italian film presenter used the theatre for that purpose. In August of 1985 I actually went to see E.T.– L'EXTRATERRESTRE, Spielberg’s film dubbed in Italian! I think the small lobby had a small religious grotto with fountain. Does anyone have any further information on this place?
Casolaro Films, a distributor of Italian films to ethnic houses and some art houses, had its offices at 106 W. 39th Street, in the Princess Theatre building, and might have supplied some of the programs for the theatre under its incarnations as Little CineMet/Cinema Verdi in the 1940s-50s. Casolaro later became Casolaro Giglio Films, moved to Lafayette Street off Canal, and supplied the Cinema Giglio (which they must have leased) with Italian product.
I don’t know why they named this theatre the “Zeotrope” (sic) since the word they were after is correctly spelled “zoetrope, ” which the dictionary defines as a mechanical toy offering visual illusion, consisting of a slotted drum that, when whirled, makes objects within the drum give the illusion of continuous motion. The programming and admission prices here are very good, but all three of the auditoriums are fairly weatherbeaten. There was talk of this theatre’s being scheduled for demolition. Anyone know what its status is now?
Seth, thanks for the great information. Where precisely was it located? Was it on Madison Avenue at 85th Street? I have an address of 1144 Madison Avenue for a Trans-Lux theatre.
I believe I visited this theatre only once, in November of 1974, for a special revival engagement of the 1953 film THE LIFE AND MUSIC OF GIUSEPPE VERDI, presented by Opera Presentations, Inc.
And that wasn’t the end of it! From the Normandie I went to the New Yorker to see A CHAPLIN REVIEW which consisted of the three films: SHOULDER ARMS, A DOG’S LIFE, and THE PILGRIM.
One great day I spent at the Normandie, as it was known in 1964, was watching five great French films in a row. They had a French classic film marathon which was, I think, sponsored by distributor Brandon Films. So on March 31, 1964, from morning until evening, I watched Marcel Carne’s PORT OF SHADOWS, Rene' Clair’s LE MILLION, Robert Bresson’s LES DAMES DU BOIS DE BOULOGNE, Jean Renoir’s LE CRIME DE MONSIEUR LANGE, and finally Maurice Cloche’s MONSIEUR VINCENT. One after the other! I don’t know when or what I ate that day, but it was one of the best movie days of my entire life.
Richard, I think you are wrong. The Pilgrim was in the center of town, in the so-called Combat Zone on Washington Street. There is a listing for it. The Olympia was out further at the corner of Massachusetts Avenue, a neighborhood theatre that ended its life as the Olympia and was never called the Pilgrim.
No, it was not not previously listed. I found that appalling. I checked every Manhattan theatre first before posting it. It certainly ought to be listed, and now I’ve done it. I have seen some great films here over the decades! It’s a truly important art house in the history of international film exhibition in New York City!
It’s listed as having been called the Baylies Square Theatre" at one time.
Isn’t the Cinema Rendezvous/Playboy/57th Street Playhouse/Trans-Lux Normandie/DGA Theatre listed anywhere? I can’t find it under any name.
I believe the Cinema Rendezvous was also the Trans-Lux Normandie at one time.
A truly lovely theatre in New Bedford and the last surviving of its downtown theatres. It does not have a balcony. This is the theatre where, appropriately enough, John Huston’s whale of a movie MOBY DICK, with Gregory Peck, had its world premiere in 1956.
I remember seeing CAR WASH here in its 1976 release and sitting in the sectioned-off balcony. The theatre must have been twinned at the time.
I just found a fascinating little wallet-size flyer from October, 1970 that was issued by the Farnese. It refers to itself as the “Farnese – petit d'essai”, French for “little art house” and adds “nel cuore della vecchia Roma”—–“in the heart of old Rome.” The flyer asserts that the cinema was at the time aligned with AIACE, Associazione Italiana del Cinema d'Essai or Italian Association of Art Cinemas. Upcoming series planned for the cinema were listed. Among them were: Aspects of Italian cinema of yesterday and today (15 films), Power and repression in the trilogy of M. Jancso (3 films), Some problems of South America (3 films), Homage to Akira Kurosawa (3 films) Swedish Cinema Week (7 films). Admission prices were 300 liras (general), 200 liras (AIACE members) or from 30 to 50 cents, from what I can remember of exchange rates at the time.
Can any Roman film buffs or others acquainted with the history of this interesting theatre in its magnificent historic location provide further information?
This description reminds me of the hilarious 1957 British movie THE SMALLEST SHOW ON EARTH (called “Big Time Operators” in the U.S.), directed by Basil Dearden. In it Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna are a young couple who inherit a dilapidated cinema and try to make a go of it. It is called the Bijou but commonly referred to by locals as the Flea Pit. Situated near train tracks, the theatre shakes when trains roar by; so the couple try to program a lot of westerns with train scenes! As dilapidated as the theatre are three attendants, played by Peter Sellers (the tipsy projectionist!), Bernard Miles, and Margaret Rutherford. Every self-respecting movie theatre buff has the obligation to see this rib-tickling comedy.
One of the films that has been often shown by Silvano Agosti at his theatre is, understandably, his own 1984 D'AMORE SI VIVE (“One Lives by Love”), started as a film series made for television (and running about nine hours) and later edited into a shorter feature length movie. Shot in the city of Parma, the movie examines in slow precise details the workings of love, especially among society’s rejected, physically and mentally challenged, socially excluded and otherwise loveless. It does this with a spirit of affection and not pity.
One has the sense in watching this film that one is peering surreptitiously into the privateness of others, their near-masturbatory ecstasies and very private joys. But instead of shock, the feeling is one of overall tenderness for love in all its varieties. Who does not deserve love? The almost voyeuristic nature of the movie aroused antipathy in some quarters.
It is worth a trip to the Azzurro Scipioni to see this film if it is ever being re-programmed, as it is from time to time. I saw it in a video projection of its shorter feature-length version at this cinema. I do not believe the movie has ever been shown in the United States.
Interesting that the Metropolitan right now is showing Mel Gibson’s LA PASSIONE DI CRISTO on one screen and a revival of Pier Paolo Pasolini’s 1964 IL VANGELO SECONDO MATTEO (THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO ST. MATTHEW) on another. So two films about Jesus are playing the same Roman theatre at the same time. Interesting also that both movies were shot in part in the southern Italian village of Matera. My own feeling is that the Pasolini film is infinitely superior both as a movie and as a portrait of Jesus.
This theatre has some of the best programming in American, much of it under the tutelage of Bruce Goldstein. I should add some accolades to the ones above by mentioning the enormously popular and virtually complete Fellini festival they put on, the retrospective of the films of Frank Capra…which included an exceedinly rare 1929 film called THE DONOVAN AFFAIR, for which the soundtrack was lost. It was shown here anyway. I believe that the dialogue was read aloud from a script! The Film Forum is not a trend follower but rather a trend setter.
I think I was only there once, in August of 1970 to see Samuel Fuller’s UNDERWORLD, U.S.A. That kind of auteurist favorite defined the programming of the Mac Mahon. I’m glad it’s still around!
Happy to read about this. Nothing against churches, but why aren’t more churches converted into theatres rather than the other way around? The now-closed Exeter Street Theatre in Boston used to be the First Spiritual Temple. I would be interested in hearing more about such church-to-cinema transformations.
The play SHOULD have been presented as written. It’s the right of authorship and should be respected. Can copyrighted plays be rewritten at whim to reflect particular sensitivities, biases? Can they be altered to change political content? I really think not.
Funny how I remember this…and I did check, but the only film I ever saw at the Kips Bay was in July of 1966. It was Bruce Brown’s surfing film THE ENDLESS SUMMER, which I believe had its first New York run here.
The address for the Gayety/Publix is 659-65 Washington Street. The spelling was Gayety, with a “y”, as evidenced by the exterior photos of painted wall-lettering in the www.cinematour.com photos. The theatre is only one block away from the beautifully restored Cutler Majestic on Tremont Street. Would that Emerson College could buy and restore this treasure as well. Alas, that is wishful thinking.
The theatre opened in 1953 and continued into the mid-1980s. I remember seeing a number of Italian-language films here around that time when a local Italian film presenter used the theatre for that purpose. In August of 1985 I actually went to see E.T.– L'EXTRATERRESTRE, Spielberg’s film dubbed in Italian! I think the small lobby had a small religious grotto with fountain. Does anyone have any further information on this place?
Was this theatre formerly known as the State, or was that another theatre?
Casolaro Films, a distributor of Italian films to ethnic houses and some art houses, had its offices at 106 W. 39th Street, in the Princess Theatre building, and might have supplied some of the programs for the theatre under its incarnations as Little CineMet/Cinema Verdi in the 1940s-50s. Casolaro later became Casolaro Giglio Films, moved to Lafayette Street off Canal, and supplied the Cinema Giglio (which they must have leased) with Italian product.
I don’t know why they named this theatre the “Zeotrope” (sic) since the word they were after is correctly spelled “zoetrope, ” which the dictionary defines as a mechanical toy offering visual illusion, consisting of a slotted drum that, when whirled, makes objects within the drum give the illusion of continuous motion. The programming and admission prices here are very good, but all three of the auditoriums are fairly weatherbeaten. There was talk of this theatre’s being scheduled for demolition. Anyone know what its status is now?