Many decades ago the theatre was known as the Wakefield Opera House and then, for a very long time, the Community Theatre. The venue might very well function as a showcase for foreign and independent American films that do well at the Avon in Providence but are never booked at the Entertainment Cinemas.
Your reference to the Cine Roma (a.k.a. Broadway Cine Roma) is interesting, since I didn’t know it was the same theatre as the Republic. Was the policy of showing films from fascist Italy ill-advised because they could not sustain the house or because they shouldn’t have been shown? Most of the films from fascist Italy,with very few exceptions, were non-political genre pieces, adventures, soap operas, vapid light comedies, musicals…as the 1978 Museum of Modern Art series showed. Films from the Soviet Union shown at various New York theatres from the 1920s on were often propaganda-saturated. During the war years, films from Italy (Germany and Japan too, of course) were banned. Those prints that were in the U.S. were confiscated and stored by the government at a military base..
In some of their newspaper ads of the 1950s they adopted folksy commentary. Of RAINTREE COUNTY, a film of tepid critical success, the management wrote: “Held Over 2nd Smash Week. The public is the final arbiter of entertainment and they endorse this great motion picture.” The Gilbert Stuart referred to itself in its ads as “The little theatre off Riverside Square.” It was a very likable place.
Thank you very much. On a visit to New York in 1959 I remember walking by the Bryant and noticing that they were running a revival double bill of OPEN CITY and PAISAN. I am interested in, in addition to movie theatres in general, those that may have played European films, and especially Italian movies. The Bryant doesn’t seem to be listed. Perhaps I’ll add it. On the topic, do you happen to know if the Cinema Giglio in Little Italy was the same place as the Canal Theatre?
Loew’s State did not normally play foreign-language films, but they did run the Italian TOMORROW IS TOO LATE in 1952 in a subtitled print to enormous business (Variety: ‘Tomorrow’ Smash 45G). It was a lovely but now forgotten movie featuring Pier Angeli and Vittorio De Sica and dealt with the sexual awakening of adolescents. The movie went on to play art houses around the country, and in a dubbed version was even shown at drive-ins.
But they had had a long non-porn history that went way back. I have a 1948 ad here for the French film CONFESSIONS OF A ROGUE with Louis Jouvet. The Pix also day/dated with the Beekman for part of the opening run of Visconti’s great ROCCO AND HIS BROTHERS in 1961.
In the 1950s for a time it ran silent films as the Inwood Art Theatre. I have an ad clipping of a run of Chaplin’s THE GOLD RUSH which had a very long play in 1959. PHANTOM OF THE OPERA and CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI, with live piano accompaniment, were listed as the upcoming program.
In 1952 the Carlton showed one of my favorite Italian films from that period: TOMORROW IS TOO LATE, with Pier Angeli and Vittorio De Sica. It dealt with the sexual awakening of adolescents and was very well done. In New York it had opened to great success in the Loew’s State in Times Square, unusual for a foreign film. I actually first saw it later at Providence’s Avon. That film even went on to play at drive-ins…like the Pike Drive-In on Hartford Avenue in Johnston, RI.
Does anyone who is familiar with theatres in Queens have information on a place that in the 1950s was called the “Inwood Art Theatre” that ran silent films? I have an ad clipping of a run of Chaplin’s THE GOLD RUSH which had a very long play in 1959. PHANTOM OF THE OPERA and CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI, with live piano accompaniment, were listed as the upcoming program. The address was 106-03 Metropolitan Ave., Forest Hills, Queens.
In late 1991 the proprietors of the Brattle Theatre in Cambridge, Massachusetts were close to finalizing a deal that would have allowed them to program the Festival Theatre on 57th Street as a repertory house. This plan, though reported in a Boston Globe article as imminent, would fall through.
No, Savage, the Biograph was further west from the Little Carnegie, on 57th near Broadway and right near Hard Rock Cafe'. I believe it started out as the Lincoln Art in the 1960s, and I remember seeing a good number of movies there in my visits to New York, including Fellini’s THE CLOWNS. For a long stretch it was the Bombay Cinema, showing films from India. The Little Carnegie was a block east, a couple of doors down from Carnegie Hall.
Their programming was even better than the Brattle in Cambridge at the time (1960s) because you generally got double bills for one low admission, whereas the Brattle then showed only a single film at 7:30 and 9:30. This is where I first saw Visconti’s WHITE NIGHTS, with Marcello Mastroianni and Maria Schell, which was hardly shown anywhere else. I brought two friends to see UMBERTO D and THE BICYCLE THIEF on a double bill. They kept running to the concession stand to buy snacks and soften the neo-realist misery. They showed lots of French new wave and classics like GRAND ILLUSION with RULES OF THE GAME, Ingmar Bergman films, Bogart and Cagney series. Truly a great place.
I saw several films here during the theatre’s modest life. THE CONSEQUENCE by Wolfgang Peterson was one. Pier Paolo Pasolini’s astonishing ARABIAN NIGHTS was another.
Richard, I believe you are right. I remember walking in once and mourning the loss of the theatre. Nothing against churches, but why aren’t more churches converted into theatres rather than the other way around?
The street number is probably correct, but it is a far stretch to refer to it as Chinatown, which is a good number of blocks away. Nothing Chinese is there. The theatre is close to Park Square.
The “Cinema 3” at the Plaza Hotel was actually referred to as Cinema III, in a review I have from the New York Times. Since it was a separate theatre in another part of town, it deserves its own listing, which I shall submit.
When E.T. played here, day/dating in its initial run with other area theatres, it was an enormous success, perhaps more than any other movie in the theatre’s not-very-long history. When the theatre was twinned by erecting a wall from rear to front, the two resulting spaces were long and narrow bowling-alley auditoriums, and CinemaScope films were no longer well-served as they had been in the single-screen years.
Yes, you may be right. I have in front of me the program notes the theatre gave out when I went there to see Antonioni’s ECLIPSE in December, 1962. It states simply “Little Carnegie” on the front, as do most of the ads I have. The now very amusing first paragraph of the notes begins, “Man’s inability to cummunicate and his sense of alienation continues to concern Antonioni…” That theme rather defined much art house fare of the period, and it was perfectly complemented by the then-free espresso so many of those places offered patrons to help them survive their angst.
I will report some of the other contents of the 1915 ad I have here. For the week of April 19th, 1915, the theatre showed: Monday & Tuesday: THE MAN FROM HOME and JUSTIFIED; Wednesday and Thursday: THE STRAIGHT ROAD with Gladys Hanson and THE CHINATOWN MYSTERY; Friday and Saturday: THE BOUNDARY LINE and the Thomas Ince produced IN THE TENNESSEE HILLS. Admission was 10 cents for all shows.
(Sunday shows were prohibited in Rhode Island at that time.)
I remember attending the Boston premiere of Alfred Hitchcock’s FRENZY here on June 20, 1972 with the great director in attendance. Hitch introduced the movie and cracked many sly jokes in his inimitable manner.
Nostalgic memories of the Johnston Theatre are many. As a child in the 1940s into the 1950s I remember regularly walking to the Sunday matinees at this theatre where the admission was 25 cents. The two-bits got you two movies, previews, cartoons, and for a while, a Roy Rogers Club featurette. 10 cents would get you a soda and a candy bar. Popcorn was no more than a dime. The kiddie-packed matinee, filled with screaming, unruly kids constantly running back and forth, particularly during quiet moments in any movie, made for an exceptionally raucous environment. All this was kept under reasonable control by an elderly matron who ran from row to row (she had a pronounced limp) and, with flashlight a-waving, snarled at kids in an attempt to keep them in line. She looked like the Wicked Witch of the West. Later, in our teen years, we would forego the Sunday matinees in favor of the Friday night shows,which is what all the local kids went to. We related to James Dean in REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE and EAST OF EDEN on a double bill at one of those shows. By common consent, the right rear of the theatre was reserved for smooching (and more) by amorous adolescents.
Many decades ago the theatre was known as the Wakefield Opera House and then, for a very long time, the Community Theatre. The venue might very well function as a showcase for foreign and independent American films that do well at the Avon in Providence but are never booked at the Entertainment Cinemas.
Your reference to the Cine Roma (a.k.a. Broadway Cine Roma) is interesting, since I didn’t know it was the same theatre as the Republic. Was the policy of showing films from fascist Italy ill-advised because they could not sustain the house or because they shouldn’t have been shown? Most of the films from fascist Italy,with very few exceptions, were non-political genre pieces, adventures, soap operas, vapid light comedies, musicals…as the 1978 Museum of Modern Art series showed. Films from the Soviet Union shown at various New York theatres from the 1920s on were often propaganda-saturated. During the war years, films from Italy (Germany and Japan too, of course) were banned. Those prints that were in the U.S. were confiscated and stored by the government at a military base..
In some of their newspaper ads of the 1950s they adopted folksy commentary. Of RAINTREE COUNTY, a film of tepid critical success, the management wrote: “Held Over 2nd Smash Week. The public is the final arbiter of entertainment and they endorse this great motion picture.” The Gilbert Stuart referred to itself in its ads as “The little theatre off Riverside Square.” It was a very likable place.
Thank you very much. On a visit to New York in 1959 I remember walking by the Bryant and noticing that they were running a revival double bill of OPEN CITY and PAISAN. I am interested in, in addition to movie theatres in general, those that may have played European films, and especially Italian movies. The Bryant doesn’t seem to be listed. Perhaps I’ll add it. On the topic, do you happen to know if the Cinema Giglio in Little Italy was the same place as the Canal Theatre?
Loew’s State did not normally play foreign-language films, but they did run the Italian TOMORROW IS TOO LATE in 1952 in a subtitled print to enormous business (Variety: ‘Tomorrow’ Smash 45G). It was a lovely but now forgotten movie featuring Pier Angeli and Vittorio De Sica and dealt with the sexual awakening of adolescents. The movie went on to play art houses around the country, and in a dubbed version was even shown at drive-ins.
But they had had a long non-porn history that went way back. I have a 1948 ad here for the French film CONFESSIONS OF A ROGUE with Louis Jouvet. The Pix also day/dated with the Beekman for part of the opening run of Visconti’s great ROCCO AND HIS BROTHERS in 1961.
In the 1950s for a time it ran silent films as the Inwood Art Theatre. I have an ad clipping of a run of Chaplin’s THE GOLD RUSH which had a very long play in 1959. PHANTOM OF THE OPERA and CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI, with live piano accompaniment, were listed as the upcoming program.
HAMLET ran on a reserved-seat, two showings per day policy, under the aegis of the Theatre Guild.
In 1952 the Carlton showed one of my favorite Italian films from that period: TOMORROW IS TOO LATE, with Pier Angeli and Vittorio De Sica. It dealt with the sexual awakening of adolescents and was very well done. In New York it had opened to great success in the Loew’s State in Times Square, unusual for a foreign film. I actually first saw it later at Providence’s Avon. That film even went on to play at drive-ins…like the Pike Drive-In on Hartford Avenue in Johnston, RI.
So is there a posting for the Loew’s State Theatre which existed in the 50’s and 60’s in Times Square??? Not clear here.
Does anyone who is familiar with theatres in Queens have information on a place that in the 1950s was called the “Inwood Art Theatre” that ran silent films? I have an ad clipping of a run of Chaplin’s THE GOLD RUSH which had a very long play in 1959. PHANTOM OF THE OPERA and CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI, with live piano accompaniment, were listed as the upcoming program. The address was 106-03 Metropolitan Ave., Forest Hills, Queens.
In late 1991 the proprietors of the Brattle Theatre in Cambridge, Massachusetts were close to finalizing a deal that would have allowed them to program the Festival Theatre on 57th Street as a repertory house. This plan, though reported in a Boston Globe article as imminent, would fall through.
No, Savage, the Biograph was further west from the Little Carnegie, on 57th near Broadway and right near Hard Rock Cafe'. I believe it started out as the Lincoln Art in the 1960s, and I remember seeing a good number of movies there in my visits to New York, including Fellini’s THE CLOWNS. For a long stretch it was the Bombay Cinema, showing films from India. The Little Carnegie was a block east, a couple of doors down from Carnegie Hall.
Their programming was even better than the Brattle in Cambridge at the time (1960s) because you generally got double bills for one low admission, whereas the Brattle then showed only a single film at 7:30 and 9:30. This is where I first saw Visconti’s WHITE NIGHTS, with Marcello Mastroianni and Maria Schell, which was hardly shown anywhere else. I brought two friends to see UMBERTO D and THE BICYCLE THIEF on a double bill. They kept running to the concession stand to buy snacks and soften the neo-realist misery. They showed lots of French new wave and classics like GRAND ILLUSION with RULES OF THE GAME, Ingmar Bergman films, Bogart and Cagney series. Truly a great place.
I saw several films here during the theatre’s modest life. THE CONSEQUENCE by Wolfgang Peterson was one. Pier Paolo Pasolini’s astonishing ARABIAN NIGHTS was another.
Richard, I believe you are right. I remember walking in once and mourning the loss of the theatre. Nothing against churches, but why aren’t more churches converted into theatres rather than the other way around?
The street number is probably correct, but it is a far stretch to refer to it as Chinatown, which is a good number of blocks away. Nothing Chinese is there. The theatre is close to Park Square.
The “Cinema 3” at the Plaza Hotel was actually referred to as Cinema III, in a review I have from the New York Times. Since it was a separate theatre in another part of town, it deserves its own listing, which I shall submit.
Then perhaps I shall be bold enough to add a separate listing for the Fine Arts Theatre to see what memories some folks may have of that place.
When E.T. played here, day/dating in its initial run with other area theatres, it was an enormous success, perhaps more than any other movie in the theatre’s not-very-long history. When the theatre was twinned by erecting a wall from rear to front, the two resulting spaces were long and narrow bowling-alley auditoriums, and CinemaScope films were no longer well-served as they had been in the single-screen years.
Yes, you may be right. I have in front of me the program notes the theatre gave out when I went there to see Antonioni’s ECLIPSE in December, 1962. It states simply “Little Carnegie” on the front, as do most of the ads I have. The now very amusing first paragraph of the notes begins, “Man’s inability to cummunicate and his sense of alienation continues to concern Antonioni…” That theme rather defined much art house fare of the period, and it was perfectly complemented by the then-free espresso so many of those places offered patrons to help them survive their angst.
I will report some of the other contents of the 1915 ad I have here. For the week of April 19th, 1915, the theatre showed: Monday & Tuesday: THE MAN FROM HOME and JUSTIFIED; Wednesday and Thursday: THE STRAIGHT ROAD with Gladys Hanson and THE CHINATOWN MYSTERY; Friday and Saturday: THE BOUNDARY LINE and the Thomas Ince produced IN THE TENNESSEE HILLS. Admission was 10 cents for all shows.
(Sunday shows were prohibited in Rhode Island at that time.)
I remember attending the Boston premiere of Alfred Hitchcock’s FRENZY here on June 20, 1972 with the great director in attendance. Hitch introduced the movie and cracked many sly jokes in his inimitable manner.
Sorry, the Carnegie Hall Cinema, with which the Little Carnegie is not to be confused, was around the corner on 7TH AVENUE.
Nostalgic memories of the Johnston Theatre are many. As a child in the 1940s into the 1950s I remember regularly walking to the Sunday matinees at this theatre where the admission was 25 cents. The two-bits got you two movies, previews, cartoons, and for a while, a Roy Rogers Club featurette. 10 cents would get you a soda and a candy bar. Popcorn was no more than a dime. The kiddie-packed matinee, filled with screaming, unruly kids constantly running back and forth, particularly during quiet moments in any movie, made for an exceptionally raucous environment. All this was kept under reasonable control by an elderly matron who ran from row to row (she had a pronounced limp) and, with flashlight a-waving, snarled at kids in an attempt to keep them in line. She looked like the Wicked Witch of the West. Later, in our teen years, we would forego the Sunday matinees in favor of the Friday night shows,which is what all the local kids went to. We related to James Dean in REBEL WITHOUT A CAUSE and EAST OF EDEN on a double bill at one of those shows. By common consent, the right rear of the theatre was reserved for smooching (and more) by amorous adolescents.