Uptown Theatre

Photos, anyone?
www.preservationdirectory.com/photodatabase_theaters.html

Last night I had the pleasure of attending a 35mm presentation of Buster Keaton’s masterpiece using a complete and restored print, proper aspect ratio, and accompanied by the wonderful Alloy Orchestra of Cambridge, Massachusetts. The showing at the beautiful Columbus Theatre in Providence was a benefit for the Rhode Island International Film Festival. So much has been written on this wondrous comedy of Keaton, it seems silly to add more except to say that the audience was bowled over by it and vociferous in its enthusiasm. The train chase sequences are inimitable and have never been duplicated even with greater technical resources at hand in later decades. Yes, the music was tremendous, but the ability of this silent treasure to generate such audience excitement today was truly gratifying. And such a gem of a cinema treasure to see it in…what a joyous combination!

The Columbus, known for decades as the Uptown, is one of the two most beautiful Rhode Island theatres, the other being the former Loew’s State (now the Providence Performing Arts Center). As a lover of Italian films, I have a special interest in the history of the Columbus/Uptown for it was here that I saw Italian films for the first time in the early 50’s. I remember in particular going with my parents to see OUTCRY (IL SOLE SORGE ANCORA, Aldo Vergano) in 1951. Later I saw De Sica’s UMBERTO D and Visconti’s BELLISSIMA here for the first time. My researches show that from the early 30’s to the 50’s the theatre very often booked short runs of Italian-language films, often unsubtitled, for the Italian-speaking audience on Federal Hill, Providence’s “Little Italy”. They also had Italian-language stage shows. In the 30’s pro-Mussolini documentaries were occasionally featured: MUSSOLINI SPEAKS: STUDY OF THE DUCE AND ITALY IN RECENT YEARS in 1933, ITALO-ETHIOPIA WAR FILMS in 1936, THE STRENGTH OF THE NEW ITALY in 1937, THE PRIVATE LIFE OF MUSSOLINI in 1938. Generally, besides normal American second run double bills, they showed shorter runs of popular Italian films for the ethnic audiences, including in 1931 the first American-made Italian film (made in New Jersey): SEI TU L’AMORE, which proved so popular it was repeated in 1933. Other relatively significant Italian movies shown here in the 30’s-50’s were ZAPPATORE (silent), the grand Roman epic SCIPIO AFRICANUS, the Neapolitan/English New Jersey-made hybrid SANTA LUCIA LUNTANA, LA CANZONE DELL’AMORE (first Italian sound feature; the theatre still owns a poster!), Blasetti’s TERRA MADRE, ETTORE FIERAMOSCA, and TIMES GONE BY, Alessandrini’s FURIA (later remade by Cukor as WILD IS THE WIND, and dozens and dozens of films with the irrepressible Italian comic, Toto’. Sometimes they did move-overs of popular Italian films subtitled for general audiences, such as THE BICYCLE THIEF, BITTER RICE, SHOE SHINE, ANNA.
Footnote: In 1962 I had the pleasure of attending a recital here by legendary Italian Tenor Tito Schipa.

The web site for this theatre can be found at: http://www.columbustheatre.com/