Nova Theatre

A long-standing personal mystery solved; thanks for that bit of info, Robert. I’m surprised none of the distributors have caught on; it’s probably safe to say they pay more concern to the venues their films show in on, say, the UWS of Manhattan than they do of the ones in Washington Heights or Corona.

Newspaper display ads and general movie clocks for Creative Entertainment-booked theatres (as was true with the Nova) often provide inaccurate information, listing more showtimes than a given theatre can support (i.e., four full showtime runs for a three-screen venue) or a showtime schedule on one or more screens which doesn’t jibe with running times.

About midway through the 1985 film “Death Wish 3” a delivery truck drives by the Nova Cinemas. The film must have been shot sometime in 1984 most likely summer; anyway “Beverly Hills Cop” is one of the movies advertised on the marquee. The Nova at this time must have been a twin because only two movies were on the marquee.

1989 films
5/19 1- Fistfighter 2- See No Evil
6/2 2- Renegades 2- See No Evil
6/16 1- No Holes Barred 2- See No Evil & Renegades
6/23 1 & 2 Batman
7/7 1- Lethal Weapon II 2- Batman
8/11 1- Lethal Weapon II 2- Nightmare on Elm Street V
8/18 1- Casualties of War 2- Nightmare V
8/25 1- Casualties of War 2- Millenium
9/1 1- License to Kill & Casualties of War 2- Lockup & Do Right Thing
9/8 1- The Abyss 2- Casualties of War & License to Kill
9/15 1- Casualties of War 2- Kickboxer
9/22 1- Black Rain 2- Kickboxer
9/29 1- Black Rain 2- Kickboxer & War Party
10/13 1- Black Rain 2- Halloween V
10/20 1- Look Who’s Talking 2- Black Rain & The Package
10/27 1- Look Who’s Talking 2- Shocker
11/10 1- Best of the Best & Shocker 2- Look Who’s Talking
11/17 1- Harlem Nights 2- Look Who’s Talking
11/24 1- Harlem Nights 2- Back To The Future 2
1/12/90 1- Downtown 2- Texas Chainsaw Massacre III
1/19 1- Tremors 2- Downtown & Texas Chainsaw 3
1/26 1- Tango & Cash 2- Little Mermaid & Tremors
2/16 1- Nightbreed 2- Hard to Kill

The exterior of the property looks much as it did – see my posting from this past March 7th – during its years of operation as a movie theatre. Of the marquee, all that remains are stubs of the wire supports visible to the left and right of the center of the marquee in the above photo.

br91975 I agree, to think it made it from 1913 and then into the new millenium and then greed closed it. I drove by it a few times but never saw the inside. Never saw inside The Astro either but went buy it a few times.

Mr. Nova did not own the Nova Cinema but did rent the cinema before the rent was raised to high and Mr. Nova left. The landlord than gutted the cinemas for retail use and found someone to rent it ( a 99 c store). Mr. Nova also closed and has since reopend The
New Coliseum.

To answer my own question – yes, the Nova has indeed been converted into a 99-cent store. All that remains within the interior is the downward slope which greeted patrons as they entered the theatre, an odd cement formation in the ceiling where at least one or two of the cinemas were (I spent a moment or two staring at it, trying to figure out what it was, but to no avail), a small counter to one’s left as they enter the theatre (it’s too battered to have been installed during the recent renovation) and what appears to be either the fire exit (although it isn’t marked as such) or the entranceway to a storage room. (Walking around, I couldn’t imagine how three auditoriums were fit within that space or what the precise layout was; at least one or two of them must have been relatively tiny.) Of the exterior, the box office and marquee are gone, as are the one-sheet display cases shown in the above photo; the tiles beneath those one-sheet cases remain and the exterior otherwise has been painted tan.

The building is located on Broadway and 147th Street.

This theater had a sister theater in Park Slope, Brooklyn (The Plaza and now the Pavilion Twin). It recently closed, leaving Manhattan north of 125th Street with not a single operating cinema.