RKO Madison Theatre
54-30 Myrtle Avenue,
Ridgewood,
NY
11385
54-30 Myrtle Avenue,
Ridgewood,
NY
11385
21 people
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Oh, and to add. I forgot to address the “how severe” was the fire. That someone else will have to answer. Of course it is a masonary building, so the exterior was completely undamaged. I assume there was lots of smoke damage, and off course that would mean that whatever remains of the ceiling and walls above the fake ceiling, is probably heavily sooted. I don’t know how severly the interior burned though.
While I don’t know the exact year, it was between 1977 and 1979. The fire occurred after the RKO Madison stopped showing movies, but before it was converted to a store. The fire occured when the building was unused. Around 1980, Consumers converted the building to a store. Originally, the public could only enter the store in the former lobby area, and maybe the area slightly under the balcony. Consumers was the type of store where you write down what you want on a form, after looking through catalogs, give it to a cashier, pay, and then they bring your item to you. It is safe to say that the merchandise was all stored in the large auditorium area of the theater, with it’s full ceiling exposed, in whatever condition it was in after the fire, after all the charred remains of the seats, etc were removed. About 2 or 3 years later, Consumers closed and, and Odd-Lot moved in. Once it was Odd lot, the barrier between the lobby area and the main theater were opened, and a false drop ceiling put up in the auditorium. Odd Lot took up more or less the same space as the Liberty Dept Store. I already remember seeing the outline of the balcony back then already.
Would you know what year the fire was at the RKO Madison Theatre? How severe was the fire and was the building already empty when the fire occured?
I was in the Liberty Dept Store back in September, and the “grand” staircase is still there. Unfortunately, time was not kind, the stairway is no longer grand, lost it’s marble to linoleum, it’s intricate railing to a standard pipe “hospital” railing, painted red. It’s hard to believe that staircase was once the “grand” staircase….I would love to go up that staircase and see what the old balcony area looks like. Nothing remains downstairs, but the staircase (totally modernized), and the outine of the huge balcony through the store. Nothing else unfortunately is visable.
And the centerpiece at the top of the staircase was a great painting of Dolly Madison. Before I retired from my job I used to visit various general contractor’s offices in Manhattan and many of them had pieces of marble from the exteriors and interiors of buildings and no doubt movie theatres on display. I saw their warehouses filled with ornaments that probably came from theaters and even huge chandeleir’s like the one that hung in the Roxy Theater. But it’s sad that they removed them from the theaters of old.
Does any of the orignal Madison Theater ornamentation still exist above the drop ceiling in the store? It’s such a travesty this theater interior was destroyed. The lobby was full of marble. The grand staircase was amazing.
Yeah, it is international. You can add a theater anywhere.
Hi Rula,Just to let you know your message was all in Russian & was deleted as was my response to you. I’m sure one of the young men will direct you to another site. Maybe “bobmc” or “RobertR” can help you…They sound like nice fellas. Good luck.
might be wrong in both answers because neither picture was an RKO production. I just associate seeing them at the Madison. One was 1939’s Tower of London. Boris Karloff was scary in it, but it was Inot a horror film, but an historical melodrama. The other was 1963’s To Kill A Mockingbird. It had the second scarriest scene in a movie picture for me. Gregory Peck’s two small children encounter someone in the woods. It happened so suddenly I nearly jumped out of my seat. The scarriest scene I had ever seen was in 1946’s Great Expectations. That one I saw at the Oasis. Young Pip played by Anthony Wager is at Romney Marshes and suddenly actor Finley Currie steps out from behind a gravestone. It was too much. Finley oudid Boris in his spooky look. This was not a horror movie either. Since horror is not expected in a non-horror film then when it happens it’s doubly scary.
bobmc stories are the best!!!Hey Bob, What was the best movie you ever saw at the Madison?
Thanks Robert.
Great story bobmc :) I actually still use my Super 8 camera and projector.
Spiderman2 sounds like an offspring of mine. In any event I recall in the spring of 1947 when I was 14 years old that I created an outdoor movie theater. My dad gave me an Excello 16 millimeter projector and reels of Castle films of Joe Louis bouts, a nature film about bear cubs and a couple of cartoons. I went into our frontroom and aimed the projector at the drawn shade in the window. We lived on the second floor in a four story building on Fresh Pond Road in Ridgewood, between Woodbine and Madison Streets. The first film I showed was of the Joe Louis Billy Conn bout of June 18, 1941.
Then I went into my sister’s bedroom and looked out of her window. A crowd was gathering on the street below. I waited until the film ended and then put on the nature reel and then ran downstairs to and joined the standing room only audience. We lived only five blocks from the Oasis Theater, but my non-paying patrons seemed to enjoy my films that were shown in reverse. A man not suspecting that I was the projectionist turned to me and said, “I wonder why they’re doing that?”
I said, “I don’t know, but it’s pretty nice of them. Right?”
Wassup spiderman2
MORE SPIDERMAN!!!!
Well that’s a pretty cool movie, so if this is accurate, I will RIP that at least the RKO Madison showed one of my favorite movies as it’s Swan Song.
The last ‘major’ movie shown at the Rko Madison theatre was Close Encounters of the Third Kind in 1977.
T do not believe you will find an exact month or day listed for the Rko Madison theatre closing. I will tell you that the closing date is listed as 1977.
i’m o.k.
I may have clicked on the wrong item in e-mail because I happened to see that my name is no longer on e-mail. I don’t get it. I’m merely writing this to check on it.
I want to thank all of you for giving me those Queens web pages. The spider didn’t bite me, and when I showed it to my local pharmacist 55 years ago he exclaimed, “Lactrodectus Mactans.” He was a former Coumbia University professor and a bug on insects. He had a window display of a variety of spiders,poisonous snakes, crystallized venom, snake eggs and the head of a rattler. He also had on display the various antidotes. The black widow spider became his prized possession and the Ridgewood Times wrote up the story and named me as the founder of the first black widow spider in the state of New York. Thanks again.
Dock Ock, Green Goblin, I’ll never tell !
Peter Parker will never tell !
I wrote a long piece and was cut off. i’ll make it short. could anyone help me to a ridgewood web where I could talk to old and young friends. I’m not that computer literate, but i’ve known for a long time a web exist and can’t find it and the funny thing is that I found the first black widow spider in the state of new york and I wasn’t impressed by that even though the ridgewood times was. I would appreciate anyone helping me. I hate to be a pain, but I’ve been trying for more than a year. Thank you.
that’s mean