RKO Keith's Theatre
135-35 Northern Boulevard,
Flushing,
NY
11354
135-35 Northern Boulevard,
Flushing,
NY
11354
51 people
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Jeffrey… I must have been mistaken. I’ve used the site from home only on my IBM laptop, not the Mac. I assume since the site is called Windows Local Live that the software is proprietary to the Windows platform.
Meanwhile… as promised, I took a trip to the Kieth’s the other morning with camera in hand and couldn’t stop snapping. I’ve added the series of 34 photos (including a few of the rear of the building) to my photobucket album.
Here’s a link to my RKO Kieth’s slbum. The new photos start at the end of the 3rd row down from the top and are all labeled “June 2006”.
If you want to cut to the chase, here are some images of the building’s rear:
Long shot rear exterior
Closer view rear stage wall
Water tower
Structure behind stage
Easy access to interior?
Chimney
Alternate view of rear wall
Alternate view of chimney
That shot of the smaller structure that appears to be attached to the rear stage wall shows a door that seems to be kicked in. I wonder if this was a stage entrance or alternative exit for the dressing rooms. It looks like there is a narrow alley behind the fencing for the small parking lot I was standing in to take these photos. I assume the stage left balcony fire escapes (which appear to have run within the building’s outer wall) must have routed folks through this structure around the rear stage wall and into the alley leaving them to exit onto Farrington Street which ran along the block’s eastern perimter. If you inspect those local.live aerial shots (particularly the view facing south showing the back wall), looks like the skinny right-of-way still runs between the building on the block’s northeast corner and the row of buldings running along Farrington.
Anyway… if that rear structure is a part of the Kieth’s, looks like easy interior access for potential vandals and squatters.
You know, that’s not a bad idea. Jane Hansen does an occasional series that runs Saturdays at 7 on WNBC-4, “Jane Hansen’s New York” that would be perfect. She once did a show on the hidden levels at Grand Central Station, and another on the abandoned High Line in Manhattan. Everybody should send e-mails to her at WNBC-TV with this suggestion!
p.s. I still can’t get anything but blank pages at Local Live — and I am using Safari.
I would love to go in and see the inside.
It’s so weird how I can recall this theater In It’s operation like It was yesterday. Let’s get togther and damand a tour.
Maybe someone can get a TV documentry or something about these type theaters and get the ok to look inside?
Love to see the secrets.
It looks great from the air, but as Ed says, that doesn’t preclude leaks in the roof, etc, but there were rumors that an entire wall was torn down. Of course, that “could” mean an interior wall was removed, such as the stage wall and procenium arch inside. You couldn’t be able to tell from the exterior. I wish someone would come up with interior photos. With all the controversy, you would think there would be some interior photos.
Here’s another view, more centered of the “RKO Flushing” side of the building:
View link
I could swear I’ve used the site on my Mac at home. Jeffrey… try opening in Safari if Internet Explorer doesn’t work. Anyway… the building looks pretty intact from that bird’s eye view. Certainly no walls blown open in any significant way. Of course, that doesn’t preclude leaky roofing or seepage through cracks in the brick and mortar.
Could be. I use windows, and they work with windows…. Not sure about Mac.
Bway, all I get with those links are blank screens. Are they perhaps not Mac friendly?
Thanks, so the address at the type of this page is obviously wrong (again, it would be in the middle of Flushing creek).
On a theater as famous as this one (probably ranking up there with the Valencia, Kings, etc), it should have the correct address!
Oh, by the way, when these links come up, “x” out the left side (with the ad on the left), as that will give you a bigger view of the link, especially in the first link, where you can’t see the theater unless you do that.
What is the true address of this theater? The top of the page says 129-43 Northern Blvd, which would put it in Flushing creek. Lost Memory posted a historic write up on the theater that states, 135-29 to 134-45 Northern Boulevard, Queens. So which is it? None of those addresses let me find it on a map. I had to go into local.live using aerial photos to locate this theater.
Anyway, here’s some local views of the building, the first one eastward facing, with the clear “RKO Flushing” painted on the side, haha…
View link
Then north facing, showing the front:
View link
And finally, the back of the building…someone had asked if there was a wall missing, and there doesn’t appear to obe a wall missing, but sometimes looks can be decieving:
View link
Flushing is, and always on the Island of Long Island….as is Brooklyn, the rest of Queens, etc….haha.
Seriously though, this is an interesting find. I don’t think there was another theater called the “Flushing”. It would seem strange that they would call the keiths in Richmond Hill the Richmond Hill, but not call the Keith’s in Flushing the Flushing. Seeing that “Flushing” is painted on the side of the building would almost have to say that they called it the FLushing, even if for a short time. Good find about the organs….I don’t know if it completely proves it, but it a start.
The book “The Landmarks of New York” by Barbaralee Diamondstein (published 1988) has the following entry regarding the Keith’s:
RKO KEITH’S FLUSHING THEATER INTERIOR, 1927-28
135-29 to 134-45 Northern Boulevard, Queens
Architect: Thomas Lamb
Designated: February 28, 1984
The RKO Keith’s Flushing Theater is one of the few surviving buildings of the “movie palace” era, which reached its peak in the short period between World War I and the Depression. Part of the vaudeville circuit founded by B.F.Keith, later the Radio-Keith-Orpheum circuit (RKO), this theater opened in 1928 to an audience subscription holders. Thomas Lamb, who designed hundreds of theaters, movie palaces and auditoriums in almost every major American city as well as in Canada, Europe and Australia, designed the Keith’s. This building is one of a handful that Lamb designed in the “atmospheric style” – a type of design for theaters that aimed at producing the illusion of open, outdoor spaces.
The grandeur of the 3,000-seat theater is seen not just in the auditorium, but also in the grand foyer, ticket booth hall, mezzanine promenade, and lounges. The walls of the auditorium – the theater’s main interior space – were built up as stage sets representing a Spanish-style townscape in the “Mexican-Baroque” or so-called Churrigeuresque style, an eighteenth-century modification of the Italian Baroque with Moorish and Gothic decorative elements. Among the Keith’s elaborate “atmospheric” features are its murals, gilded wood and plasterwork, a bright blue ceiling with electric “stars”, and a special machine projecting “clouds” moving across the ceiling – completing the illusion of a Spanish outdoor garden.
Ed, I was going to make the same reference…I don’t recall if Fitzgerald actually mentions the North Shore while he’s talking about Queens, but if I remember correctly, Jay Gatsby drivies out Northern Blvd. on his way to Big Egg and Little Egg (Great Neck and Little Neck) after passing through the Valley of Ashes (Corona) where the optometrist’s advertising sign with the big eyes stares down over everything. I can’t remember anything else in the book, but that scene has stuck with me for nearly 40 years!
It all sounds logical. And for the record, I don’t think the RKO Keith Richmond Hill ever had anything more than “RKO Keiths” on it either, IINM….
Perhaps the name “RKO FLUSHING” was some sort of short hand used simply as a way to distinguish the theater from the similarly named RKO Keith’s in Richmond Hill. I know in newspaper ads the theaters were sometimes referred to as “RKO Flushing” and RKO Richmond Hill". I don’t know this for a fact, but it’s possible (and I think likely) that the name “RKO Flushing” never graced the theater’s marquee.
Another thing to consider is that a trade-off might have been made when painting the sign to sacrifice the exact name of the theater in order to maximize the size of the lettering. Today, even in its faded condition, one can make out the advertising even from as far as the right field upper deck at Shea Stadium. I’ll bet when the sign was still bright and vibrant, people probably saw it for a great many blocks to the west.
Jeffrey… the identification of the phrase “North Shore” exclusively with Nassau and Suffolk Counties might be something of a post-war phenomenon. Remember that Queens (as well as Brooklyn) is technically on Long Island and back in the 1920’s and ‘30’s I’m fairly confident that it was not uncommon to refer to Queens as such. I think there are references to that effect in the Fitzgerald novel “The Great Gatsby” as well as in the 1930 Marx Brothers film “Animal Crackers”.
We lived in Flushing from the middle of the ‘60’s and it was known to us and our neighbors as the RKO Keith Flushing. Or the Flushing Keith!
Here’s a possibility. Those are awfully big letters, and I know that wall faces west…it is, of course, visible from down Northern Blvd. which would have been the major east-west road prior to the construction of the major parkways in the late 30s, or the expressways that came in the 60s. With that “North Shore” reference, I would assume the sign was intended to grab the attention of motorists heading further out on Long Island, with a geographical reference to Flushing that would be relevant to travelers. For that audience, the place reference was probably more important than the actual theater name.
LOL! But at least “Madison” was a part of it’s name! Why would they paint “FLUSHING” across the side of their theater if that was never even a part of their name?
Probably….however, it’s strange that it’s painted right on the side of the building, but would never have been referred to as the RKO Keiths Flushing.
Agreed, those are great photos.
What’s also interesting about that sign — though I’m not sure what era it’s from — is that for as long as I can recall (which is between 45 and 50 years) the “North Shore” has referred to Long Island. I don’t remember ever hearing Northern Queens referred to as the North Shore, or Flushing being lumped in with the rest of Long Island (even though, technically, it is). Since we know it was originally the Keith-Albee, and by the 60s was the RKO Keith’s, does anybody have any idea whether the RKO Flushing name was ever actually on the marquee, or did they just paint it on the building at some point?
Thanks Ed! My suspision is correct then! It was called the RKO Flushing at one time. Perhaps that should be added to the aka names above? I mean, it’s even painted on the side of the building!
Great collection of photos by the way….
Bway… I have a better photo of the old faded sign on the side of the building here in my photobucket album for the Keith’s. It’s the last photo in the top row.
The sign reads “RKO FLUSHING” in huge letters and beneath that in smaller print, “The finest theater on the North Shore”.
Jeffrey1955… I’ll see if I can get down there with my camera and snap some shots of the rear. As big as it is, the structure doesn’t run all the way back to the rear street, and there are some structures along that street that partially obscure the view. However, I have driven down the side street (Farrington) and have caught glimpses of the theater’s rear stage wall, which appears to be intact. Judging by what can be seen from the street, the roof also appears to be largely intact, but there may be sufficient gaps in the surface or at the seams to allow for water seepage. I don’t think there are any gaping holes in the outer walls or roofing that expose the auditorium to sunlight and weather. The partial demolition referred to above was done by the previous owner, Thomas Huang, who apparently had a field day (or two) with a demolition crew on some of the theater’s interior elements.
I attempted posting this yesterday, but apparently it didn’t take. Does anyone have any (recent) photos showing the rear of the building? I’m trying to figure out why all these photos make it look like the building is intact, yet earlier posts describe partial demolition and deterioration with the auditorium open to the elements. Where, exactly, is the destruction — is it entirely from a hole in the roof?
Lost, thanks for posting those photos. From the photo linked here below:
View link
..it appears that the word “Flushing” was at one time painted on the side of the building. Was the word “Flushing” ever in the official Theater title? Such as for example, “RKO Keiths Richmond Hill”?
I pass the theater with some frequency… As of yesterday, the theater is still standing.