RobertR, there may not have been a second feature with “Airport”. I recall seeing “Airport” at the RKO Madison, in the spring or summer of 1970. I also saw “Topaz” at the RKO Madison in March 1970, and saw “They Shoot Horses, Don’t They ?” there in April 1970.
Same here. There were two staircases up to the balcony, one in the outer lobby, outside the original ticket takers, one in the inner lobby. I remember the chain across the outer lobby staircase. Like yourself, I only returned to the balcony after it had been made into separate cinemas.
Same here. There were two staircases up to the balcony, one in the outer lobby, outside the original ticket takers, one in the inner lobby. I remember the chain across the outer lobby staircase. Like yourself, I only returned to the balcony after it had been made into separate cinemas.
Bway, you could be mistaken, or, at age 13, one of the two lower cinemas may have seemed as large as the original full orchestra, when you saw E.T. there in 1982.
The first multiplexing MUST have been the separation of orchestra and balcony, because that’s what I saw on Tuesday, June 17 1980. I also think that, prior to that, the balcony may have been closed for awhile. On June 17, 1980, the original elliptical balcony lobby was still intact.
Perhaps this question should be directed to “The Old Timer” of the Times Newsweekly, perhaps the closest we have to a “Ridgewood Answer Man”.
To once again add my own voice to this ever-growing and increasingly layered confusion, RobertR, I too saw “Blowout” (the 1981 Brian DePalma film with John Travolta and Nancy Allen) at the Ridgewood in late July 1981, but remember it being at one (and perhaps this is the key) of the downstairs cinemas. If it’s any help, “Wolfen” was also playing there then.
I think the orchestra was still one cinema when I saw “The Howling” at the Ridgewood on Friday, March 13, 1981, 7:30 PM screening. I think the moon was full that night also. Seriously.
The date of that image # 2637 you refer to was 21 September 1975. I do not know what that tall structure behind the RKO Bushwick was, that appears in that image.
The address of the Monroe was 4 Howard Avenue. Let’s one of us get a tax map showing that address, and that should settle where the Monroe was located.
I don’t know. I will ask my dad about it. I see it on my Cinema Tour listing. Perhaps Jackie Gleason appeared there as well as at the Halsey Theater, a block away.
Perhaps Gleason named his Honeymooners character Ralph Kramden, after nearby Ralph Avenue.
You and me both. Perhaps now is the time to begin making our case to, and filing the paperwork with, the National Registry of Historic Places, on behalf of the Ridgewood Theater, to make it an official landmark. I think it has been an unofficial landmark for many years now.
The Ridgewood may have still been a single theater when I saw “Love At First Bite” there in May 1980. I know it still was when I saw the Langella “Dracula” there in September 1979, and the re-release of “Jaws” in July 1979.
When I was at the Ridgewood on Tuesday June 17, 1980 it was already a duplex. A boxing match was being shown on closed circuit TV on the lower, orchestra level, and “Friday the 13th” was playing on the balcony level. Bway has posted some recollections about the multiplexing of the Ridgewood above and earlier on this page.
Perhaps you should send your ideas to the owners of the Ridgewood Theater. They would probably want to know how to make more money.
The Ridgewood has always had an “actual second floor”, as it has always had a balcony. I know. I’ve been there. I was last up there late September 1988 for the atrocious film “Nightfall” (based in name only on the Isaac Asimov sci fi story of that name).
The Ridgewood’s original balcony used to have a beautiful elliptical lobby, with an ornate raised molding plaster ceiling, with central medallion and light fixture, with entrances to seating aisles in front, refreshment counter in back, stairs to the outer and inner lobbies to the sides. I was last there Tuesday June 17 1980.
Glad you liked my joke, Bway ! Maybe the holographic shark will draw customers in, like a sidewalk hawker !
Perhaps in 2104, if the “Friday the 13th” movies have kept up, more kids will know who Jason is, than know who was U.S. President on Friday, June 13, 1980, when the first “Friday the 13th” movie was released. (Hint : it was Jimmy Carter !)
I liked the MAD TV routine of “Apollo the 13th : Jason takes NASA ” :
“Houston, we have a problem !” as the hockey mask looms and the machete comes down, yet again.
Also, how much more “multiplexed” will the Ridgewood be then ? Will it be showing as many features as it has seats (about 2000) each seat having its own audio-visual headset, like the private-viewing cubicles in the Museum Of Television and Radio ?
Our dedicated young fan, Monica, may be of some help, as she still lives in Ridgewood, still attends the Ridgewood Theater, and has created a separate page for the Ridgewood on this very site !
The Ridgewood Theater, still there in a hundred years ? Certainly !
To borrow a joke from “Back To The Future III” :
It’s the year 2104, and the Ridgewood is showing “Jaws 43” in 5-D, but the shark STILL seems fake !
Lostmemory, the Jefferson Theater, located at 811 Myrtle Ave in Brooklyn, is also on my Cinema Tour listing for Brooklyn. The adjacent cross streets were Nostrand and Marcy Avenues. Neither I nor any members of my family, to my knowledge, have had any experience with, or memory of, this theater. I might have once glimpsed it out the window of a Myrtle Avenue el train, but do not remember doing so.
Lostmemory, you’re welcome. Maybe you or I should start pages on those theaters, and hope that others may fill in the blanks.
RobertR : Please tell me, on what dates did you see “Squirm” and “Tentacles” at the RKO Madison ? As I recall, “Squirm” came out in July 1976. I remember the ads on TV : a guy telling a girl, “It’s too late ! They’re dead !” and a girl in a shower looking up at a shower head clogged with night crawlers and screaming her lungs out.
As I had posted previously, I remember the RKO Madison showing a re-release of “The Exorcist”, along with “The Yakuza”, in August 1976.
I don’t recall the large metal Coca Cola signs.
I also remember a small record store in spring 1976 at the eastern end of the RKO Madison’s Myrtle Avenue facade, right where the building abutted on Woolworth’s. Album covers I remember in the record store’s window were : “Nice ‘N Nasty”, The SalSoul Orchestra, with that barely, teasingly, bare-assed dark-haired girl smirking over her shoulder, and Redd Foxx, “You Gotta Wash Your Ass”. I was going to buy the Stones album “Black And Blue” there, but got it in midtown Manhattan instead. I remember debating carfare vs. a higher retail price with my mom at the time.
RobertR, I don’t know about the independent reopening the Madison, because I still don’t know the last day that the RKO Madison Theater showed movies. I feel I should know this, because I lived near it, and walked by it all the time then, but I don’t know, and it bugs me. The last two films I saw there were “Taxi Driver” in May 1976 and “Lipstick” in either June or July of 1976. For those two films, the screen seemed the same size it had always been.
lostmemory : Both the Imperial and the Echo Theater are on the Cinema Tour listing that I printed out for myself last April. The cross street for the Echo is Moore St. northwest of Flushing Avenue, and northwest of the part of Bushwick Avenue that is mostly residential. To my knowledge, my family has had no experience of this theater. I asked my father if he remembered it, and he said no.
The Imperial was at Irving and DeKalb Avenues. The older of my two uncles saw the Lugosi “Dracula” there either 1931 or 1932. About a dozen years later, when he returned home from the Signal Corps in Africa during WW II, the Imperial had become a Robert Hall store, so my uncle went there to buy some needed civilian clothes.
R143, please take my word for it ! The RKo Madison Theater was a beautiful showhouse in its day. I was very saddened in April 1979 to peer through a sidewalk board peephole at its charred, gutted interior, and remember how beautiful it once was, and all the enjoyable times I had had inside it. I saw only movies there, but my parents saw live shows there before I was born. What a place. You are quite right.
BTW, are you also R143 on the SubTalk and SubChat message boards ?
Sorry I missed you, Tampadad. I’m glad to read that the theater did such a brisk business on weekends back when you were there. The one and only film I ever saw at Loew’s Oriental was “Star Trek IV : The Voyage Home” the last Sunday in February 1987. It was a triplex at the time. Even divided into three cinemas, each cinema was huge, given the total size of the theater. The Moorish architecture of balconies, arches, vaulted ceilings, all covered with ceramic tiles, was beautiful. Seeing all of this, one of my friends thought it had been a mosque before it was a theater. I and my other friends had to explain to her the grandiose architecture and interior decor of some of NYC’s older theaters.
Did a gang war break out inside the theater during “Fort Apache The Bronx” ?
Thanks, lostmemory, for the interesting details. But I thought Ridgewood was first known as East Williamsburgh, and that Elmhurst was first known as Newtown. The Grand Avenue stop on the local Queens Blvd. subway is still sub-titled “Newtown”.
It is possible. The Madison was huge, but not infinite ?
RobertR, there may not have been a second feature with “Airport”. I recall seeing “Airport” at the RKO Madison, in the spring or summer of 1970. I also saw “Topaz” at the RKO Madison in March 1970, and saw “They Shoot Horses, Don’t They ?” there in April 1970.
Same here. There were two staircases up to the balcony, one in the outer lobby, outside the original ticket takers, one in the inner lobby. I remember the chain across the outer lobby staircase. Like yourself, I only returned to the balcony after it had been made into separate cinemas.
Same here. There were two staircases up to the balcony, one in the outer lobby, outside the original ticket takers, one in the inner lobby. I remember the chain across the outer lobby staircase. Like yourself, I only returned to the balcony after it had been made into separate cinemas.
Bway, you could be mistaken, or, at age 13, one of the two lower cinemas may have seemed as large as the original full orchestra, when you saw E.T. there in 1982.
The first multiplexing MUST have been the separation of orchestra and balcony, because that’s what I saw on Tuesday, June 17 1980. I also think that, prior to that, the balcony may have been closed for awhile. On June 17, 1980, the original elliptical balcony lobby was still intact.
Perhaps this question should be directed to “The Old Timer” of the Times Newsweekly, perhaps the closest we have to a “Ridgewood Answer Man”.
To once again add my own voice to this ever-growing and increasingly layered confusion, RobertR, I too saw “Blowout” (the 1981 Brian DePalma film with John Travolta and Nancy Allen) at the Ridgewood in late July 1981, but remember it being at one (and perhaps this is the key) of the downstairs cinemas. If it’s any help, “Wolfen” was also playing there then.
I think the orchestra was still one cinema when I saw “The Howling” at the Ridgewood on Friday, March 13, 1981, 7:30 PM screening. I think the moon was full that night also. Seriously.
The date of that image # 2637 you refer to was 21 September 1975. I do not know what that tall structure behind the RKO Bushwick was, that appears in that image.
The address of the Monroe was 4 Howard Avenue. Let’s one of us get a tax map showing that address, and that should settle where the Monroe was located.
My pleasure. Excelsior !
I don’t know. I will ask my dad about it. I see it on my Cinema Tour listing. Perhaps Jackie Gleason appeared there as well as at the Halsey Theater, a block away.
Perhaps Gleason named his Honeymooners character Ralph Kramden, after nearby Ralph Avenue.
You and me both. Perhaps now is the time to begin making our case to, and filing the paperwork with, the National Registry of Historic Places, on behalf of the Ridgewood Theater, to make it an official landmark. I think it has been an unofficial landmark for many years now.
The Ridgewood may have still been a single theater when I saw “Love At First Bite” there in May 1980. I know it still was when I saw the Langella “Dracula” there in September 1979, and the re-release of “Jaws” in July 1979.
When I was at the Ridgewood on Tuesday June 17, 1980 it was already a duplex. A boxing match was being shown on closed circuit TV on the lower, orchestra level, and “Friday the 13th” was playing on the balcony level. Bway has posted some recollections about the multiplexing of the Ridgewood above and earlier on this page.
Perhaps you should send your ideas to the owners of the Ridgewood Theater. They would probably want to know how to make more money.
The Ridgewood has always had an “actual second floor”, as it has always had a balcony. I know. I’ve been there. I was last up there late September 1988 for the atrocious film “Nightfall” (based in name only on the Isaac Asimov sci fi story of that name).
The Ridgewood’s original balcony used to have a beautiful elliptical lobby, with an ornate raised molding plaster ceiling, with central medallion and light fixture, with entrances to seating aisles in front, refreshment counter in back, stairs to the outer and inner lobbies to the sides. I was last there Tuesday June 17 1980.
Glad you liked my joke, Bway ! Maybe the holographic shark will draw customers in, like a sidewalk hawker !
Perhaps in 2104, if the “Friday the 13th” movies have kept up, more kids will know who Jason is, than know who was U.S. President on Friday, June 13, 1980, when the first “Friday the 13th” movie was released. (Hint : it was Jimmy Carter !)
I liked the MAD TV routine of “Apollo the 13th : Jason takes NASA ” :
“Houston, we have a problem !” as the hockey mask looms and the machete comes down, yet again.
Also, how much more “multiplexed” will the Ridgewood be then ? Will it be showing as many features as it has seats (about 2000) each seat having its own audio-visual headset, like the private-viewing cubicles in the Museum Of Television and Radio ?
Our dedicated young fan, Monica, may be of some help, as she still lives in Ridgewood, still attends the Ridgewood Theater, and has created a separate page for the Ridgewood on this very site !
The Ridgewood Theater, still there in a hundred years ? Certainly !
To borrow a joke from “Back To The Future III” :
It’s the year 2104, and the Ridgewood is showing “Jaws 43” in 5-D, but the shark STILL seems fake !
Lostmemory, the Jefferson Theater, located at 811 Myrtle Ave in Brooklyn, is also on my Cinema Tour listing for Brooklyn. The adjacent cross streets were Nostrand and Marcy Avenues. Neither I nor any members of my family, to my knowledge, have had any experience with, or memory of, this theater. I might have once glimpsed it out the window of a Myrtle Avenue el train, but do not remember doing so.
Lostmemory, you’re welcome. Maybe you or I should start pages on those theaters, and hope that others may fill in the blanks.
RobertR : Please tell me, on what dates did you see “Squirm” and “Tentacles” at the RKO Madison ? As I recall, “Squirm” came out in July 1976. I remember the ads on TV : a guy telling a girl, “It’s too late ! They’re dead !” and a girl in a shower looking up at a shower head clogged with night crawlers and screaming her lungs out.
As I had posted previously, I remember the RKO Madison showing a re-release of “The Exorcist”, along with “The Yakuza”, in August 1976.
I don’t recall the large metal Coca Cola signs.
I also remember a small record store in spring 1976 at the eastern end of the RKO Madison’s Myrtle Avenue facade, right where the building abutted on Woolworth’s. Album covers I remember in the record store’s window were : “Nice ‘N Nasty”, The SalSoul Orchestra, with that barely, teasingly, bare-assed dark-haired girl smirking over her shoulder, and Redd Foxx, “You Gotta Wash Your Ass”. I was going to buy the Stones album “Black And Blue” there, but got it in midtown Manhattan instead. I remember debating carfare vs. a higher retail price with my mom at the time.
RobertR, I don’t know about the independent reopening the Madison, because I still don’t know the last day that the RKO Madison Theater showed movies. I feel I should know this, because I lived near it, and walked by it all the time then, but I don’t know, and it bugs me. The last two films I saw there were “Taxi Driver” in May 1976 and “Lipstick” in either June or July of 1976. For those two films, the screen seemed the same size it had always been.
lostmemory : Both the Imperial and the Echo Theater are on the Cinema Tour listing that I printed out for myself last April. The cross street for the Echo is Moore St. northwest of Flushing Avenue, and northwest of the part of Bushwick Avenue that is mostly residential. To my knowledge, my family has had no experience of this theater. I asked my father if he remembered it, and he said no.
The Imperial was at Irving and DeKalb Avenues. The older of my two uncles saw the Lugosi “Dracula” there either 1931 or 1932. About a dozen years later, when he returned home from the Signal Corps in Africa during WW II, the Imperial had become a Robert Hall store, so my uncle went there to buy some needed civilian clothes.
R143, please take my word for it ! The RKo Madison Theater was a beautiful showhouse in its day. I was very saddened in April 1979 to peer through a sidewalk board peephole at its charred, gutted interior, and remember how beautiful it once was, and all the enjoyable times I had had inside it. I saw only movies there, but my parents saw live shows there before I was born. What a place. You are quite right.
BTW, are you also R143 on the SubTalk and SubChat message boards ?
I wonder how many theaters in not only the USA but the entire world named the Empire once featured burlesque ?
Thank you, Rose. At that admission price, too bad the Monroe is gone. I will tell my father. He will be very interested to know.
Sorry I missed you, Tampadad. I’m glad to read that the theater did such a brisk business on weekends back when you were there. The one and only film I ever saw at Loew’s Oriental was “Star Trek IV : The Voyage Home” the last Sunday in February 1987. It was a triplex at the time. Even divided into three cinemas, each cinema was huge, given the total size of the theater. The Moorish architecture of balconies, arches, vaulted ceilings, all covered with ceramic tiles, was beautiful. Seeing all of this, one of my friends thought it had been a mosque before it was a theater. I and my other friends had to explain to her the grandiose architecture and interior decor of some of NYC’s older theaters.
Did a gang war break out inside the theater during “Fort Apache The Bronx” ?
And inquiring minds WILL know, so long as they keep inquiring !
True. The album title is also a comment on how laughable world politics and power struggles often are.
J.F. Lundy :
My e-mail address is :
.army.mil
Thanks in advance for the image of the Empire marquee.
The burlesque once performed there has been memorialized in the title of a 1985 Bob Dylan album : “Empire Burlesque”.
Thanks, lostmemory, for the interesting details. But I thought Ridgewood was first known as East Williamsburgh, and that Elmhurst was first known as Newtown. The Grand Avenue stop on the local Queens Blvd. subway is still sub-titled “Newtown”.