RKO Keith's Theatre
135-35 Northern Boulevard,
Flushing,
NY
11354
135-35 Northern Boulevard,
Flushing,
NY
11354
51 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1,251 - 1,275 of 1,324 comments
Ok, This has been killing me, I’m getting so sick of people here saying “the damage is already done” and “the former owner destroyed it”. Thats all bull$#!% ! I’ve had the chance on numerous occasions to slip inside, the plywood wall out fron hasnt always been the most secure and there is no secuity. Yeah, the guy who owned it has done some damage to it but it HAS NOT been destroyed. Its dusty and has leaks but for the most part ITS WHOLE. Everyone has been falling for this excuse and for them to give us the lobby (and let me tell you the part they are gonna restore is no bigger square footage wise than your average mcdonalds restaurant. Someone had psted why cant they build the new building above the old one so the auditorium can be saved ?? The theater is pretty much intact and no worse for wear than the little trylon theater they are all trying to save on queens blvd. I mean the keiths even has its original stage curtains still hanging and i guess thats all gonna get ripped down as long as we get our little lobby. Look at the Lowe’s paradise theater in the bronx, that place was just as bed, and i had the pleasure of getting in there for a peek before the did and just compleated a full blown restoration. Sorry if i seem bitter but it just hurts that everyone is kind of just settling for “nothing” kinda like a tease of what used to be there.
Restored lobby…..nonsense
Yes, that also seems pretty awful to me.
Absolutely HORRIBLE! What that Saran wrap front has to do with the original
Keith is ridiculous. It also has nothing to do with the neighborhood where I lived for 20 years. Or with the people who live there now. Who approved this desecration?
Here’s the only image I could find online regarding the proposed “RKO Plaza” development on the Keith’s site. It reveals nothing regarding what elements of the lobby will be preserved as the angle of the image shows only an exterior rendering of what the undulating glass curtain facade might look like from down the block.
View link
This is from the architectural firm’s official web site.
The problem here is that the damage is already done. The theater is all but gone inside from what I’ve heard. The former owner destroyed it, and whatever he didn’t was probably destroyed through the ravages of time over the following 20 years. It’s over, whether we like it or not. Nothing can bring the theater back, as much of what was the theater is already gone.
I agree. What really eats at me is how the media plays up this alleged “restoration” as if the entirety of the theater will be “given back” to the neighborhood, as the article reads. As Warren points out, it was only the lobby that had been granted landmark status, not the once magnificent auditorium — even though this article and several others posted on this page before it would have you believe that the full interior will be restored. Even so, a “glass curtain” is to replace the southern interior wall of the lobby as per the developer’s plans, meaning that plenty of the detail that is under landmark “protection” will be demolished anyway. If the Borough President feels so passionately about the theater’s importance, then why couldn’t she have vigorously campaigned for a complete restoration as a negotiation point for the increased FAR desired by the developers? I know the Keith’s is a much larger theater, but Hilton was able to cantilever their 42nd Street Hotel over the auditorium of the Liberty Theater, thereby preserving it for future use. I’m afraid that after all is said and done, there’ll be little more than the grand staircases and upper lobby facade left to remind us of the RKO Keith’s former glory.
“It will indeed be a resurrection,” says the Sun… What nonsense!
While it may have been too much to hope for a restoration to it’s former glory, I also don’t believe this to be a reasonable compromise either. They could have built several floors over the theater to use as office space. What a shame to allow another still redeemable show palace like RKO Keith slip through our fingers.
This article appeared in The New York Sun newspaper on 09/29/05:
http://www.nysun.com/article/20711
September 29, 2005 Edition > Section: Real Estate >
Developer May Soon Revive Landmark Theater in Flushing
BY JULIA VITULLO-MARTIN – Special to the Sun
September 29, 2005
URL: http://www.nysun.com/article/20711
At a public hearing on Tuesday, the Board of Standards and Appeals signaled that the 20-year saga of the RKO-Keith Theater in Flushing, Queens, may soon end, leading to the building’s rebirth.
The board’s chairwoman, Meenakshi Srinivasan, indicated she would be receptive to granting the variance that would allow a major reconstruction of the site to go forward. Further negotiations will be necessary to decide the details of a tentatively reached compromise proposed by the development director of Boymelgreen Developers, Scott Milsom, who agreed to provide more parking in exchange for being allowed to build at their requested bulk.
Many community representatives seemed relieved. “People are in favor of this project,” the district manager of Community Board 7, Marilyn Bitterman, said. “The site was abandoned and neglected for years. We were thrilled when the developer purchased it and decided to develop it while keeping the integrity of the theater and enhancing the landmarked portion of the building.”
The president of Queens, Helen Marshall, regarded RKO-Keith as so important that she testified in person – the first time she has done so since leaving the chairmanship of the zoning committee of Community Board 3 and winning elected office. She urged the board to accept the “project proposal as approved by Community Board 7 and myself.”
Or as Council Member John Liu said, “We want this building resurrected from the dead, and we really don’t want to wait much longer.”
A lawyer for Boymelgreen, Howard Goldman, said the project would go forward if all goes well at a final hearing on November 2. The board may then approve the project by the end of the year.
It will indeed be a resurrection. After being nearly destroyed in 1986 by its owner, Thomas Huang, who demolished sections of the exterior and spilled hundreds of gallons of oil in the basement, the RKO-Keith Theater sat vacant, dragging down property values. Boymelgreen bought it in 2002, and proposed a 19-story, 375,000-square-foot mixed-use building, which is about three times what zoning allows. Community members were concerned about the size of the project and were not appeased even with a design by a renowned architectural firm, the V Studio of the Walker Group. In February 2004, Community Board 7 voted 35-0 not to approve it.
The architect tried again, scaling it down from a floor area ratio of 9.5 to a FAR of 7.5, eliminating the interior retail mall and most office space, making the project largely residential with only ground-level retail. The new design retained features important to the community, including a 12,500-square-foot senior center and four levels of parking. In February 2005, the community board voted 32-2 to approve it.
Nonetheless, the Board of Standards and Appeals, which had to authorize the variance, was intent on scaling the project back further, to a FAR of 6.5.The developer said this was unworkable.
The site offers tough design problems for many reasons, not least because the theater’s interior, which is landmarked, has been badly trashed. (Though designed by a famous architect, Thomas Lamb, the theater’s exterior was not landmarked at the request of then-borough president Donald Manes, who later committed suicide amid financial scandals.) Calling this part of the site “the egg,” a principal of the V Studio, Jay Valgora, testified that preserving it while trying to build on top of and around it presented him with the “most complex job of sequencing” he had ever faced as an architect. It also presented him with very high construction costs of $238 a square foot. “The costs of preserving the egg are constant,” he said. “We need a variance for greater bulk to offset these costs. If we’re forced to go down to 6.5, we’ll have to produce an inferior building, with punched windows and a far less articulated facade.” The audience stirred as he spoke. After waiting all these years, community members do not want an inferior building.
And while the apartments will be sold at prices between $470 and $623 a square foot ($337,000 to $1.2 million), Mr. Goldman testified that profits will be low – 3.3% at the 7.5 FAR requested by the developer, or 1.5% at the 6.5 FAR preferred by the Board of Standards and Appeals. Ms. Srinivasan, the chairwoman, challenged Mr. Goldman and Mr. Valgora, asking why they could not provide all the same amenities they propose at 7.5 for a smaller building at 6.5.
In the end, the extra parking demanded by the board – 32 spaces – became a deal maker. The site, which is near Flushing Bay, sits on a high water table, making construction deep into the ground very expensive. But Mr. Milsom proposed a solution: “We’ll figure out how to find more parking without going down to the water table,” he said.
Yet even if the board approves the FAR of 7.5 on November 2 as expected, construction is unlikely to begin for another eight months, while new designs are prepared. The building won’t open, says Mr. Milsom, for at least two and a half years.
If the neighborhood is indeed given back its RKO-Keith Theater in 2007, it will have much to celebrate – including the 80th anniversary of RKO-Keith’s first groundbreaking in 1927. It opened to joyous crowds in 1928.
Went to this theatre only a couple of times when I lived in Flushing but it was great house too bad its no longer operating. Bring back the past!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Wow. Great photo Warren. I can’t say that I ever recall admiring the exterior facade of the Keith’s much… but this shot really shows how handsome the detailing around the windows and spandrels was back in its heydey. Was that cast iron? And of course the old fashioned arched marquee was an integral part (indeed the focal point) of the whole design — as opposed to the big boxy marquee I recall from the ‘70’s and '80’s.
Warren….is there anyway you can forward me a large scan of that 1947 exterior pic of the RKO Keiths? I grew up in Flushing in the 60s/70s and now live in Houston and thatpic brings back so many memories.
Thanks
joe
Just a personal post script… The last time I spent time inside the Keith’s was for a double feature in the big upstairs theater around 1985 or ‘86 when I was still a student at Queens College. The movies were “Hells Angels Forever” – a documentary on the infamous motorcycle club that I wanted to see mostly because of Jerry Garcia’s involvement (long time Dead head here) – and a re-release of the offbeat 1975 sci-fi flick “A Boy and His Dog” starring Don Johnson and Jason Robards. I remember the place was as cold as an ice-box. There were, perhaps, 15 or 20 people taking in the show – a weekday matinee, by the way.
A week later, I saw my Uncle at a family gathering and he asked if I had seen that very double feature at the Keith’s a few days earlier… Turns out, he had been among the small crowd in attendance that afternoon, but was maybe 20 or 25 rows behind me. He thought he spotted me coming back to my seat from a visit to the candy counter downstairs and tried to get my attention, but the lights went down for the second feature and he decided not to bother me in case he was mistaken. I guess I ran out of the theater so quickly at the film’s end that he never had a chance to catch up with me (the place was enormous, so it was very easy to get a jump on the folks in the back rows if you sat down front in the old balcony, close to the exit)!
Anyway… I do remember taking a long look around at the old place as if I somehow knew that she might not be around for much longer. I spent almost the entire intermission walking around the lobby and taking in the view as I ascended the magnificent curved staircase back up to the balcony auditorium. Then I hung out between two of the columns on the landing upstairs that overlooked the lower lobby… just drinking it all in. Trying to imagine the crowds streaming past the old fountain (long gone by that time) or up the stairs for a bird’s eye view on a Friday or Saturday night.
I wish I were back there now… with my camera.
What a damn crying shame…
Warren… I agree with you. Anything less than a full restoration has to be considered some kind of defeat. As for the plans to restore the lobby, if they plan on installing a glass curtain through which passersby on the streets and sidewalks can peer into the old lobby, wouldn’t that mean the necessary destruction of the interior front wall – which has some marvelous detailing above the entrance from the outer lobby? How can that be considered a restoration of the landmarked portion of the structure if the entire lobby was so designated? Still, I’ll begrudgingly accept this very bittersweet compromise when faced with the total destruction of the building.
And much belated thanks to Ed Baxter for his well written post detailing his “guided tour” of the Keith’s ruins back in February. It was so richly detailed, I almost feel as if I was given that tour myself (the description of the torn and frayed screen from the upstairs theater hanging from the ceiling like an “old pirate ship sail” was most evocative). My impulse is to say that if the Keith’s were located in Times Square rather than in Flushing (the outer boroughs always play second fiddle to Manhattan) this story might have a different ending… but, of course, history has shown that the popcorn palaces of Broadway didn’t fare any better themselves for the most part (see Roxy, Rivoli, Capitol, etc). Still… for all the talk of how dilapidated the auditorium is, could it be any worse than that of the New Amsterdam before Disney came to the rescue? I mean, that place was a complete wreck with portions exposed to the elements via gaping holes in the roof!!!
Anyway… here are some photos I took of the Keith’s exterior a couple of weekends back. In the last photo you can still make out the advertisement painted on the side of the building heralding the “RKO Flushing” as the “Finest Theater on the North Shore”…
IMG_0648.jpg
IMG_0649.jpg
IMG_0651.jpg
IMG_0652.jpg
I’d love to get my camera inside the place, but I doubt my luck would ever run as hot as Ed Baxter’s did and – alas – the days for that would seem to be numbered.
Thank you, Warren, for your kind comments. There is no commercial recording of Movie Palaces. I do have it on cassette recorded at revues. But no way of transmitting it here. It is from my 1989 and 1995 show “Life Is Not Like The Movies”—so you see the subject has always been front and center with me. I am very impressed with your involvement and knowledge of movie palaces. Do you know Jerry Rotondi who risked his life trying to save the Keith? Francesca
The morning I saw that sign on its marquee announced the proposed destruction of the RKO Keith, I was on my way to work in Manhattan. In that time it took to get to my office, I’d written this lyric, which has since been performed in NY cabarets, the Queens Museum and elsewhere:
“MOVIE PALACES”
They’re tearing down the RKO Keith on Northern Boulevard
And I’m taking it hard.
Remember starlit ceiling, scarlet walls?
Waiting for the matinee in Tudor halls
Seats of ruby velvet, carpeted aisles,
Luminous tears and flashbulb smiles.
Movie palaces were shining, shining all over town.
There we found the silver lining and spangled gown.
Remember marble statues, Raisinets?
Gold braid on the uniforms of usherettes,
In their gilded cages, pretty cashiers,
The thrill when dimmers dimmed the chandeliers?
Movie palaces were glowing, glowing a million nights.
Movie palaces were showing our lives in lights.
Remember tinkling fountains, three hour shows?
And all those couples necking in the dark back rows,
Moorish balconies and Renaissance doors—
And on the screen, their dreams were yours!
The Loew’s Valencia, the Loew’s Alhambra,
The Paramount, the Paradise, the Fox—
The Capitol, the Avalon, the Rivoli, the Tivoli,
The Strand, the Majestic, the Roxy…ahh the Roxy!
Remember angels flying round the dome,
Restrooms reminiscent of the baths of Rome,
Satin sofas that belonged at Versailles,
Cathedral arches soaring to the sky,
All our castles in the air
Came down to earth for everyone to share.
You didn’t have to be a millionaire.
Just one tiny ticket you were there…
And so it’s not surprising when you find
Movie palaces keep rising in your mind!
©1988 Francesca Blumenthal & Addy Fieger
I grew up in Flushing and saw more movies at RKO Keith’s than I can count. The best movie for the locale was “Murder on the Orient Express” in 1974. The elegant costumes and decor in the film perfectly matched the ornate RKO Keith’s. This was before they chopped up the theater into a triplex, so that cool fountain was still in the lobby. So many memories at the RKO – both Godfather and Godfather II, Star Wars, Stepford Wives….it’s nice to remember them all. I’m glad that at least a small piece of the theater will remain, unlike the Prospect just down the street, which is now a bank with absolutely no sign a theater ever existed there.
Yeah, since that hairbag illegally destroyed some elements and let the place rot for 20 years, there isn’t much left to restore. Kudos to the do-nothing NYC Landmarks Commission, yet another worthless city bureaucracy….
How could anyone be so cruel to destroy such a work of art in such a brutal way?!? I’m highly anticipating the completed Keith Theatre project. Can’t wait to tour it! A victory is finally being achieved!!! (If only that applied to more Queens theaters)
My wife and I frequently went to the movies at the Kieth in the early – mid 70’s. Having spent most of my childhood growing up on LI, I had not seen a theater like that in many years. However, as a kid growing up in Crown Height, Brooklyn, I do remember going into a very opulent Loews theater on Easter Parkway (within a few blocks of Bedford Avenue?). I remember going to see one of the dopey Korean War movies there called “Pork Chop Hill” with my dad and uncle.
I remember by first visit to the theater and was awestruck by the architecture. I felt it was a crime to even convert it to a multiplex but, alas, the theater has suffered a much worse fate. FYI … I believe, the fountain was gone after the conversion to a multiplex.
I always new there was more “behind the scenes” at the Keith than the theater we movie goers saw. Hearing about the backstage areas was fascinating.
to Warren
the pictures of the lobby and the exterior were great!
If you can locate any more pictures please post them.
this was my neighborhood theater when i was growing up
as it was magnificent. shame on all who had a part in destroying this jewel. once again Warren, thank you.
Here is the advance order form for when the Electronovision version of “Hamlet” opened at the Keith's
View link
I’d like to know if anybody could verify whether Pearl S. Buck made any personal appearances at the RKO Keith’s around 1935-1937. If not, is there a source I might be able to refer to for dates of celebrity appearances?
On a personal note, I went to a number of movies there from the late 60s to the early 80s, when the theater was subdivided to compete with the multiplexes. Half of the experience was taking in the grandeur of the theater – the stars & clouds on the ceiling, the ornate balcony, lobby fountain and the organ rolling out from stage right… I’m glad my mother brought me there, and gave me memories that today’s young people will only find in history books and museums. All they have to look forward to are impersonal multiplex rooms which for the most part are quite sterile. Worse, I’m writing this and I’m only 41.
It’s a shame that another piece of rich New York history is slipping away.
In reference to this Daily News story, as found as part of a Newsreel post on this site’s main page earlier this week – View link – the progress being made on redeveloping (and restoring, where possible) the Keith’s site is fantastic, but there’s one thing I’m not clear on: do those future plans include rehabbing the auditorium? From what I’ve read previously, including Ed Baxter’s post from this past February 27th, it had been essentially destroyed beyond hope, but this article, if I’m reading it correctly, seems to indicate otherwise. Can anyone shed some light on this?
To Robert R, I couldn’t get the link to work, is there a different search criterea to get to this article?
I worked at the Keith’s as an usher and occasionally as an assistant manager from 1973-1977. I also worked The Albee, The Dyker, The Alden and The Fordham. They were magnificent theatres. But none matched the Keith’s. What pleasure and fun I had working there, operating the curtains and light switches at the Keith’s. Not to mention exploring the great rooms behind the stage and the basement. I remember having to bring the movie canisters to the projection booth way up there. I also remember the night they lost the Mohamed Ali feed and a riot broke out. We ushers scrambled where the stagehands hanged out and locked ourselves behind a steel door. When things settled the fountain was somewhat trashed and the managers door had dents in it. What a night that was.
All the employees there were fun to work with and the management was fun also.
To those of you who were there I hope all of you are all well
Best Regards and Cheers
Liv