Comments from PKoch

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PKoch
PKoch commented about RKO Keith's Richmond Hill Theatre on May 30, 2006 at 8:26 am

Could the Triangle Ballroom have been located above the Triangle Hofbrau Restaurant, the “triangle” being formed by 117th Street, Myrtle Avenue, and Jamaica Avenue ? It used to be Doyle’s Triangle Hotel.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Embassy Theatre on May 30, 2006 at 8:21 am

I remember a Greek-American Colony restaurant in Ridgewood, Queens, on the northwest side of Cornelia Street, a few doors northeast of Myrtle Avenue, from 1964 to about 1970.

“A young lady was getting ready for bed with the blinds turned the WRONG way!!”

That reminds me of my dad’s favorite joke :

“I couldn’t sleep at all last night. The shade was up all night !”

“Why didn’t you pull it down ?”

“The shade was up across the street !”

I was friends in the latter 1980’s with Abe and Minerva Diaz, who lived over the bar at Jamaica and Norwood Avenues.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Trylon Theater on May 30, 2006 at 8:13 am

I saw it at the 34th Street East in January 1978.

Forever ?

Tony Manuro will burn forever in a “Disco Inferno” !

For wearing a “condominium” !

PKoch
PKoch commented about Ridgewood Theatre on May 30, 2006 at 8:04 am

I hope the Ridgewood Theater remains open. I was in Ridgewood this morning, but did not pass by the theater. Any thoughts ? News ?

PKoch
PKoch commented about Embassy Theatre on May 25, 2006 at 9:07 am

I was born in Bushwick, in Evangelical Deaconess Hospital, 615 Chauncey Street, corner of Broadway, but mostly grew up at 1668 Cornelia Street, near Cypress and Myrtle Avenues, in Ridgewood.

The doctor who delivered me, Joseph Berman, had his office at, I think, 25 Logan Street.

My aunt, my father’s sister, graduated Franklin K. Lane in 1947. She lived with my dad and their parents on Bushwick Avenue at the time, near Pilling Street. Sometime between 1956 and 1963 they moved to 169 Chestnut Street in Cypress Hills. They moved from there to Woodhaven in summer 1968, and lived there the rest of their lives.

In January 1975 I got to know Joe Bettinger of 16 Grant Avenue and Laura Messina of Autumn Avenue. Joe lived at 195 Lincoln Avenue before moving upstate to Saugerties, NY the summer of 1979. I next saw him in May 1980 at the Redemptorist seminary at Suffield, Connecticut, near the Massachusetts border, when he had changed from pharmacy as a career to studying for the Catholic priesthood.

I next saw Joe the summer of 1982 when he was visiting his parents at 16 Grant Avenue. I think he’d already been ordained to the priesthood at Oconomowoc, Wisconsin.

PKoch
PKoch commented about RKO Keith's Richmond Hill Theatre on May 25, 2006 at 8:55 am

That’s roughly how I felt, seeing there was a prizefight showing on the orchestra level of the Ridgewood on Tuesday, June 17, 1980, while “Friday The 13th” was shown above on the balcony level, after having opened there on, of course, Friday, June 13, 1980.

Anniegirl, Jahn’s may disappoint you if you go there now. I was last there Saturday April 4, 2004, and it was darker, quieter and emptier than the last few funeral homes I’ve been in !

PKoch
PKoch commented about RKO Bushwick Theatre on May 25, 2006 at 8:50 am

OK, Bway, thanks. That’s what I thought you meant. Overall, Queens housing is newer than Brooklyn housing, and Ridgewood seems to be transitional between the two housing types.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Loew's Valencia Theatre on May 25, 2006 at 8:46 am

Yes, I remember “The Wild Bunch” opening at the RKO Madison Theatre in Ridgewood, Queens ( # 4621 on this site) in June or July of 1969.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Embassy Theatre on May 24, 2006 at 8:06 am

Hi robbie dupree, thanks for joining in the fun ? Were you born in 1955, like me, or are you older ? Where was st.michaels grammar school ? Were you and your family St. Michael’s parishioners, as opposed to Blessed Sacrament and St. Rita’s ?

PKoch
PKoch commented about RKO Bushwick Theatre on May 24, 2006 at 4:58 am

Bway, I think I know what you mean about Brooklyn and Queens feel of housing, but please elaborate.

I’ve seen those beautiful, high brownstone-stooped, two and three-story, three-window bay front, brick houses in Bushwick and Bay Ridge, to name two Brooklyn neighborhoods, as well as Ridgewood, albeit not always made of “Ridgewood” orange and yellow Kreischer brick.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Loew's Valencia Theatre on May 24, 2006 at 4:53 am

Thanks, EdSolero, interesting how the horizontal member of the cross sign seems to jut out of the “hole” in the upper center of that baroque facade.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Loew's Valencia Theatre on May 23, 2006 at 11:15 am

Samuel Beckett was yet another.

PKoch
PKoch commented about RKO Bushwick Theatre on May 23, 2006 at 10:14 am

EdSolero, it’s also that Ridgewood and Glendale, though in the borough and county of Queens, were for many years, until January 1980, in the 11227 postal zone, which was part of the Brooklyn post office.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Loew's Valencia Theatre on May 23, 2006 at 9:59 am

Thanks, BoxOfficeBill. I’m reminded of Lenny Bruce’s obscenity busts.

Are you a Beat historian, by any chance, either professional or amateur ? I’d be interested to know.

I recall Kenneth Tynan as either the author and / or producer or director of “Oh ! Calcutta !”

PKoch
PKoch commented about Loew's Valencia Theatre on May 23, 2006 at 6:52 am

It’s good that they had that mono surround channel as backup.

It would have been nice to have that on my first stereo phonograph, when I’d start losing the right channel of sound because of my cartridge wearing out ….

Yeah, yeah, I know, spend $ 10.95 on a new cartridge !

I saw a screening of the 1939 “Wizard Of Oz” in Yonkers in November 1998 which purported to be stereo, but was mostly mono sound.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Kew Gardens Cinemas on May 23, 2006 at 6:46 am

pmulins, hardbop, perhaps the Kew Gardens Cinema should hire you to do their publicity, but then their ticket prices might go up, to pay your salaries ….

Yes, over the year, you can save lots of money, especially if you see at least one movie a week, like I did when I was single.

Now, I watch one of my wife’s or son’s movies each day …

PKoch
PKoch commented about Loew's Valencia Theatre on May 23, 2006 at 5:47 am

Thanks, Warner, for mentioning that, specifically, that the Broadway stage wasn’t subject to the Hollywood Production Code.

What code, if any, WAS the Broadway stage subject to ? I’m thinking specifically now of the arrest of the cast and crew of the Michael McClure play, “The Beard”, in the late 1950’s or early 1960’s. Please elaborate and enlighten us, if you can.

PKoch
PKoch commented about RKO Bushwick Theatre on May 23, 2006 at 4:56 am

Ridgewood seems to be the only neighborhood that this Brooklyn-Queens border error is seen in. I’ve never seen it, for example, in Cypress Hills adjacent to Woodhaven.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Loew's Valencia Theatre on May 23, 2006 at 4:50 am

Thank you so much, Lost Memory, for all this detailed information.

“House Of Wax” (the original) was a great film. My dad saw it when it first came out, and I saw it, also in color Polaroid 3-D, about 35 years later, at Film Forum in downtown NYC.

The mention of Marilyn [Monroe]’s behind in Cole Porter’s song seems a bit forward for the times, seeing how we got to see a good deal more of her in that 1952 nude color calendar shot, the one where her left breast seems to be looking right at you, like an eye, and what wasn’t seen in that, was fantasized about, when the subway breeze blew her skirt up around her in “The Seven Year Itch”.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Loew's Valencia Theatre on May 22, 2006 at 10:39 am

Thanks, Warren, that’s probably correct. I’ll check it out on the IMDb.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Loew's Valencia Theatre on May 22, 2006 at 9:20 am

Warren, when did stereophonic sound begin in motion pictures ? It was mentioned explicitly (“in stereophonic sound”) in a song in a musical film. You might recall which one.

Apparently, stereophonic sound began in motion pictures a few years before it became available on LP records.

PKoch
PKoch commented about Ridgewood Theatre on May 22, 2006 at 9:14 am

Now, what was the relation between William Fox, and Sonny Fox, host of the Sunday morning kids' show “Wonderama” in the early 1960’s ? And was their name originally “Fuchs”, as in Leo Fuchs, mainstay of the Yiddish Theater ?

PKoch
PKoch commented about RKO Bushwick Theatre on May 22, 2006 at 9:07 am

Bway :

It’s like Jay Leno said, they’re not movie theaters any more, they’re concrete bunkers at the end of the shopping malls !

Warren :

I love New York, especially in the evening !

PKoch
PKoch commented about Ridgewood Theatre on May 22, 2006 at 7:55 am

No, Warren, I was NOT joking. Thanks for your answer.

PKoch
PKoch commented about UA Crossbay I on May 22, 2006 at 7:01 am

Hopefully open another cinema somewhere close by.