Radio City Music Hall
1260 6th Avenue,
New York,
NY
10020
1260 6th Avenue,
New York,
NY
10020
118 people
favorited this theater
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Well I couldn’t resist taking a couple days and many hours skim-reading through the long string of previous posts here and now know who Mr. Endres is. I’m not sure which is more amazing, that I remember his name after 30 years, or that he is still with us, but I’m very grateful for both.
My memories of the Music Hall begin in 1968 when my father took me to see THE ODD COUPLE. I clearly remember being very impressed with the place, the lower lounge with a TV playing, no popcorn then, only Cracker Jacks (?!?) The amazing grand curtain, and, okay this will sound funny… the Men’s Room was so big and so very Art Deco that I thought all that was missing was Ann Miller tapdancing her way past that long wall of urinals! (hey, I was a kid)
Some time later I think I saw WHERE WERE YOU WHEN THE LIGHTS WENT OUT? there… and I’m certain I saw BEDKNOBS AND BROOMSTICKS there on Thanksgiving (‘71 I think) I didn’t know then how much the picture had been cut to play the Hall but I do remember Disney had abandoned its original classy ad art for the kind of cheesy stuff normally only seen in post roadshow popular price runs. Part of th e fun of the Christmas show was the Nativity and watching to see if one of the camels would choose that moment to relieve himself on The great Stage. I also clearly remember the show’s ice skating gag and even as a kid knew they were on a turntable.
When I moved to NY in 76, I saw THE SLIPPER AND THE ROSE with a Christmas show at Thanksgiving. Before it stopped showing movies, I also saw CROSSED SWORDS, and HARRY AND WALTER GO TO NEW YORK among other things. It was obvious the caliber of film booked at the Hall had plummeted. I think the last thing I saw there was the sad VIncente/Liza Minnelli “musical” A MATTER OF TIME. I heard in its later years the Hall had lost out on many blockbuster films because they reportedly insisted on maintaining their policy of being exclusive for a 50 mile radius. Some years later, after a pretty decent restoration, I saw a godawful stage show called NEW YORK SUMMER, and a concert or two…
I remember the Hall as a great place to watch a movie and I would love to see a classics film festival done there, or maybe a steady regular once a week or twice a month kind of thing, something they could sell in advance. Something like personal appearances or programming like the old days with vintage newsreels, cartoons and trailers might make it special enough to fill the house. Of course the organ and grand curtains would have to be running. Sponsorship/advertising tie-ins from some Studio Home Video departments or TV networks might help. I’d also suggest a wide range of prices so that most regular folks could afford it, while the affluent could pay a high premium for VIP treatment in the first Mezzanine.
For many years I’ve missed seeing a good movie there with a Christmas show, and was happy to find a double LP from RCA called CHRISTMAS AT RADIO CITY MUSIC HALL that consisted entirely of Christmas Carols played on the Mighty Wurlitzer, just like I remember between shows at Christmas. I still have the LP although attempts to transfer it to CD have been unsuccessful… If anyone knows a way to get that album on a CD I’d be thrilled.
It is also disappointing to note that the once impressive RMCH website that used to offer 360 views of the place and much more history and pictures, is now a memory.
Well then, Robert, I’m glad I get this chance to thank you personally for that amazing show. Everyone in that audience appreciated the great job you did. Hard to believe that was 25 years ago, but it’s one of those things you don’t forget.
Bill, I worked every performance of “Napoleon” as Head Projectionist. I had worked with Boston Light & Sound doing dailies at Astoria, and recommended them to do the three projector interlocking. It was run from the third of the five projectors in the booth, with the other two panels on Machines #1 and #5. I had two other operators on #1 and #5 to open the lamp dousers and make sure the projectors were running properly. After they were threaded and locked, I was able to start all three from the center machine, and when I hit that changeover pedal all of the changeovers opened at the same time. The first run of the show, #1 and #5 operators had spotlight gel holders with blue and red gels, and on my cue would drop them in front of the lenses to create the French Tricolor effect. Later runs used tinted film on those machines. Vito, if you think a normal changeover at the Hall was thrilling, you ought to do one to 3 projectors at once! I always thought that after sitting for four hours watching the film, if we blew that finale the audience would lynch us!
A couple of summers later one of our producers wanted to do three screen effects in our stage show, but didn’t want to rent the selsyns and hire operators to do it. We snuck selsyn rentals (which we HAD to have to keep the machines in step) into the toilet paper account for the show, and I rewired the lamps for auto strike, so that when I started the machines the lamps would light on all three machines. That way I could leave the lamp dousers open. Since I couldn’t close them remotely the lamps extinguished when I stopped the machines in black film a the end of the cue and I would go over an manually close the changeovers for the next cue. I did every performance of that show by myself over the space of a couple of months with only l misframe on one machine during the run, and with three of those multiscreen effects in the show. THAT was really thrilling!
I have to put my two cents in here. I never ran three strip Cinerama, my only experience was in the 70mm version, I think the last one I ran was “Grand Prixâ€. The last big screen experiences I had before I retired was with IMAX, THAT was scary. During my last years as a projectionist I grew to despise platters, and here I was running IMAX 3-D with two platters running simultaneously at what to me super-sonic speed. It was all very new and we had problems galore. The humidity level in the booth had to at Rain Forest levels to prevent the print from warping, the projectors had to be thoroughly cleaned after every show or you had trouble. In addition, the sound would occasionally go out of sync, and oh yes, a couple of times the print jammed and we had brain wraps, we also had on going problems with the software. Because the print is 70mm running at a fast speed, it would be shipped to us on cores and took hours and hours to assembled.
No wonder I retired!
In fairness, I have been back since to visit and things have improved considerably, they seem to have gotten most of the bugs out and problems are few. I would also like to mention we had outstanding support from IMAX, as a matter of fact we had an IMAX tech in the booth from opening to closing the first 2-3 weeks after installation. So mostly I chained him to a chair and would not let him leave except to use the bathroom. (that’s a joke)
I would have to say for me the best experience I had in the booth was running 70mm Roadshows, putting on a show with the overtures and intermissions, and playing with the lights and curtains was fun.
You have to understand, running a show like that to a packed house with 1000+ people was a rush, and I can only imagine what it must have been like for REndres running the booth at RCMH. My God, making those changeovers had to be thrilling.
Robert, I attended one of the Sunday afternoon “Napoleon” shows at Radio City. The only seat I could get was in the back row of the third mezzanine, right underneath you if you were working that day. But even from that faraway vantage point, the 3-screen sequence was an awesome sight.
If only some rich Hollywood bigshot would do for Cinerama what Francis Ford Coppola did for “Napoleon”.
Bill, Amen! Cinerama and Imax are both “World Series” projection systems, although I first saw 3 strip Cinerama when I was 13 or 14 years old and it blew me away sitting in the 3rd or 4th row center of Eitel’s Palace in Chicago where the screen actually came out to the ends of that row. At that time no one had see a “widescreen” picture since “Napoleon”, and no one had heard stereophonic sound since “Fantasia”, thus the impact on me was even greater than Imax two or three decades or so later. I have been lucky enough to see 3 strip in three theatres, including the Cooper Cinerama in Minneapolis, and while I’ve never run it, I have been lucky enough to run the “Napoleon” triptych at Radio City numerous times and run 3 interlocked 16mm projectors on a curved screen at the New York Experience. I also worked a 3 strip array than ran on the front of the Metropolitan Opera for the 15th (?) anniversary of Lincoln Center. It’s always exciting to do one of those gigs, and the prospect of doing a “How The West Was Won” digitally would really be fun!
Robert and Ed: You’re right. Cinerama is a wonderful process, flaws and all. But the last time I saw it, in Hollywood 2005 (“How the West Was Won”), the presentation was so skillful that whatever flaws there were in the process were not even noticed! Cinerama must be to a projectionist what playing in the World Series is to a baseball player.
Yes, REndres. Then, if we could only get a curved screen Cinerama venue in New York City, where the process was first unveiled to the public over 50 years ago! With a digital presentation, I imagine that a temporary screen installation would be relatively easy in any number of existing facilities. Of course, you’d want to ensure a big enough space to accomodate a screen size worthy of the format.
And yes again, REndres… I do think that we do tend to be charmed by the defects in a favorite process or system. Good point there. But then, I never saw true Cinerama myself… the three camera system fizzled out a couple of years before I was born and there’s been no opportunity in NYC to see it on revival. I would love to experience a near-flawless digital interpretation of that process on a giant screen! I know the product pickin’s are slim, but I’d gladly suffer the dramatic deficiencies of “How the West Was Won” for the cinematic experience!
Vito, I hope Universal does that too. “Mulholland Drive” wasn’t a box office smash but it did OK business, and more importantly it was a great movie that earned Lynch a Best Director Oscar nomination. He’s too good a director to have his films struggle to get widely seen.
CinemaSightlines, guilty as charged. It’s “Robert”, and I did make the very last edition of the Radio City souvenier book as Head Projectionist 32 years ago (where does time go?!) I was also mentioned a couple of times in the Boxoffice Showmanship section (and I miss it too.)
Vito and Ed, One of my fantasies is to have Paul Allen put digital projectors in his Cinerama booths in Seattle along with the Cinerama projectors and try projecting a Cinerama project digitally. Think of the probelms that could be solved that way: no carbon arc color shift between panels (although I know they’re already using xenon), no lab problems matching the color timing of the prints, and no sync problems.
That does raise the question: do we also love the defects of a process? Like tube hiss, vinyl hiss and occasional pop, the matching lines of the Cinerama panels have a certain charm about them. Every time we ran “Napoleon” at Radio City in a scene where a horse runs across the three panels of the triptych the audience applauded even though the matching was far from perfect. Perhaps it was because it was something daring that had never been done before, even though done crudely, that drew the applause. A digital Cinerama could pretty much eliminate even the matching seams even though probably not some of the distortion of the horizon line caused by the angling of the three cameras. Wouldn’t it be interesting to try?
Bill, As far as I know, “Inland Empire” does not have a distributor as yet, however I believe it is currently scheduled to be shown at the NY Festival, probably at Alice Tully Hall, sometime next week. It is also going to be shown at the AFI festival in LA.sometime in November. Although it was shot in digital format it is being shown in 35mm for now.
Perhaps some smart executive from Universal, the studio that released the David Lynch production of “Mulholland Drive”, will see it and pick it up.
Vito said: “I believe we will see less and less film. Think about it, a lot fewer people are using film to take pictures today.”
David Lynch shot his new 3-hour film “Inland Empire” on digital video. Now if only some brave US distributor will have the courage to pick up the movie so we can all have a chance to see it!
REndres: your name seems really familiar and I’m amazed that it sticks in my mind… is your first name Roger or Robert? I seem to remember sreading that name like 30 years ago… were you mentioned in 60s-70s souvenir books about the Music Hall? Either that or I remember you from a Boxoffice article about presenting a roadshow inthe late 60s… Boy do I miss Showmanship!
Well Ed, looks like you have joined REndres and I to the “dark side"
We have to be realistic and accept the fact that we must consider preserving our treasured films to a Digital format for future generations to enjoy. The jury is still out, and I often get into discussions, about the possibility of film going the way of vinyl records and replaced by digital technology. I hope we will always have film but as new generations less interested in film begin to take over the movie business, I believe we will see less and less film. Think about it, a lot fewer people are using film to take pictures today.
I have only one concern, and that is the preservation of theatres and the movie going experience, and if that means a complete transformation to digital, then with a heavy heart I say, so be it.
The plus side for me would be the end of the dreaded platter.
Hey… I love film myself – particularly large format film – and I worry about the loss of richness and detail from a great old Technicolor print… But I definitely can see the advantages of digital cinema. One of those bonuses may well turn out to be that some older titles will be digitized from pristine restored prints and may find their ways into retrospective series and revival programs a lot easier and with greater quality then we sometimes find. As technology improves and image degradation is diminished, a restored 70mm film can be faithfully preserved on digital media and played at any big-screen facility with the proper equipment.
Rob, I completely agree with you regarding Digital for movies and stage presentations.
It took me a while to fully appreciate and except the changes in technology, but as I see and hear all the new innovative and improved methods of projection available now, and in the process of being developed, I have come to accept and welcome theses changes.
I will always love film but I loved my 78-rpm records as well, times of course are a changin and very much for the better.
I am a bit concerned about the future of theaters, attendance is down and continues to drop, we have good weeks and bad weeks, but the growing trend is folks are not going to the movies as they did in years past
Other threats are a shrinking window of release dates from theatre and DVD and Internet downloadable movies. We need to make it worth their while for people to start going back to the theatres,one way I see to move in that direction is to improve the quality of the presentation, perhaps try and give them what they can’t get at home on DVD. I was not happy to see Digital Cinema come along, we had a lot of problems with Pixels along with computer problems such as not being able to load the proper media or not being able to select certain media to play. We had a lot of lost shows and in the beginning it was necessary to have a 35mm print in the booth as back up, my feeling was who needs it. However I have seen many improvements in Digital, and if theatre owners and studios ever settle on who is going to pay for it, I now believe it will be a good thing for us.
I am especially impressed with Digital 3-D, Yes I know, we have tried that before with film going back to the early 50s, but the Digital presentation is quite amazing.
As you know, old 3D films typically did this with two projectors. The new generation of digital projectors does it with just one machine, alternating rapidly between images meant to be seen by the right and left eyes.
The technology shows 144 frames per second, and the alternating left eye, right-eye images are projected with polarized light.
Another technique is about to be used by George Lucas who is going to create 3D versions of the “Star Wars” films. This system is primarily focused on creating 3D masters of 2D originals, but it is also backing a technology using “active” glasses, in which each lens actually goes rapidly dark in turn. This may be easier for theaters to use, since it doesn’t require installation of a silver or reflective screen. However, it does require a significant investment in glasses, which currently cost about $15-20 a pair.
It is also very important for the Music hall to change with the times, we want the old girl to be around for generations to come, it is good to hear they are moving in that direction with conversions to Varilights and other innovations in stage presentations.
As for Digital projectors in the booth, well I suppose you would have my blessing, I have not run across the Heresy projector as yet, my experience has been mostly Christie/Technicolor. As you said we may have some losses in the beginning but I already see vast improvements over the last two years.
I recently saw a Digital version of “The Departed†and was very impressed with the quality, the movie is a knockout as well.
Vito, Thanks for the kind comments. I’m afraid if I went back to the Hall now I would be pushing for (heresy!) digital cinema projectors. The facility I’m at now has both 35/70mm film projectors and 2K digital cinema projectors with both D-5 and HDCam feeds. I see a lot of first generation digital material (including digital dailies), and its getting very good indeed. Especially compared to the quality of film prints pulled in a hurry to fill a 4,000 theatre opening schedule. When I think of all the apertures I cut to fit film effects into the scenery at the Hall, and how much more easily (and probably effectively) it can now be done digitally, I’m afraid I’m going over to the “dark side”! Music Hall management is very aware of the latest in staging effects, especially in performing venues such as the Las Vegas casinos, and want to be state of the art at the Hall. Times do change. I can remember seeing one of the last of the original “Undersea Ballet” performances when I was in high school and being blown away by the film and slide effects in the show. I was also blown away by the huge number of carbon arc follow spots employed both from Front Lights and D-Cove and from towers backstages in the entrances. By the time I started there, they were no longer viable. The arc spots were used because there were no lamps bright enough to work in spaces that large, but by the 60’s there were, and their brightness in turn wiped out the Brenograph slide and motorized water effects. Now those effects can be duplicated with VariLights which are capable of doing so much more. So its going with film projection. There will be some losses as there were in the transition from tubes to transistors and vinyl to digital recordings, but in time the newer media will gain in quality, and when creative people such as Fred Waller who invented Cinerama discover how to use the new technology artistically, we may find that we have gained something exciting in the process.
Rob, I had not realised it has been eight years since you left, my goodness where does the time go?
I hope you are going to consider the head of production’s offer to get you back, there are only a few of us “showmen” left, and RCMH would ne lucky to have you. I am also happy to hear about the use of the surround system, in the old days I believe most if not all the surrounds were in the ceiling, the effect was minimual, but now with the speakers placed everywhere in the hall it is very impressive,
I was also glad to see the speakers were covered in gold fabric.
Good luck to you, I hope you come back home to the hall soon.
Vito, it was good to see the Hall again, although I was with another member of my current firm who was there to discuss surround capabilities of movie system for use in the stage presentations. (We did have a surround sound mix for “Riverdance” and it was very effective, particularly for thunder in one of the dance routines.) I really hadn’t been in the booth since I worked on film effects for the first Christmas Show after I left. At that time construction was underway,and it was rather depressing. Yesterday everything was cleaned up and rather impressive. While I’m not going to work the Christmas Show, their head of production was kind enough to ask twice what it would take to get me to come back. The Music Hall crew really is a family — even after I’ve been away for almost eight years now.
Thanks Bill, what a treasure! I love seeing those again.
Rob, glad to hear you are “back home” at the hall.
I will be sure to watch the “Jeopardy” shows when they air, I am a big fan of that show.
7kw lamps!! they must put out a magnificent image, are you going to work the Christmas show?
Ed, as to the 70mm festival I am sure with REndres aboard it would be presented with class and perfection. However, somehow I doubt it would ever happen, but we can dream.
To make it easier, here are the last 17 ads I posted to various theater pages. They’re mostly for LA, with a few NY, NJ and DC ones thrown in:
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I tried to get tickets to “Jeopardy” but they were “unable to fill my request” due to overwhelming demand. I was last at the Hall for the 2001 Tony’s and the place looked magnificent. I’d love the chance to see a good 70mm film festival at the Hall, but I wonder if the schedule is too cramped – and probable financial return too light – for such an event to be worked into the year.
Vito, I just came back to work from the Hall about hour ago, and they are well underway for the “Jeopardy” tapings. The stage really looks like the “Jeopardy” set. When I was there I worked the tapings of “Celebrity Squares” and “Wheel of Fortune”, and they were fun, so be sure to watch. I hadn’t walked through the house since the refurbishment was finished, but it did look good, and I also got chance to see the new 7kw lamphouses used on the 70mm machines for the 3-D sequence in the Christmas show. Very impressive!
Vito and Robert: I recently posted some old ads for Los Angeles theaters (Grauman’s Chinese, El Capitan, Cinerama Dome, Hawaii Theatre).