I grew up on West End Avenue in Chicago. The Paradise was just around the corner on what then known as Crawford Avenue. I moved away when I was about six. But until then often escaped to Paradise. I cried when I found out it was torn down, only a few years later.
Working from memory impressions, the way dreams are implanted in our psyches. They weren’t called Dream Palaces for nothing.
Did see the seventies re-issue on opening night at the Chinese. I believe it was accompanied by ‘Mysteries of the Wax Museum’, in two color Technicolor, and a personal appearance by Fay Wray, who starred in it. I may be mixing two events together. But the lack of light pumped into ‘House of Wax’ dimmed the impact of the film. Have since seen it again, in double system 35 mm at the Castro Theater in San Francisco. All of the original snap was there. There also was a time when projectionists were king.
My personal, perhaps idiosyncratic definition for road show was big event, long run, special screen, reserved seat. I loved the hype theater owners once called ‘showmanship’. Seeing pictures in a non-descript box is about as much lasting fun as eating at Mickey ’D’s every night. And showmanship in exhibition long since has left the room.
Bought a reserved seat for ‘Scent of Mystery’. Needn’t have bothered, the theater was mostly empty. I sat close to the projection booth so that I could hear the mechanism of odoriferous jars roll into place.
‘House of Wax’ opened at The Chicago Theater in ‘53, where I saw it as a ten year old. While it was magnificent in its first run with top projection, by the time it got to the neighborhoods with inferior projection and often spliced, worn prints, it wasn’t so much fun.
Looked forward to the ‘72 re-release, which I saw at the Chinese in Hollywood. Don’t think it was a 70mm print, because it was much darker and grainier than what I saw in '53. I suspected that it was standard 35mm, with essentially two 16mm size images printed side by side. Also the 3-D window was projected in a way that had the depth going inward from the screen surface, rather than outward. It was a very disappointing effort.
‘Scent of Mystery’ was not actually a road show movie. It is the infamous Smell-o-Vision movie produced by Mike Todd, Jr. It played long at the Todd owned theater, because few other theaters were equipped for, or desired to, book that stinker.
After that Junior left the radar and returned to obscurity. His father had chutzpah and taste. Junior had chutzpah…
Also believe that the theater name was the RKO Palace when the first Cinerama production played in 1952. Think after Hughes sold RKO, it became Eitel’s Palace. This because I remember both names, being that there were few non Balaban & Katz venues in the fifties. Whatever the owner’s name, it was a magnificent ‘road show’ theater.
Made it to Saturday morning, first screening. The ‘El’ was my escape to paradise. Was already a very young film lover, so made it a point to see things I thought would be fun. Had been using CTA since about eight. The times were safer than, and I was fearless when it came to seeing movies. Within a year or so of Cinerama, I made it down to The Chicago Theater for its first screening @ around 10AM for ‘House of Wax’. You might imagine, I loved 3-D too.
And while the Chicago still had live stage shows, the Palace didn’t. Lowell Thomas only appeared on celluloid in the Cinerama prologue.
Saw ‘This is Cinerama’ on opening day, which was always a Saturday in those days. Will never forget the moment when Lowell Thomas announces from a small square screed, “This is Cinerama…” as the curtains part, the screen expands, the sound magnifies into multi-track stereo, and the roller coaster drops. What a thrill.
Many years later, saw 2001 in 70mm Cinerama at the Warner Hollywood. The subject of the film and its treatment were worthy of the big picture, but the impact of that first roller coaster ride in Chicago couldn’t be matched. – Leslie Michael Bender
Was about ten when I realized the second meaning of the word ‘terminal’. With that flash of insight, I began noticing the peeling paint on the theater’s impossibly high domed ceiling. My tiny but enlightened mind connected it to a recent story about people dying in another theater somewhere in America when the roof collapsed.
Symbolically I knew that the golden age of cinema was ending, but even a crumbling ceiling in a theater named for death couldn’t keep me from the movies.
Been enthralled with NaturalVision 3-D since, as an eight year old kid, saw ‘House of Wax’ at the first screening on its opening day at the palatial Chicago Theater.
Was plucky enough to see all ‘Wax’, ‘Creature from the Black Lagoon’, and ‘It Came from Outer Space’ all in first run.
Although ‘Kiss Me Kate’ and ‘Dial M for Murder’ hit Chicago flat. Many years later saw both with pristine prints in double system 35 projection, and was wowed. ‘Kiss Me Kate’, due to its Cole Porter wickedness, was probably the most clever of all the films shot in the process.
It has taken more than fifty years, but 3-D is now entering its second golden age.
When the backwards entry Metro closed, around 1952, even as a kid I knew it was the increasing dominance of TV. I remember the marquee: ‘losed for Repairs. Will Re-open Soon’. I waited so long that the letters, one by one, fell off the sigh. The repairs were never made, and the theater never reopened. It was my first sense of nostalgia, recognizing that an era was ending. I was ten.
Shortly thereafter, I began haunting the television studios of WENR, which shortly became WBKB. Everything was so new that even a precocious kid could gain access to that magical world.
David Balaban (yes, that family) has recently published a book, ‘The Chicago Movie Palaces of Balaban and Katz’. It is filled with great pictures and a history of those wonderful places that anchored neighborhoods in the days before shopping centers, strip malls, and multiplexes.
Came upon the book while doing some research. Great fun in the reading. It particularly reveals the why our experiences were so special. They were designed to be.
Haven’t seen Chicago since the winter of 1960, when I left for college then went west. So the images in my mind are those of almost fifty years ago.
Much of my life was lived thanks to Balaban and Katz, escaping to fading dream palaces first on the West Side, then Albany Park, then the Loop. The ‘El’ was my ticket out from a very early age. I also hung out at WBKB, beginning in early 1952. That was the ultimate escape into a magical world of actors, comics, clowns, musicians, writers and directors. The call letters stood for Balaban & Katz Broadcasting— BKB.
Am writing a book about the world I escaped into. While I am less than significant, that Magic Show was not. Going backward can be full of rewards, but it is also a slippery slope. But the pictures are implanted deep within.
Thanks for providing verification of my mind images.
I can still taste the hot dogs and fries I used to demolish at Lerner’s. Nothing like them here on the West Coast.
Funny you say Hitchcock. A little later in the era, I remember reading about Edward Gein while hiding my folded Sun-Times inside my school desk. I immediately thought the Parental School could have been where his grizzly murders took place. Years later when I was seventeen, I took the Ravenswood ‘El’ down to Woods Theater to see Psycho on its opening day. After recovering from the shock, I recognized the connection to the Gein murders.
Many years later I learned that Robert Block based Psycho on the Gein story.
The Woods will always be Psycho, and The Terminal is The Chicago Parental School for Boys.
Does anyone remember Mrs. Schwabble from Hibbard Elementary in the fifties? She smelled of old lady perfume attempting to hide the a mercifully hidden rarely bathed body.
I too remember the parental school boys being marched into the Terminal Theater on Saturday mornings. I also remember the school’s foreboding, Dickensonian building, which appeared haunted to my ten year old eyes.
I grew up on West End Avenue in Chicago. The Paradise was just around the corner on what then known as Crawford Avenue. I moved away when I was about six. But until then often escaped to Paradise. I cried when I found out it was torn down, only a few years later.
Working from memory impressions, the way dreams are implanted in our psyches. They weren’t called Dream Palaces for nothing.
Did see the seventies re-issue on opening night at the Chinese. I believe it was accompanied by ‘Mysteries of the Wax Museum’, in two color Technicolor, and a personal appearance by Fay Wray, who starred in it. I may be mixing two events together. But the lack of light pumped into ‘House of Wax’ dimmed the impact of the film. Have since seen it again, in double system 35 mm at the Castro Theater in San Francisco. All of the original snap was there. There also was a time when projectionists were king.
My personal, perhaps idiosyncratic definition for road show was big event, long run, special screen, reserved seat. I loved the hype theater owners once called ‘showmanship’. Seeing pictures in a non-descript box is about as much lasting fun as eating at Mickey ’D’s every night. And showmanship in exhibition long since has left the room.
Bought a reserved seat for ‘Scent of Mystery’. Needn’t have bothered, the theater was mostly empty. I sat close to the projection booth so that I could hear the mechanism of odoriferous jars roll into place.
‘House of Wax’ opened at The Chicago Theater in ‘53, where I saw it as a ten year old. While it was magnificent in its first run with top projection, by the time it got to the neighborhoods with inferior projection and often spliced, worn prints, it wasn’t so much fun.
Looked forward to the ‘72 re-release, which I saw at the Chinese in Hollywood. Don’t think it was a 70mm print, because it was much darker and grainier than what I saw in '53. I suspected that it was standard 35mm, with essentially two 16mm size images printed side by side. Also the 3-D window was projected in a way that had the depth going inward from the screen surface, rather than outward. It was a very disappointing effort.
‘Scent of Mystery’ was not actually a road show movie. It is the infamous Smell-o-Vision movie produced by Mike Todd, Jr. It played long at the Todd owned theater, because few other theaters were equipped for, or desired to, book that stinker.
After that Junior left the radar and returned to obscurity. His father had chutzpah and taste. Junior had chutzpah…
Well, there’s something poetic about the list appearing three times. Something like the three strip process this thread is celebrating.
Also believe that the theater name was the RKO Palace when the first Cinerama production played in 1952. Think after Hughes sold RKO, it became Eitel’s Palace. This because I remember both names, being that there were few non Balaban & Katz venues in the fifties. Whatever the owner’s name, it was a magnificent ‘road show’ theater.
Made it to Saturday morning, first screening. The ‘El’ was my escape to paradise. Was already a very young film lover, so made it a point to see things I thought would be fun. Had been using CTA since about eight. The times were safer than, and I was fearless when it came to seeing movies. Within a year or so of Cinerama, I made it down to The Chicago Theater for its first screening @ around 10AM for ‘House of Wax’. You might imagine, I loved 3-D too.
And while the Chicago still had live stage shows, the Palace didn’t. Lowell Thomas only appeared on celluloid in the Cinerama prologue.
Its amazing what imprints are left as meaningful and remarkably pleasureful more than fifty years later.
Saw ‘This is Cinerama’ on opening day, which was always a Saturday in those days. Will never forget the moment when Lowell Thomas announces from a small square screed, “This is Cinerama…” as the curtains part, the screen expands, the sound magnifies into multi-track stereo, and the roller coaster drops. What a thrill.
Many years later, saw 2001 in 70mm Cinerama at the Warner Hollywood. The subject of the film and its treatment were worthy of the big picture, but the impact of that first roller coaster ride in Chicago couldn’t be matched. – Leslie Michael Bender
Was about ten when I realized the second meaning of the word ‘terminal’. With that flash of insight, I began noticing the peeling paint on the theater’s impossibly high domed ceiling. My tiny but enlightened mind connected it to a recent story about people dying in another theater somewhere in America when the roof collapsed.
Symbolically I knew that the golden age of cinema was ending, but even a crumbling ceiling in a theater named for death couldn’t keep me from the movies.
Such is the magic of light and shadows.
Been enthralled with NaturalVision 3-D since, as an eight year old kid, saw ‘House of Wax’ at the first screening on its opening day at the palatial Chicago Theater.
Was plucky enough to see all ‘Wax’, ‘Creature from the Black Lagoon’, and ‘It Came from Outer Space’ all in first run.
Although ‘Kiss Me Kate’ and ‘Dial M for Murder’ hit Chicago flat. Many years later saw both with pristine prints in double system 35 projection, and was wowed. ‘Kiss Me Kate’, due to its Cole Porter wickedness, was probably the most clever of all the films shot in the process.
It has taken more than fifty years, but 3-D is now entering its second golden age.
Long live film in ALL its dimensions.
When the backwards entry Metro closed, around 1952, even as a kid I knew it was the increasing dominance of TV. I remember the marquee: ‘losed for Repairs. Will Re-open Soon’. I waited so long that the letters, one by one, fell off the sigh. The repairs were never made, and the theater never reopened. It was my first sense of nostalgia, recognizing that an era was ending. I was ten.
Shortly thereafter, I began haunting the television studios of WENR, which shortly became WBKB. Everything was so new that even a precocious kid could gain access to that magical world.
Always a pleasure to share good images, mental and otherwise.
David Balaban (yes, that family) has recently published a book, ‘The Chicago Movie Palaces of Balaban and Katz’. It is filled with great pictures and a history of those wonderful places that anchored neighborhoods in the days before shopping centers, strip malls, and multiplexes.
Came upon the book while doing some research. Great fun in the reading. It particularly reveals the why our experiences were so special. They were designed to be.
Leslie
Haven’t seen Chicago since the winter of 1960, when I left for college then went west. So the images in my mind are those of almost fifty years ago.
Much of my life was lived thanks to Balaban and Katz, escaping to fading dream palaces first on the West Side, then Albany Park, then the Loop. The ‘El’ was my ticket out from a very early age. I also hung out at WBKB, beginning in early 1952. That was the ultimate escape into a magical world of actors, comics, clowns, musicians, writers and directors. The call letters stood for Balaban & Katz Broadcasting— BKB.
Am writing a book about the world I escaped into. While I am less than significant, that Magic Show was not. Going backward can be full of rewards, but it is also a slippery slope. But the pictures are implanted deep within.
Thanks for providing verification of my mind images.
I can still taste the hot dogs and fries I used to demolish at Lerner’s. Nothing like them here on the West Coast.
Funny you say Hitchcock. A little later in the era, I remember reading about Edward Gein while hiding my folded Sun-Times inside my school desk. I immediately thought the Parental School could have been where his grizzly murders took place. Years later when I was seventeen, I took the Ravenswood ‘El’ down to Woods Theater to see Psycho on its opening day. After recovering from the shock, I recognized the connection to the Gein murders.
Many years later I learned that Robert Block based Psycho on the Gein story.
The Woods will always be Psycho, and The Terminal is The Chicago Parental School for Boys.
Now back to present time.
Thanks.
Leslie
Does anyone remember Mrs. Schwabble from Hibbard Elementary in the fifties? She smelled of old lady perfume attempting to hide the a mercifully hidden rarely bathed body.
I too remember the parental school boys being marched into the Terminal Theater on Saturday mornings. I also remember the school’s foreboding, Dickensonian building, which appeared haunted to my ten year old eyes.
Leslie (Arye) Michael Bender