Back in the early 70’s, the Fairfax was usually the only theater in the area to run Disney films. Our audiences (mostly kids), and the grosses, were huge. Once, during the run of Robin Hood (animated) Wendy, the cashier, oversold by nearly 50 tickets and nobody noticed. Part of the fun of going to the Fairfax had nothing to do with the film. The wide aisles were perfect for running amok and the stage (fully functional after a brief run of Oh Calcutta) was ideal for impromptu performances.
As the Assistant Manager under Eugene Wydra, part of my job was to make sure the little darlings didn’t kill themselves. Thankfully, the head usher, Jay Abramson, had little use for rude kids and their obnoxious parents.
On the plus side, I learned a lot about diplomacy and crowd control. We had a great staff of smart, loyal and hard working kids who would do anything I asked. One of them, Wendy Widlus, is now with the Attorney General’s office. I’m sure the others have gone on to bigger and better things.
Celebs liked the Fairfax. Natalie Wood often brought her daughter, along with several neighborhood kids, and couldn’t have been nicer. John Lennon came in shortly before I left. He was with a pretty Asian girl (NOT Yoko) and seemed disappointed that only a couple of us recognized him.
There seems to be some question about when the theater was built. Down in the basement, there was an enormous “air circulator” that was installed and certified in 1930.
My phone number was one digit off from the Oriental’s. After five years of obnoxious phone calls at 3 a.m., I started making up double bills. I wonder how many drunks showed up expecting The Sound of Music and Deep Throat on the same bill.
As much as I love old theaters, I had mixed feelings about the Oriental’s closing.
A neighbor took my sister and I to the Embassy, in 1965, to see My Fair Lady.
While there was nothing exceptional about the theater, the neighbor was a real piece of work. After the movie, he gave us a stack of racist hate literature to pass around at school. My mother was horrified and we were forbiden to talk to him again.
As it turned out, he was a real sleazeball in more ways than one. It came as no surprise when Alan Vincent went on to head the American Nazi Party.
The stories about the Vogue being haunted sprang up when a “Psychic” Tour group was using it as a base of operation. I was the Assistant Manager there in the early seventies and never heard of (or experienced) a haunting of ANY sort. They were also spreading some BS about a schoolhouse burning down and the site being haunted by dead kids. While there WAS a school a couple of blocks away, The Misses Janes school didn’t burn down. The house is now a Tourist Information office. The only other school in the area was on Selma Avenue.
Someone else mentioned an odd storage room next to Musso Frank’s. That was a former speakeasy that, for years, was bricked up except for an entrance inside Musso’s.
Back in the early 70’s, the Fairfax was usually the only theater in the area to run Disney films. Our audiences (mostly kids), and the grosses, were huge. Once, during the run of Robin Hood (animated) Wendy, the cashier, oversold by nearly 50 tickets and nobody noticed. Part of the fun of going to the Fairfax had nothing to do with the film. The wide aisles were perfect for running amok and the stage (fully functional after a brief run of Oh Calcutta) was ideal for impromptu performances.
As the Assistant Manager under Eugene Wydra, part of my job was to make sure the little darlings didn’t kill themselves. Thankfully, the head usher, Jay Abramson, had little use for rude kids and their obnoxious parents.
On the plus side, I learned a lot about diplomacy and crowd control. We had a great staff of smart, loyal and hard working kids who would do anything I asked. One of them, Wendy Widlus, is now with the Attorney General’s office. I’m sure the others have gone on to bigger and better things.
Celebs liked the Fairfax. Natalie Wood often brought her daughter, along with several neighborhood kids, and couldn’t have been nicer. John Lennon came in shortly before I left. He was with a pretty Asian girl (NOT Yoko) and seemed disappointed that only a couple of us recognized him.
There seems to be some question about when the theater was built. Down in the basement, there was an enormous “air circulator” that was installed and certified in 1930.
My phone number was one digit off from the Oriental’s. After five years of obnoxious phone calls at 3 a.m., I started making up double bills. I wonder how many drunks showed up expecting The Sound of Music and Deep Throat on the same bill.
As much as I love old theaters, I had mixed feelings about the Oriental’s closing.
A neighbor took my sister and I to the Embassy, in 1965, to see My Fair Lady.
While there was nothing exceptional about the theater, the neighbor was a real piece of work. After the movie, he gave us a stack of racist hate literature to pass around at school. My mother was horrified and we were forbiden to talk to him again.
As it turned out, he was a real sleazeball in more ways than one. It came as no surprise when Alan Vincent went on to head the American Nazi Party.
The stories about the Vogue being haunted sprang up when a “Psychic” Tour group was using it as a base of operation. I was the Assistant Manager there in the early seventies and never heard of (or experienced) a haunting of ANY sort. They were also spreading some BS about a schoolhouse burning down and the site being haunted by dead kids. While there WAS a school a couple of blocks away, The Misses Janes school didn’t burn down. The house is now a Tourist Information office. The only other school in the area was on Selma Avenue.
Someone else mentioned an odd storage room next to Musso Frank’s. That was a former speakeasy that, for years, was bricked up except for an entrance inside Musso’s.