Jean Renoir Cinema

To think that 34 years ago before the advent of video & cable,you could open a speciality boutique mini-cinema and show vintage classics and edgy product. At least Ilene Kristen is still around, hamming it up on “One Life to Live” (at least for the time being!)

As the late, quite remarkable Ray Blanco explains above, the Jean Renoir Cinema originally opened at 162 Second Avenue, then was forced to move to the Actors Playhouse at 100 7th Avenue South due to landlord problems. A plumbing crisis at the second location was the last straw, and the cinema closed for good at the end of 1977. I was there, and it was quite a year, full of ups and downs.

The first commercial festival of Cuban films was held at the Olympia in March 1972 way before the Jean Renoir opened. It lead to the commercial release of the now classic MEMORIES OF UNDERDEVELOPMENT.

If indeed the Gate, Camelot Twin and Jean Renoir are all the same, the address is: 162 Second Avenue.

The Camelot Twin, listed elsewhere on this site, was reported to have existed at 2nd Ave. and 10th. Could it have used this space five years earlier?
The Gate Theater which, along with its alternate name, Tambellini’s Gate Theater, should be listed as Previous Names for this theatre, was mostly used as an Off Broadway venue. It was located, along with the Cricket Theater (AKA Cricket Playhouse), another live venue, in the former Second Avenue Baptist Tabernacle building (erected in 1909, replacing the original church structure which had been built in 1849), a 14-story structure at 162 Second Avenue, New York, NY 10003. One theater was in the basement and the other on the 1st floor. The auditoriums apparently seated 135 and 250 persons, though COs for the property report capacity as 165 and 350.
In the later half of the 1960s, the Gate Theater screened many underground, experimental, and short films, including, in 1964, Martin Scorcese’s “What’s a Nice Girl Like You Doing in a Place Like This?” In December 1977, the location became home to the Theater for a New City.
Today, the structure is home to Urban Outfitters.

I forgot to mention that my other true partner was Ken Edwards…we were both 19 years old then. He kept that theater going against another. Ken and I are still in business together.

At that time, we also distributed films through Bauer International (originally A.J. Bauer & Company)and then became Liberty Films. We distributed the early films of Wim Wenders (when no other American distributer would touch him…including Dan Talbot of New Yorker Films), Hans Jurgen Syberberg, Alexander Kluge, Gregory Nava (whose first film Confessions of Amans had its theatrical release at the Renoir) and Martha Coolidge whose first film (Rape…Not A Pretty Picture) also had its theatrical premiere at the Renoir.

Another one of my friends (till today) was Kevin Lally who today is the Editor of the Film Journal and the author of Wilder Times, the definitive book on Billy Wilder. The latter project was a dream of his back then.

To answer your question, it was only 16MM which limited us greatly back then. But we actually experimented with 16MM creating a platter system so the entire film was on one reel. It only broke down once…during the last two minutes of a Bunuel Mexican film…of course to a packed audience! I forget the film right now…and can you believe not one single person asked for their money back. And they say New Yorkers are heartless…it would have bankrupted us sooner rather than earlier.

Well that’s it for now. Sort of memory lane for me…anyone remember Joe Franklin? Yes, I made an appearance…my first on television with Ilene promoting the Jean Renoir Cinema. Now Franklin was a treasure!!!

Please do go on. Nice comment. I’d like to know the exact dates or years of existence of this theatre, whether you were equipped for both 35mm/16mm, perhaps have links to ads or photos, read some more anecdotes, etc.

“Daughter of Deceit” was Luis Buñuel’s “ La Hija del engaño.” The director’s more obscure Mexican films were being released for the first time in art and specialty houses in the U.S. Most had been shown already, but in unsubtitled showings in Spanish-language cinemas. The Little Theatre at the Public showed a few of them. I remember seeing “El Bruto” there.

What was the exact street address of this theatre? I presume its former space – at least on the exterior – bears little or no resemblance to its former film or live theatre tenants, given how much that stretch of 2nd Avenue continues to change and redevelop itself.

WOW I never heard of this theatre, I would love to hear more details.