Metro Twin
2626 Broadway,
New York,
NY
10025
2626 Broadway,
New York,
NY
10025
17 people
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By Annie Aguiar Published July 26, 2024 Updated July 27, 2024
After almost two decades of failed attempts to reopen, a landmark Upper West Side movie theater may be resurrected with a plan from a potential new buyer and celebrity support.
The independent film producer Ira Deutchman is spearheading the project, along with Adeline Monzier, the U.S. representative of the French film promoter Unifrance and a guest programmer at the Metrograph, a Lower East Side theater.
They have formed the Upper West Side Cinema Center, a nonprofit corporation, whose website lists Martin Scorsese, Ethan Hawke and John Turturro as advisers, along with Bob Balaban, Griffin Dunne and the “American Psycho” director Mary Harron. (They would call it the Metro Cinema Center.)
Representatives for Scorsese and Dunne confirmed their involvement.
The plan was reported earlier by IndieWire.
The proposal includes a five-screen theater dedicated to art house releases, classic film and special events; it would also have an education center and a café
Mark Levine, the Manhattan borough president, said he has spoken with two other parties that are talking with the owners about a potential sale, but Deutchman’s proposal is the most fully developed. The estate of the former owner also has yet to engage a broker for the sale, Levine said.
The Upper West Side, once a hot spot for art house theaters, is now served by selections at Film at Lincoln Center and large multiplexes. “This is a really underserved audience that is in a community that clearly has an interest in the kinds of movies we’re talking about,” Deutchman said in an interview.
The Metro Theater, with its landmark pink terra-cotta Art Deco facade at 99th Street and Broadway, opened in 1933 and closed in 2005. At the time, Albert Bialek, its owner, pointed to the rise of multiscreen theaters as making smaller movie houses like the Metro “obsolete.”
Subsequent attempts to reimagine the space as a Planet Fitness and an Alamo Drafthouse location were unsuccessful. Development options are limited because of the landmark status and because Bialek, who died in 2023, previously sold the air rights above the theater.
Deutchman said he thinks his proposal has a higher chance of being successful than previous attempts to revitalize the theater because Bialek’s estate is looking to sell the building, while Bialek had pursued leasing agreements.
The Upper West Side Cinema Center proposal hinges on convincing Bialek’s estate to accept the plan and finding funding through individual donors, private investors and, possibly, government grants.
Deutchman said that he was not at liberty to disclose a financial estimate for the purchase.
But he indicated that estimates from a community group, which were included in the IndieWire article and placed the sale at $5 million to $10 million and restoration at $15 million to $25 million, were generally accurate.
“We’re hoping that there’s one person of means who would really like to see their name” on one of the five movie theaters that would make up the Metro Cinema Center, he said.
Levine, the borough president, who has been involved in efforts to reopen the theater since he was a city councilman representing the district, said that he likes the plan and is optimistic, but that it’s still early.
“I have been through at least half a dozen cycles of hope and heartbreak,” he said. “It’s been quite a roller coaster.”
Celebrities Support Plan to Reopen Upper West Side Movie Theater
Martin Scorsese, Ethan Hawke and John Turturro are all listed as advisers to a new proposal to buy the former Metro Theater, which closed in 2005.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/26/movies/celebrities-plan-metro-theater-movie-upper-west-side.html?searchResultPosition=1
Martin Scorsese and a few others have formed a non-profit with the intent of reopening the long-closed Metro theater on Broadway at 99 Street as an ‘art house’ type movie theater. It looks like a risky move, and wonder if that will work even on the Upper West Side in 2024? The target market of Manahttan is an upscale borough where I’m sure everyone owns a large HDTV. It’s not like the pre-Home Video days when Manhattanites would flock to the many art house and revival movie theaters that existed back then.
I wish this group luck but the building is in terrible shape and requires expensive renovations and repairs.
NYTimes story - http://u.pc.cd/It5ctalK
Latest attempts to rehabilitate the building have failed, according to a report in the New York Post. Click here
From the New York Post on March 22, 2022 article:After a very long intermission, this theater is finally set to return.
For 17 years, Manhattan’s Metro Theater has been collecting dust on the Upper West Side. Since 2005, the 82-year-old Art Deco theater has sat vacant, nearly home to numerous tenants — Urban Outfitters, Planet Fitness, Alamo Drafthouse, an arts education nonprofit — all of which eventually fell through.
Now, though, it’s official: A lease has finally been signed and the historic building will stay a cinema.
“There have been so many false starts and failed plans at The Metro; I think a lot of us started to feel like Charlie Brown with the football and had given up being excited,” Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine told The Post. When he heard yet another potential business was interested in bringing back the Broadway building, “I decided that I wouldn’t celebrate until I heard it directly from a tenant that a lease had been signed.”
And now that’s finally happened.
“This is real, I heard it direct from the head of the company: The lease has been signed so there’s no turning back,” he went on. “They’re asking for a bit of anonymity at this point, but I can tell you unambiguously that this is real, it’s happening, and it’s a best case scenario.”
The 10,260-square-foot building will become a “Community Entertainment” and “multi-screen cinema center, with restaurant facilities and community meeting rooms on a rental basis,” longtime owner Albert Bialek told The West Side Rag. Since being built in the 1930s, the two-story building has housed an art house cinema, pornography theater and two national movie chains, and still boasts the same landmarked exterior. Its interior, however, has since been gutted. “It kind of works for this new format because it’s going to be a large number of smaller screens,” Levine noted optimistically of the blank interior canvas.
The yet unnamed company of “renowned people” from California are refusing to reveal their identity until they “file their plans” in the next few weeks, but they’ll offer movie-goers an alcohol-equipped dine-in film experience, the Rag reported.
In response to The Post’s inquiry, movie chain Alamo Drafthouse — which almost built a five-screen theater in the space before backing out in 2012 — offered no comment regarding if it is the secret new tenant.
The news is a huge boon for the area, which has lost a lot of businesses during the pandemic and is now pockmarked by empty storefronts.
“It’s been a rough two years,” said Levine, who represented part of the Upper West Side during his time on New York City Council from 2014 to 2021. “We had feared this would be a chain clothing store or a pharmacy, although anything would’ve been better than abandonment.”
Its vacancy has indeed been not only sad but also expensive: Bialek has been charged over $840,000 in city property taxes in the time the address has remained vacant, the Real Deal previously reported.
“This is gonna transform that area,” Levine went on enthusiastically. “This is just the boost that the neighborhood needed.”
Please update, became a Twin on August 29, 1986. Theatre closed on December 1, 2005
It became a twin in 1982. The Jessica Lange “KING KONG” was a 1976 release. The food carts down the aisle were a Cineplex Odeon project that started in the early nineties. Are you talking about the original “KING KONG” as a revival?
There is something incorrect about this description. I remember very specifically because I was there. Sometime in the middle 80s, the theatre had a grand opening as the Metro and they completely restored the inside to art deco style and even had users who had carts with popcorn and snacks going up and down the aisles. The first movie showed was King Kong. It wasn’t a duplex at that point! The only reason I went was to see the unedited Kong on a big screen! The theatre is still there and available for rent.
Please correct your desciption, New York Cinemas (owners of Cinema Studio and Lincoln Plaza Cinemas) ran the Metro Theatre. They made that theatre a twin with only one auditorium Dolby Stereo.. Clearview took the theatre over from Cineplex Odeon after they were force to sell some theatres off when they merge with Loews.. I enclose a ad with NYC owning the theatre
Hello- after Alamo scraped their plans is the' theater just sitting there boarded up?
It’s a shame that Alamo Drafthouse could not make it work as a movie theatre. Well at least the exterior has landmark status, so that can’t change it, thankfully.
New York Times – October 17, 2015.
Metro To Become Fitness Center
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/17/nyregion/landmark-metro-theater-in-manhattan-to-be-reborn-as-a-planet-fitness.html?ref=nyregion&_r=0
not sure if this listing is current re what sounds like vendor booths http://www.besenretail.com/2626-broadway.htm
Damn… That is too bad. Seemed like an ideal salvage for this old structure. Now, I’m sure, whatever is left of the place is destined to be hauled away as rubble.
Alamo Drafthouse won’t be opening at the Metro, after all: http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/10/01/alamo-drafthouse-scraps-plan-for-upper-west-side-movie-theater/
With the Alamos, construction looks can be deceiving. The old Movieland in Yonkers looked for months as if nothing was happening and plans were abandoned. Then all of a sudden, like Christmas, it opened! And it’s beautiful! Don’t worry, it’ll be fine!
Direct link to article and photos here
Photos of the construction progress: http://www.westsiderag.com/2013/04/08/heres-a-first-peek-at-the-transformation-of-the-old-metro-theate
I am dubious about these big plans. I passed by the other day and not only was there not any work being done but there was also a Space Available banner up.
Since there was a balcony in the original, they’ll stack them and likely utilize basement space. I anticipate at least a few of these rooms will be quite small, but I’m hoping the screen sizes remain reasonable.
The Ritz mentioned in the interview with Tim Leauge is a cool venue that was turned into two stadium seating theaters with great sight lines. I think they were working with a raw shell there but it’s a pretty classy-looking place, I’m sure The Metro will also incorporate elements of the original look. After all they are all about vintage.
With this said I love Alamo Drafthouse – they program everything down to the pre-show (imagine YouTube clips designed to get you excited about the film you’re about to see). While I also really like Nitehawk in Willliamsburg (it’s the closest thing to Alamo in the area) it’s always encouraging to see a movie theatre run by film lovers create a fun but respectful atmosphere (including kicking out talkers and texters), I think people will travel uptown for the experience. (and it makes sense to go uptown, below 14th is probably over screened so they’ll be massive compitition for product). The only thing about them that’s a little concerning is the pace at which they’re expanding….
Sad that the theater was completely gutted. Seems that Alamo might have employed many of the original architectural features in the new auditoriums. It is heartening to hear that they will research the original decor and use that as a basis to design and trim the new interior.
Al… I wonder if Alamo will be able to succeed where CO wasn’t, based on their being licensed to serve liquor on the premises.
He’s going to run into trouble with that ‘no kids under 6’ policy. Cineplex Odeon was sued for attempting that in New York.
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