Angelika 57
225 W. 57th Street,
New York,
NY
10019
225 W. 57th Street,
New York,
NY
10019
8 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 69 comments
A friend told me he went to this theater when it was the Lincoln, and there was a bust of Lincoln in the lobby. He returned a few months later and it had gone from an art-house to gay porn, and the Lincoln bust had a blindfold on it.
Walter Reade Organization took over the New Carnegie on November 7, 1985. Grand opening ad in photos. Closed July 10, 1997
Awww, I loved this place when it was the Biograph, and I never realized it had only just started as such when I first moved to the city. I was 16 ½ and my previous job back home in Florida had been working at a video store. They would never let us check out new releases, so I had decided to educate myself on classic film after seeing A Place in the Sun one night on the late, late show. So when I came to NYC shortly after, I was thrilled to find a place that showed these films.
I had started hanging out with some of the club kids of the late 80s through a friend of mine. They had little use for me, but I became friendly with one of the DJs and he shared my love of old movies so we’d often go together to see double features. Saw Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, Alice Adams, Carrie (w/ Jennifer Jones), Adam’s Rib, and my beloved Monty Clift in I Confess and my first of several times seeing A Place in the Sun on the big screen. Once I hit NYU, I stopped going, as I didn’t have as much time and I lived right near Theater 80 (and Kim’s Video, so I’d rent instead), but it was such a treat to get to spend those months seeing classic films on the big screen.
To my knowledge this was the only Roadshow engagement that played here. It seems to be the case for other cities. In Philly it played Theater 1812 and Atlantic City the Charles. That was the only two roadshow engagements they had.
“THE LION IN WINTER” played here for over a year.
“The Graduate” opened here fifty years ago today. The film went on to play for nearly a year. (Anyone know of a film that played here for a longer period of time?) And here’s a retrospective article to commemorate the film’s golden anniversary.
The intro needs adjusting. This theatre opened in 1964.
The only memory I have of this theater is when i was 18 and it was a porno theater and me being a dumb nieve teenage got pickpocketed by the guy sitting next to me.
The opening ad as the Lincoln Art;
View link
View link
New Carnegie needs to be added as an aka name and the map link now goes to Queens.
Renewing link.
The map link above goes to Brooklyn.
I’ve been doing some research on the revival houses in New York City and remember this one’s opening weekend well. The repertory programming under Frank Rowley’s direction begain on February 19, 1988 and continued until Cinemaplex Odeon pulled the plug on September 21, 1991. I remember people importuning me to sign petitions on the sidewalk after the theater closed. The era of the private art house was coming to an end. Rowley resurfaced in 1993 when he attempted to turn the Gramercy Theater on 23rd Street into a revival house, but that lasted less than a year.
In any event, I remember being here on the opening weekend. The Biograph kicked things off by showing 10 films with a “New York City” theme on Friday and Saturday and then on Sunday they started running a 34-film Myrna Loy/William Powell retrospective. I remember that because I was there Sunday night, with Myrna Loy in the house as a special guest, when THE THIN MAN screened.
I vaguely remember being here at the end too, but can’t remember which films played the last weekend. My research will continue.
I’d love to see some schedules for this place. How I wish I had saved them!
I believe the Biograph was closed for a couple of years before Joe Saleh ran the place as the Angelika 57 until it closed for good and became a very pricey supermarket.
I was delighted when the ubiquitous Frank Rowley began programming this theater with classics and disheartened when his era ended here, as it had at the Regency. What a loss!
A very hairy lady was the subject of Marco Ferreri’s The Ape Woman, shown here in 1964.
Thanks, Joe. By the way, you rabble still have to pay for access to NYT articles published prior to 1981.
Now that the New York Times has opened much of its archives to us non-paying rabble, a July, 1997 article on the occasion of the closing of the Angelika 57 is available right here. (The Times may still require free registration at their site before you can see the article- I’m not sure.)
The article gives the opening date of the Lincoln Art Theatre as July 21, 1964, and the seating capacity as 572.
In addition to its incarnations as the Bombay Cinema (1976-1985) and Cineplex Odeon’s Biograph (February 1988-September 1991), there was a period in between when it was called the New Carnegie Theater, a resurrection of the former Little Carnegie Theater which had been demolished in 1982.
The house became the Angelika 57 in 1993, and closed forever on July 10, 1997.
I discovered the Biograph almost by accident in the Fall of 1988 when some friends and I went to see a revival of my all-time favorite film, 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY. I remember thinking that it was revival theaters like this that made Manhattan great! Too bad something that special was not meant to last.
The Biograph Theater was also inspirational to me in that when writing a couple of my screenplays, I created a ficticious revival movie theater in several scenes that take place in small coastal towns.
Yes, Wanda. Zed signifies “The End.” Music swells, fade to black. House lights come up, and we wonder what did it all means.
Thanks for attempting to move the conversational ball down the field, Gerry/Warren. It’s all up to you now. Your 1965 opening night, the tony Lincoln Art Theatre, the Lincoln statue in the Lobby, the Maltese Falcon, the little tramp, the moving shadows on the wall, the past itself, these are the elusive things of which dreams are made. Pleasant dreams, Bryan K, my dear old friend! Zeddy?
In June 1965 the Lincoln Art Theatre held the American premiere of this fine 1961 commedia all'italiana, The Fascist/Il federale, unfortunately all but forgotten today.
Let’s get something clear, Warren. We’re not interested in the Lincoln Art’s shameful descent as a palace of porno perversions. If you have a interest in gay porn, I suggest you confine those proclivities elsewhere. Let’s revel in the Lincoln Art’s glory as a purveyer of fine films with artistic merit.
Don’t flatter yourself, Warren. I’ve heard Bryan Krefft call you a fathead many times.
Yes, fairytail. “Warren” and “Zeddy” seem to be the same silly person in conversation with him/her/itself. Could the moderator please intervene? I understand it’s “illegal” to post here under more than one signature at a time, “Warren,” if that’s your real name. (Warren dear, read this in your best Paul Lynde voice.)
Oh my what a bunch of nonsense. This person Zeddy joined Cinema Treasures on March 31, 2007 and the one and only message was an ass kissing message to Warren. Talk about stupid and pointless messages! You are both guilty of this crime. I will pray for both Warren and Zeddy.