Comments from LouRugani

LouRugani commented about RKO MAINSTREET (NATIONAL, ORPHEUM) Theatre; Racine, Wisconsin. on Sep 5, 2018 at 2:52 pm

April 25, 1912.

LouRugani commented about Alger Theatre on Sep 4, 2018 at 4:18 am

THE SMALLEST SHOW ON EARTH: IN MEMORY OF THE ALGER (1940-2015) by Dennis Cozzalio, JUN 18, 2016

The delightful British comedy The Smallest Show on Earth headlined a great Saturday matinee offering from the UCLA Film and Television Archive on June 25, 2016 as their excellent series “Marquee Movies: Movies on Moviegoing” wrapped up. So it seemed like a perfect time to resurrect my review of the movie, which celebrates the collective experience of seeing cinema in a darkened, and in this case dilapidated old auditorium, alongside my appreciation of my own hometown movie house, the Alger, which opened in 1940 and closed last year, one more victim of economics and the move toward digital distribution and exhibition.

“You mean to tell me my uncle actually charged people to go in there? And people actually paid?” – Matt Spenser (Bill Travers) upon first seeing the condition of the Bijou Kinema, in The Smallest Show on Earth

In Basil Dearden’s charming and wistful 1957 British comedy The Smallest Show on Earth (also known under the far-less evocative title Big Time Operators), a young couple, played by Virginia McKenna and Bill Travers, inherit a small-town cinema, the Bijou Kinema – known to the citizenry of Sloughborough as the Flea Pit – and decide, in order to drive up the selling price to the local cinema magnate, who wants to tear it down and build a carpark, that against all odds and common sense they’ll reopen the doors and give the business a go. They also inherit three elderly employees who have long been part of the Bijou’s checkered history—Mrs. Fazackalee (Margaret Rutherford), the cashier who was once also the cinema organist during the silent era; Mr. Quill (Peter Sellers), the projectionist with a more-than-slight penchant for Dewar’s White Label; and Old Tom (Bernard Miles), the janitor who only wants a uniform commensurate with his position and who dutifully provides a fiery solution when negotiations with the magnate hit a snag. These three comprise what passes for the barely beating heart of the Bijou, and if Dearden’s movie seems to end just as the third act is set to begin, it remains a sweet-tempered testament to the blinkered spirits of the Bijou staff, as well as to the fleeting pleasures of nostalgia and the long-lost palaces where past generations learned to love the movies.

Some of the richest comic highlights of The Smallest Show on Earth come from all the technical foul-ups that come courtesy of the theater’s antiquated equipment — busted reels, focus failures, upside-down images and, of course, the image of sizzling celluloid from a frame on fire, these are as good as a cartoon and a newsreel, the expected bonuses when you buy a ticket at the Bijou. And audiences in 2016 who stumble upon this little beauty on DVD (or on Amazon Streaming Video, where it is currently available) will likely get huge laughs from the movie’s sly comment on the panicked movie industry’s attempt to stave off the deleterious effects of television through unabashed gimmickry.

Unable to afford upgrades to Cinemascope and stereophonic sound, the staff at the Bijou make do (albeit inadvertently) with the hardships imposed on them by the march of progress. One of the factors of modernity contributing to the theater’s fall into disrepair is a railway which zooms directly past the outside of the auditorium, making the building shake from its faulty foundation to its rickety rafters. However, fortune smiles upon the Spensers as audiences react with wild abandon when the roar of the train outside is accidentally synched to a scene of a train robbery in the western on screen. The rumbling is so awful that poor Mr. Quill, recently having “taken the pledge,” is driven back to drink after throwing himself bodily on the projector to keep it from vibrating off its floor mounts. But the audience sees it as an “enhanced” experience, something they certainly couldn’t get from sitting at home in front of the tube.

Viewers taking in The Smallest Show on Earth 60 years later will think of everything from Sensurround to D-Box, technological gimmicks that, effective as they might be, still probably wouldn’t be as much fun as a well-timed passing locomotive threatening to literally bring the house down. The movie gently satirizes the raucous behavior of working-class audiences in the age of television while serving as a bridge between the rapidly changing landscape of modern entertainment and its own unapologetically nostalgic yearning for days past, when tastes were simpler and ornate palaces built to showcase flickering images of grandeur and adventure were commonplace. Whatever else you might say about them, the rowdy, television-spoiled audiences that (eventually) pack the Bijou are at least having fun, unlike their “sophisticated” modern-day counterparts, whose countenances, lit by cell phone screens, betray the desultory sense that, despite the fact that they’ve paid upwards of $17 to get in, they’d rather be anywhere else than in a theater watching a movie.

Of course, that appeal to nostalgia for days past rings slightly differently in 2016 than it did for the characters in Dearden’s film, who have seen change in the film industry, from silent to sound to color to wide-screen, but who mourn most especially for the days when the theater could be packed for every show, when the movies really were the best and only show in town. Audiences exposed to the movie today might first marvel that there were ever such huge, expansive, ornately designed, single-screen temples whose only purpose was to show movies. Modern multiplexes with 25 screens and a bounty of tentpole blockbusters to exhibit still find themselves appealing to Internet technology to stimulate ticket sales, booking live, high-definition video feeds of operas and other “special events,” and even appealing to organizations like churches to rent auditoriums, all in order to stay afloat in an age when entertainment choices are even more fragmented. Single-screen palaces for everyday exhibition really are, with a few exceptions like the historic Vista in East Hollywood, things of the past.

For me, seeing The Smallest Show on Earth for the first time in 2014 provided its own sort of coincidence, like a train with the word “progress” spray-painted on its engine in ironic quotation marks rumbling past, but without the pleasant afterglow of an enhanced experience. As I watched the efforts of the Spensers and their staff to raise the Bijou Kinema from the ashes, I couldn’t help but reflect on a couple of beloved movie palaces in my own life that are not now what they once were.

2014 was the year that the movie palace of my own childhood finally closed its doors for what looks like the last time. I saw my very first movie in a theater at the tender age of three. It was Gay Purr-ee (1963), the Abe Levitow-directed animated feature (co-written by Chuck Jones) about cats in the French countryside making their way to the big city, and I saw it at the Marius Theater in beautiful downtown Lakeview, Oregon. The Marius, built in the early 1930s, wasn’t the first movie theater in town — there was a tiny silent theater operating in the early 1900s that introduced the industrial age wonder of the movies to the Irish immigrants and cowpokes who first populated my hometown. (Writer Bob Barry commemorated the theater, whose name I can’t recall — the Rex, maybe? — in his book of local history From Shamrocks to Sagebrush.) But the Marius was my first. I don’t remember a thing about it, and without the help of some photographs I doubt I’d even be able to recall what the exterior looked like— it was closed and remodeled into an office building during the years in the mid-60’s when my family briefly moved to California. By the time we returned in 1968, the Marius was gone. (The remnants of the theater stage are still discernible in the basement of that remodeled building, known since the theater’s closing as the Marius Building. Otherwise, you’d never know a movie theater once stood there.)

By the time I returned to Lakeview in 1968, I’d been infected by the movie virus in a serious way. My parents took us to movies at the big theaters near the outskirts of Sacramento —the Tower and the Roseville in downtown Roseville, and the Citrus Heights Drive-in in the bedroom community of Citrus Heights, where we lived — and when we moved back to the rural splendor of Lakeview, I took as full advantage as I could of the opportunity to go to the movies by myself or with friends —something we weren’t allowed to do in the big city. And the Alger Theater, at the edge of downtown Lakeview, just a mile from my house, became my refuge, my oasis, my home away from home. Those were the days of double features, Saturday matinees (with reduced prices!), of driving into town and thrilling to see the lights of the marquee turned on before sundown, beckoning, promising a peek into a world well beyond the limits of what could be offered by my little burg. I dreamt of that place often, the yellow bulb lights dotting the undercarriage of the marquee, glowing and playing off the pale green trim of the theater frontage — it was glamorous, the only glamour my town had to offer, and it was irresistible.

My dad’s side of the family, the Italians, were dutiful Catholics, and as such were well acquainted with Bob and Norene Alger, visible participants in local Catholic culture who owned and operated the Alger Theater and the Circle JM Drive-in Theater on the north end of town; they had owned the Marius as well. Being the son (and grandson) of family friends, Mr. and Mrs. Alger always made me feel welcome. I can remember filing out of many matinees and evening shows and being greeted by Mrs. Alger with a hug, which many of my friends and peers thought was strange because she was rarely any more than standoffish — and sometimes downright cranky — to most of them. She also came down into the auditorium to personally check on me the night I first saw Blazing Saddles, apparently fearing from my relentless laughter that I was in danger of respiratory failure or full-on hysteria. And the very first review I ever wrote, at the tender age of 12, came at the behest of Mr. Alger, who offered me free admittance to the Saturday night showing of Young Winston (1972) if I would provide him a written review of it after mass the following morning. I have no idea why he wanted me to write about it, but when I delivered my little essay, he accepted it with that slightly inscrutable half-smile, which could be easily misinterpreted (or correctly interpreted, I suppose) as a frown and which rarely left his face. I never heard another word about the review, and he never asked me to do it again.

Though they were overseers of one of the two primary communal entertainment options available to Lakeview back in the day, Bob and Norene felt no need to worry about competing with television. Which was a good thing, because the Algers were anything but show people. They ran the theater with an increasing sense of begrudging duty, and not without a sense — definitely noticed by the general populace — that they were too socially sophisticated for the audience they served. And they didn’t go in for gimmicks or promotions either. The only bonuses offered by the theater came on Christmas Eve (an annual canned-food drive matinee which didn’t survive the early ‘70’s – see Dear Brigitte on the calendar above); Independence Day (a bare-bones fireworks show for which several pals, including the Algers’ son David and I, comprised the mortar crew when I was a teenager); and, best of all, one-night horror shows for New Year’s Eve, Halloween and whenever a Friday the 13th would roll around. The Alger booked a terrific array of Hammer, Amicus and American-International titles for my formative years, allowing me to see films like Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed, Dracula Has Risen from the Grave, Rasputin the Mad Monk, The Fearless Vampire Killers, The Green Slime, Tales from the Crypt, Asylum, The House That Dripped Blood, Count Yorga, Vampire and countless others that stand as favorites to this day, all projected to a crowd of very enthusiastic screamers.

Audiences at the Alger weren’t far removed from the hijinks of those rowdy delinquents inside the Spensers’ Bijou either. One of the apocryphal Bob Alger stories for me and my buddies came as a result of a Halloween night screening of Tales from the Crypt during which the audience, comprised mostly of high school kids like myself who, unlike myself, were there to do anything but watch the movie, got well out of control. The din started before the opening curtain and continued to increase. And when some sort of projectile flew out of the crowd and landed very close to the screen, it wasn’t long before Mr. Alger marched slowly, deliberately, to the front of the theater, the lights came up, the movie stopped and everyone went silent. “What I have before me, on the floor of the auditorium,” he intoned ominously, as fearsome as Sir Ralph Richardson’s cryptkeeper, “is a fresh egg.” He berated the audience for their behavior and threatened to shut the screening down entirely, with no refunds, if decorum wasn’t restored immediately. He even yelled out at one poor bastard who was still cutting up during his speech: “You! In the balcony! I know it was you who threw it!” Even though I wasn’t causing trouble myself, I was terrified (I could only laugh about it later), but I was also secretly glad because, damn it, I couldn’t hear the movie, and the last thing I would have wanted was for the Algers to pull the plug on these horror holiday special shows, which I considered a major perk and a significant antidote to the doldrums of Lakeview citizenship.

I went to see everything I could at the Alger. I wanted to see everything I could. But for the general audiences, who during the early ‘70s came out to see just about anything the theater showed — I remember a half full house for Robert Altman’s box-office bomb Buffalo Bill and the Indians, for crying out loud, a phenomenon probably attributable to the cowboy community assuming they were in for a run-of-the-mill western — I don’t think the movies themselves mattered nearly as much as the chance to get out and do something, anything.

And when that movie was done, it was done — there was no going out and talking about it afterward, because movies were rarely seen as anything more than simple diversion. Sometimes the movie was done before it was done. One of the funniest moments in The Smallest Show on Earth comes as a B-western is beginning to wrap up. It’s the last scene in the movie, and the audience, sensing that the meat of the action has finished, jumps up and bolts for the exits before “The End” even has a chance to pop up and cue them that it’s time to leave. The audiences at the Alger were similarly inclined to get on with life rather than savor the cinematic experience they’d just had. I’ll never forget coming home from college and seeing Star Wars with the hometown crowd. As soon as the Death Star exploded, at least 40 people in the packed house grabbed their coats and scooted out of the theater.

For all its deficiencies — the inept projection, the frequently misspelled marquee (it was always “Pual” Newman in something or other, and I’ll never forget “Ward Bond 007” in The Man with the Golden Gun), the uncomfortable seats, the indifferent management — the Alger was where I really fell in love with the movies. That love would be deepened elsewhere, but the Alger’s lights always seemed to be visible to me from the dark quiet of Southern Oregon nights long after I’d left the town, a glowing reminder of where it all began.

The Algers closed the drive-in in 1981 after a winter storm ripped the screen in half like a piece of wet paper. They kept the indoor theater open for a couple years after that, but soon retired, and it sat dark for a few months during the early ‘80s when local folks were finally getting into the swing of the VCR era. It eventually reopened under new ownership in the mid-80s, and competition to keep pace with an ever-shrinking window between theatrical release and home video debut forced the theater to begin picking up releases much more quickly than it ever did under the guidance of Bob Alger. In those days, it wasn’t unusual to have to wait 6-9 months after its national release for a movie to bow at the Alger — Jaws (1975) played at the Circle JM Drive-in during the summer of 1976. But the video-age Alger was facing a much-changed exhibition landscape. I remember being completely shocked to open up the pages of the local weekly newspaper, the Lake County Examiner, 15 years ago and seeing a tiny ad for the week’s offering at the Alger, Scream 3, which was opening at the Alger the very same night it opened on 3,000 or so other screens across the nation, an unthinkable scenario even five years before then.

The theater, under new management now twice removed from Bob and Norene Alger, more or less limped into the digital age. Shows were now weekends only, and the theater, which opened in 1940 was beginning to show the effects of a lack of cosmetic upkeep. A ghastly stage had been installed in the mid ‘80s, ostensibly in a move to establish a community theater presence which never took hold, obliterating the first four or five rows of original seats. What seats remained were the original 1940 editions and as butt-numbing as ever; the marquee lights were spotty, every other bulb either burnt out or screwed into a socket that had long since failed to carry current; the façade of the theater was tattered and badly in need of a paint job; and the marquee itself was warped, rickety and weather-beaten, its ability to hold up plastic letters routinely challenged by a stiff breeze. With the cost of keeping the theater open for just three days a week becoming increasingly indomitable, it seemed the writing was on the wall, and it probably had been for at least the first 10 years of the 21st century.

Much like how the storm that destroyed the drive-in screen in 1981 had presented the Algers a convenient exeunt from the drive-in business, big studio threats to stop providing 35mm prints to theaters, thus forcing small-town operations like the Alger to upgrade to digital equipment in order to stay in business, were the rationale current management needed to call theatrical exhibition in Lakeview, Oregon a permanent day. After several attempts to communicate with the current owners and brainstorm ideas for keeping the theater alive — a theater in nearby Alturas, California had successfully navigated a crowd-funding campaign to upgrade their theater and make it a community-operated business — I stopped receiving replies to my e-mails, and it became clear that, in response to deteriorating attendance, the owners weren’t really interested in rallying an effort to come up with the money to keep the doors open.

So, in March 2014 the reels of the Alger Theater’s 35mm platter projection system spun their last. The theater, much like Hollywood itself, had long since ceded any attempt to appeal to any other audience beyond the PG/PG-13 market, the only folks left in town who could be counted on to occasionally show up for a movie. It’s grimly appropriate that the last picture show would not be a landmark like Red River (the current Alger management likely being unaware of that movie, or The Last Picture Show, for that matter), or even an adult-oriented audience-pleaser like the recent Oscar-winner Argo. Instead, it was the generic animated movie The Nut Job, and a sadder, more ignominious finale for my beloved theater I couldn’t possibly imagine. According to a report filed by my niece, who was very upset about the theater closing and tried herself to generate some local interest in preserving it, the last show was just as nondescript and lacking in fanfare as one might expect. The end credits playing before an empty auditorium, what there was of the audience having already listlessly filed out, the marquee lights went dark over South F Street, the main drag on which the Alger held dominance for 74 years, and save for one special screening – author Cheryl Strayed brought the movie version of Wild to town, Lakeview being one of the towns she walked through on her epic journey along the Pacific Crest Trail – those marquee lights haven’t been back on since. It’s not clear as yet whether the township of Lakeview has even noticed.

Last year I got a message from a friend still living in Oregon who said she’d heard that the Alger was about to be purchased by a new owner, given a digital upgrade and a paint job, and reopened. Did I dream this? If it were true, it would be an unlikely deus ex machina, given the history of this theater, and given the economic straits in which the town is currently mired. It’s the sort of dream of the past and its familiar faces that I wake up from all the time. But no, I didn’t dream it. The message was real. And whether or not the resurrection of the Alger makes the transition from rumor to reality—and the town’s active interest in making it happen cannot be overemphasized– is a story I have been following closely and will continue to keep my eye on.

Maybe the Alger Theater doesn’t mean the same thing to the current citizenry of Lakeview that it does to me. Maybe it never did. However the general population may have felt it’s difficult for me to discount the importance such a tiny blip on American culture as the Alger had on the forming of my mind and my desire to see more than what could be offered on the dusty, muddy streets passing outside its doors. If they’re lucky, everyone reading this will have a place like it nestled in their memories, a place where love for what the movies could show us, could inspire in us, the emotions they could stir, was instilled and made foundation for the appreciation of what movies could be that we had yet to understand. When I see the empty shell of that theater, standing abandoned and ignored at the edge of my hometown, I don’t feel like a piece of me is lost. No, I know right where that piece is at. It’s still inside those doors, in communion with the dusty old red curtain, the forever dimmed house lights running the edges of the auditorium at the ceiling level, the mysterious projection room from whence all those amazing sights and sounds emerged, the tidy confines of the snack bar watched over by the old Thornton’s Drug clock on the wall, its timekeeping partner, the one bearing the Lincecum Signs ad, still perched in the auditorium above the door to the back of the screen, stage left. Yep, I’m still in there, sitting in those worn-down seats, waiting for the next movie to start. By a great stroke of fortune, maybe someday it will. (Dennis Cozzalio)

LouRugani commented about RAPIDS PLAZA Cinema; Racine, Wisconsin. on Sep 3, 2018 at 5:07 am

LouRugani commented about Oriental Theatre on Aug 6, 2018 at 4:29 am

The Changing Face of the Oriental Theatre (by David Luhrssen, July 3, 2018, Shepherd Express) — Although it turns 91 this summer, the Oriental Theatre (2230 N. Farwell Ave.) isn’t Milwaukee’s oldest cinema; the Downer claims that honor. But, with all due respect to the beautiful Avalon, the Oriental was and remains the city’s most spectacular movie palace for its exuberantly Near East-Far East decor. And for several decades, the Oriental has been an anchor of the city’s cinema culture as a repertory house and then as a theater with a consistent lineup of foreign, indie and documentary films.

This month, the venerable Oriental goes dark as its new operators take charge and begin phase one of planned renovations. Milwaukee Film—whose primary project has been the Milwaukee Film Festival—is now the leaseholder, and Jonathan Jackson, MF’s artistic and executive director, has big plans. First off: more ambitious and diverse programming that reflects, and magnifies, the work of the annual festival. “The film community loves the 15-day event, but people have asked us to create more opportunities,” Jackson says.

In 1988, the Oriental caught up with the late 20th century when the Landmark Theatres chain divided its cavernous interior into a three-screen house with great sensitivity to the building’s architectural integrity. To bring it into the 21st century, Jackson has announced an upgrade in sight and sound. The 2K digital projectors will be supplanted by higher-resolution 4K units. And, in a nod to the enduring significance of actual film composed of celluloid (not pixels), MF will also install new 35mm and 70mm projectors. “With those, we expect to secure access to all the leading film archives in the world,” Jackson explains. He has received applications from old-school projectionists—an occupation rendered obsolescent by digital technology—from around the country.

“But first and foremost,” he adds, “I think it’s a great idea that women have a restroom on the first floor!” Since the Oriental Theatre opened, the women’s room has been lodged at the far end of the mezzanine and is inaccessible to the disabled. Women were usually forced into a small chamber, an afterthought added for the handicapped next to the ground floor men’s room. “I was always ashamed to walk to the bathroom during the film festival past a line of women,” Jackson says. “I once saw a gentleman block the men’s room door to allow only women to use it for a given time.”

The new women’s room—carved out of space opened up by annexing a small retail bay abutting the Oriental’s northeast corner—will, like all future alterations, conform to the building’s character. Jackson adds that MF is more than halfway through the process of adding the Oriental to the National Register of Historic Places.

Most Milwaukeeans were surprised last summer when Milwaukee Film announced its acquisition of the Oriental’s lease from the theater’s longtime operator, Landmark Theatres, but the historic cinema had long been on Jackson’s mind. The Oriental was his first job after moving to Milwaukee. He went on to manage the UW-Milwaukee Union Cinema and became, in 2003, programming director for the Milwaukee International Film Festival. (Full disclosure: I was a co-founder of the MIFF and served as its executive director through 2007.) The Oriental had always been one of that festival’s major venues, and its importance only grew after Jackson became the Milwaukee Film Festival’s executive director in 2008.

So, why not continue renting the Oriental for two weeks each year instead of undertaking the year-round responsibility for a historic landmark?

“Our relationship with the Oriental became the critical factor in our success,” Jackson explains. “It was great working with [theater manager] Eric Levin and his staff, but the growth of the festival was inhibited because we had no long-term contract.” Instead, MF worked with the Oriental year by year; according to Jackson, the paperwork for the next fall festival never arrived before late spring. “Anyone in my position would have lost sleep,” he continues. “It was a challenge for long-range planning, to secure sponsors, to sell advance tickets. You can understand the potential instability of that.”

Also, Landmarks Theatre never rented MF more than two of the Oriental’s three screens and never gave Jackson the timeframe he sought. “We always wanted late October-early November, but Landmarks wanted to save their screens for the big fall releases,” he explains. “Historically, our dates overlapped with the New York Film Festival, one of the biggest film festivals with dibs on all content.” As a result, many significant non-Hollywood movies could never be booked at the Milwaukee Film Festival—until this year. “You can only do so much to grow a film culture in 15 days,” Jackson continues. “From now on, Milwaukee Film have an additional 350 days to play.”

Aside from the opportunity to screen every available movie in the world, Jackson’s decision to assume control of Milwaukee’s flagship cinema has a financial dimension. “Non-profit cinemas are healthier than film festivals,” Jackson explains. “Most film festivals operate on 30-40% earned income, mainly ticket sales, and the rest comes from fundraising. Nonprofit cinemas generally run on 60% earned income and 40% philanthropy. We hope to change our metric by running the Oriental.” And what of Landmarks’ remaining Milwaukee venue—the city’s oldest movie theater, the Downer? “Landmarks has a lease on the Downer,” Jackson says. Landmarks Theatres refused to comment.

Milwaukee Film has an 11-year lease plus two 10-year options on the Oriental. “We have a strong, long lease so that we can fundraise long-term to pay for improvements to the structure of the building,” Jackson says. “We are investing in the building even though we don’t own it, but since we’re running it for 30 years, we’re comfortable with that.”

“Aside from, ‘What about the women’s bathroom?’ the thing that everyone says to me is, ‘Don’t touch the popcorn!’” says Jackson on future plans for the Oriental. Phase two of the facelift will include some changes at the concession stand. “We’ll want to feature as many local products as possible,” he says. The original plasterwork of the cinema’s ceiling needs restoration. And down below, the original seats in the balcony have to be replaced. The curtains and tapestries need cleaning or mending. The HVAC (heating, ventilation, air conditioning) system requires updating. “We need to look at the acoustical treatment to insure that the sound is not bouncing within each space or between the theaters,” Jackson says.

He continues: “In the early days of cinema, people might find live programming at a movie theater, a double feature, a newsreel, an organ performance—it was more of a full cultural event, and it’s what film festivals do naturally—to create an experience.” Which leads to the inevitable rebutting of the tired doomsayers who keep forecasting the death of movie theaters. After all, they say, why not stay home with your Plasma screen, your lumpy Barcalounger and your popcorn machine?

“The statistics show that movie attendance is stable,” Jackson replies. “For me, the point is the communal experience. It’s so wonderful and strange, having hundreds of people sitting silently in a room staring at a screen and sharing an experience. It’s an unparalleled opportunity for community engagement. And besides,” he adds, “you cannot beat the experience of seeing a movie on a big screen.”

The Oriental Theatre will reopen on Friday, Aug. 10.

LouRugani commented about Labor Temple Theater on Jul 26, 2018 at 2:47 am

The Labor Temple was built in 1914 by the Local Miners' Union. The front doors opened onto an attractive lobby with a wide stairway to the second floor on the right and a ticket office centered between two entrances to a large auditorium with a sloping floor, aisles between three sections of seats and a large stage. The theatre had the first air-conditioning system within thirty-five miles of Staunton. From Tuesday through Sunday it was a first-run theatre for years. The musical “Don’t Give Up the Ship” led to the Staunton High School fight song “Don’t Give Up the Fight”. On the first Monday of each month the miners held a union meeting there; other Mondays were available for graduations, dramatic or musical productions by local groups, lectures and so forth. Lavatories were upstairs as were several conference or committee meeting rooms and a large hall where lodges met and dances and receptions were held.

LouRugani commented about STATE Theatre; Milwaukee, Wisconsin. on Jul 26, 2018 at 2:29 am

Summer, 2018.

LouRugani commented about Roosevelt Theater on Jul 25, 2018 at 10:37 pm

(Kenosha News, April 12, 1968) – Kenosha’s Mr. Showman, Bill Exton, will ring down the curtain next Thursday on his 29-year role as owner and manager of the Roosevelt Theater. Exton, whose career in the entertainment industry spans more than four decades, has long endeared himself to Kenoshans by his activities on behalf of youngsters and adults alike at his theater, the Roosevelt Rd. Businessmen’s Association and in other civic activities. At the close of business on Thursday, he will turn over the keys and operation of the theater to Theodore F. Witheril of Racine. “I am not going to retire entirely,“ said Exton. “I’m just not built that way. I will try to get away for two or three weeks, though, just to get my feet on the ground.” Operation of the theater has been a day-and-night job for Exton, who took over the Roosevelt in 1939. Prior to that, he had managed the Kenosha Theater, now closed, and the old Gateway Theater, now known as the Lake, for about 4 years. Exton’s fascination for the entertainment business became apparent at an early age. During his high school years in his native Detroit, Mich., he got his first job as a theater usher and from then on worked at just about anything they would pay him for. WORKED AT CIRCUS – By graduation, it was and one time a monkey ran up apparent to his father and moth- through the audience, er that they had a showman for Life Not Dull “Life wasn’t dull by a long shot,” he remarked. Exton’s career included a stint with Paramount Pictures, who hired him to do promotional work. Part of his job was to escort Paramount stars on personal appearance tours and whip up occasional live variety acts such as those used between reels in the movie houses at that time. After graduation, Exton went to work for a circus as a “pot-walloper,” scrubbing pots and pans and cleaning up around the kitchen. He knew by the end of the season that he would never be able to “shake the sawdust out of his trouser cuffs.” During the winter months, he wolfed in the movie houses, worked part time for the Detroit Free Press and tried his hand at public relations. Then, as now. he liked people and was good at selling his product when the product was entertainment. Summertime meant a return to the circus, and his bulging scrap book attests to his many experiences during his career with the tents. In 1921, Ringling Brothers asked Exton to head their publicity department and he “went into orbit.” The work was hard but never dull, he recalled. There were exciting and dangerous incidents such as the time when an elephant went berserk and knocked over a cage of panthers, scattering the wild cargo over the grounds. Although the panthers were recaptured without incident, the elephant killed its trainer before it was killed itself. On another occasion, a lion got loose inside a sideshow tent, In 1934, as district manager for Standard Theaters, Exton was sent to Kenosha to open the Gateway Theater, and he remained to become one of the most distinguished and well-loved citizens of the city. One of his best known projects is the annual Halloween Parade which he organized about 14 years ago. He recalled that about 200 youngsters took part that first year, but the number has grown to more than 1,400 costumed children who now compete for the coveted Halloween prizes. Exton was instrumental in the formation of the Roosevelt Rd. Businessmen’s Association about 15 years ago and twice served as its president. He is also active in the Lions and Elks Club. He resides at 6521 43rd Ave. TESTIMONIAL DINNER – In 1963, Exton was feted at a testimonial dinner sponsored by the Roosevelt Rd. Businessmen’s Association. Several hundred Kenoshans joined in honoring him for his contributions to the community, and a three hour program was presented in commemoration of his 40 years of service in the entertainment industry. In addition, Exton was named the Showman of the Year in 1964 at a convention of the Allied Theater Owners of Wisconsin held in Milwaukee. He was selected from more than 50 others under consideration for “making his theater a focal point of community campaigning and creating civic good will.” Through the years, Exton has followed a policy of selecting films for his theater which he considered “suitable for the family.” “I never wanted to get off the trend of decent, clean entertainment,” he remarked. Movies are getting better, Exton believes. There may have been a slow-down with the advent of television, but in the movies as well as in his own plans for the future, there are great things in store.

LouRugani commented about Perrien Theatre on Jul 25, 2018 at 7:26 am

(Film Daily, Oct.-Dec. 1940) – Detroit — Edward Hilke, owner of the Perrien Theater, is starting a remodeling program, with stage remodeling being completed now. House is being reseated by International Seating Co. New front will be installed next year. Architect Henry M. Freier is supervising the work.

LouRugani commented about Uptown Theatre on Jul 21, 2018 at 6:31 am

Restoring The Dream: The gilded interior of Chicago’s Uptown Theatre remains mostly intact, ready for a $75 restoration project that will be the centerpiece of a neighborhood renewal years in the making. Jam Productions bought the building more than 10 years ago and, in partnership with a local developer and the city of Chicago, is on the verge of bringing the landmark back to life.

Jam Productions’ Jerry Mickelson and Arny Granat could be within months of realizing a decades-long dream: breaking ground on a $75 million restoration of Chicago’s ornate, landmark Uptown Theatre, which they purchased 10 years ago for a reported $3.2 million.

They knew it would take a massive injection of financing to bring the building, closed since 1981, back to its gilded, ca. 1925, Spanish Revival glory. And Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel knew he had an as-yet unfulfilled 2011 campaign pledge to create an entertainment district in the Uptown neighborhood.

Mickelson and Emanuel jointly announced June 29 they’ve found a partner in Farpoint Development and a patchwork of funding that, pending city council and regulatory approvals, should enable restoration to begin in fall on a 5,800-capacity Uptown Theatre.

A new partnership entity will be formed as a joint venture between Jam Productions and Farpoint, which is one of the city’s biggest commercial real estate developers. In addition to the Uptown restoration, a comprehensive streetscape plan will help bring together the vision for an entertainment district that will also include the 2,300-capacity Riviera Theatre, also operated by Jam, 4,378-cap Aragon Ballroom, booked by Live Nation, and Green Mill Jazz Club that seats about 100.

The $6 million streetscape project includes improvements to surrounding streets, with a new pedestrian plaza, sculpture and public stage all expected to be completed this summer.

But it’s the Uptown Theatre that is the unquestionable jewel in the city’s crown, and the object of Mickelson’s deep affection as not only a concert promoter but a Chicagoan. The Uptown long ago was granted “landmark” status – from façade to stagehouse – which likely saved it from the wrecking ball fate of so many other movie palaces of its era. “Jam did all the concerts there from Oct. 31, 1975 with The Tubes through Dec. 19 1981 with the J. Geils Band,” Mickelson proudly says. “At that time, the theatre was owned by a small family, not theatre operators, and they weren’t putting any money into the venue. When I walked into the theater on that cold December day, we had to purchase the oil to get the furnaces going to heat the building because they couldn’t afford it. The bathrooms were barely functioning, so I told the owner he had to close it. And he did and gave it back to the people he bought it from. “But the only damage was in the winter of 1982 when some roof pipes burst because the owners didn’t put the heat on. But other than some small, minor plaster damage, everything’s there. It’s not one of those old, decaying, decrepit theaters. It’s a landmark building, inside and out,” Mickelson says.

He might have come to regret telling those owners they had to close it. Twenty five years later, the ownership was subject to a battle for control between Jam, Live Nation, AEG and Madison Square Garden Co. at various times since at least 2006, when AEG and Live Nation last kicked the tires at the old building. Two years later, Live Nation appeared on the brink of making a deal to lease the venue from the city of Chicago until a final bid was scuttled by a dispute over who actually owned the property.

As it turned out, Jam Productions and Joseph Freed & Associates LLC owned a second mortgage on the Uptown property. The holder of the first mortgage, David Husman of investment firm Equibase, refused their offer of $1.3 million to pay off the mortgage. “That doesn’t stop us from doing anything other than what we’ve been trying to do and are in court over, which is trying to pay off the mortgage,” an impassioned Mickelson told Pollstar at the time. “We paid off the first mortgage, but they sent us our money back. We don’t believe that’s legal and that’s what we’re fighting over.”

But a complex scenario was made simple by a court-ordered sale in July 2008. Jam was the sole bidder, and bought the Uptown for $3.2 million. At about the same time, the worst recession in memory struck, making financing for a rehab project all but impossible. “It’s been a long journey over the past 10 years but I can see the finish line is right ahead of us,” Mickelson tells Pollstar. “It’s not easy to restore a theater like this without being a city or municipality, just doing it privately is difficult. But we will get it done.”

Not all of the financing is in place. According to Mickelson, about $49 million of the $75 million is secured – but “we’ll get the rest,” he says.

As for the Uptown itself, plans call for interior improvements including new elevators and concession stations; mechanical, electrical, plumbing and “life safety” systems, and restored decorative finishes, New seats and a reconfigured first floor of the three-story building will reduce the old theatre’s seated capacity from about 4,400 to 4,200 – though some floor seats will be removable, allowing for a total capacity of 5,800.

Exterior work will repair the building’s masonry and terra cotta and improve marquees and related signage, among other improvements, according to a statement from Emanuel’s office.

“The Uptown Theater has been a staple of the Uptown neighborhood’s past, and will be a strong asset for the community’s future,” Emanuel said. “The restored theater will be the centerpiece of the new, revitalized Uptown entertainment district, giving residents and visitors another way to experience world-class culture and entertainment in one of the City’s most storied neighborhoods.”

Mickelson also envisions the restored theater as a catalyst for lifting up Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood, and compares its potential impact on Chicago’s North Side to that of the Fox Theatre in Oakland, Calif. “It’s an economic engine that starts everything else. After the Fox [in Oakland] opened, and the Paramount was already opened, that created some nice synergy that allowed the Uptown part of Oakland to come alive as well,” Mickelson said. “This is more than just about concerts. It’s creating jobs, it’s creating new businesses.”

It’s also about creating education and job opportunities for area youth and, to that end, Mickelson’s vision includes collaborations with organizations like After School Matters, a program of the Chicago public schools, and the nearby Peoples’ Music School that provides free music education to 600 kids. “We are going to provide them the opportunity to be part of the Uptown Theatre, starting from the restoration phase all the way through opening and when we’re presenting events,” Mickelson explained. “I decided to make a program that benefits students and the education they can get that they normally would not have access to. They’re going to be part of this and we’re going to let them use the theatres for fundraisers and rehearsals, things like that.”

Redevelopment agreement details will be finalized this summer and presented this fall to the Commission on Chicago Landmarks, the Community Development Commission and the Chicago City Council for review and approval. Restoration work would start later this year and be completed in 2020.

“Given its past, size and potential impact on the City’s cultural landscape, the Uptown will be one of the most significant restoration projects in the city’s history,” said Department of Planning and Development Commissioner David Reifman. (Pollstar, by Deborah Speer)

LouRugani commented about Park I & II Theatre on Jul 19, 2018 at 1:30 am

From 1928 until the 1980s, the Park Theatre showed movies. Now, the building sits crumbling, cluttered and vacant. City of Racine Chief Building Inspector Kenneth Plaski ordered the building be razed because “the structure had deteriorated structurally to the point where the building was no longer safe to be inhabited.” Demolition won’t begin for several months likely, because the courts still need to review the order. Plaski reported that the building’s exterior is in disrepair. At a July 16, 2018 Landmarks Preservation Committee meeting, a photograph was shown depicting visible holes in the roof of the theater. “That didn’t happen overnight,” said Don Schumacher, a member of the committee. “It’s taken a few years to get to this point.” The committee accepted and filed Plaski’s order. It doesn’t have the power to stall or speed along the process. The building is also rife with plumbing and electrical violations, according to the inspector, and there have also been “related odors emanating from the building at the sidewalk.” This accumulation is the result of a pipe back-up, resulting in 5 inches of raw sewage filling the basement. There is also “pigeon excrement over the entire theater area,” according to Plaski. In August 2017, Plaski ordered a list of 24 repairs and inspections needed to make the building habitable again. He reported that none of them had been complied with in the last 11 months. The building’s owner, John Apple, ignored orders to repair the building, according to the city, resulting in the raze order. Looking through the former theater’s glass doors, piles of antiques can be seen filling the lobby, including two safes, a barber chair, at least 10 cash registers, several lampshades, a trash bin full of aluminum cans, several human figurines and a smashed smoke detector. One of the more-than-two-dozen violations Plaski laid out was a lack of functioning smoke detectors. Apple has until Aug. 3 to contest the raze order. If he doesn’t, the courts can decide the fate of the historic building. If the building is condemned and razed, it will be Apple’s responsibility to pay for it. On Monday, Plaski told the Landmarks Preservation Committee that Apple owes more than $1.7 million in back forfeitures and tax delinquency, in addition to $57,000 owed to the Department of Revenue and $45,000 to WE Energies. The Park Theatre is valued at only $108,000. In June, Plaski told Apple that the building was no longer suitable for human habitation. However, a tenant of Apple’s claims she was unaware of the issues. Neregin Paynes-Ramsey is the owner of the Regime Hair Studio, located in the same building as the Park Theatre. A wall separates the salon and the cluttered theater lobby. “I really didn’t know this was going on with Mr. Apple,” she said. Paynes-Ramsey said that she didn’t know there was any risk of the building being condemned until she was ordered to vacate in June. She asked the Landmarks Preservation Committee for an extension on the order to vacate, but the committee is not legally able to fulfill the request. That’s up to the courts. According to City of Racine Building Department documents, the building is supposed to be vacated by all tenants by Wednesday. The Regime Hair Studio is the only occupant, although there are empty apartments on the second floor above the lobby. Paynes-Ramsey claimed that more than $4,000 was spent on electrical work to make her salon functional, even though the building as a whole is now condemned. Members of the Landmarks Preservation Committee discussed ways to prevent situations like this. Committee member Pippin Michelli inquired if there were ways to help owners maintain their properties. “Public money is not the answer,” fellow committee member John Monefeldt said. “It (the raze order) probably should’ve been issued some time ago.” The theater was built in 1928, and Marcus Corporation purchased the building for $50,000 in 1981, after which it was renovated and renamed Park Cinemas 1 & 2, because the theater had two screens. It closed in 1987 and hasn’t shown another movie since. The theatre was sold four times between 1987 and 2006, when it was acquired by Apple. It was once recommended to the National Register for its Mediterranean Revival architecture but was never added. The building is not considered a landmark by any local or national entity. This isn’t the first time the city has taken a building from Apple. He once owned a building at 410 Main St., which he used to store antiques. The building was considered blighted and condemned in 2002, for which Apple was compensated $197,000 in 2005. It now houses Not Your Parents Basement Gaming Lounge.

LouRugani commented about See-More Theatre on Jul 15, 2018 at 5:15 am

Opened as the AUDITORIUM Theatre with 380 seats. Sound was by Voisophone.

LouRugani commented about Nor Shor Theatre on Jul 8, 2018 at 3:02 am

If the walls of the NorShor theater could talk, they wouldn’t know where to begin.

In the past 100 years, the old building on Superior Street in downtown Duluth has served many purposes: a live theater, a movie theater, a strip club. But for almost a decade it sat dormant, the marquee announcing one show: “Restore the NorShor.”

Now, after a grand re-opening earlier this year, it’s a palatial multi-use venue with the help of a massive public restoration effort, a revival that’s part of a trend of historic-theater renovations across America.

Today, the Art Deco-style theater stands tall in the middle of downtown Duluth near the shore of its namesake, the world’s largest freshwater lake — Lake Superior. It’s got a shining marquee, striking murals, and it’s yearning for you to visit, big-time.

A packed summer schedule of concerts, plays, musicals, film screenings, opera and poetry readings means anyone can find something pleasing to the eyes and ears.

Each month, the theater shows a different classic film, including a post-show discussion. The intense 1955 drama, “Rebel Without a Cause,” is on deck for August, for example.

Even former Duluth Mayor Don Ness Jr. gets into the act. He has revived the variety show his father, Don Ness Sr., started in the 1980s. Each installment of “Don Ness Shows Off Duluth” is different, featuring new content, including interviews, musical performances and skits.

A complete listing of events can be found at norshortheatre.com.

The NorShor isn’t the only place in Duluth with an emphasis on culture and the arts, however. It’s only the most recent addition to a burgeoning historic arts and theater district. Within a couple of square miles, downtown Duluth has popular restaurants, a historic train depot, and a quirky public library that’s shaped like the freighters that cruise through the harbor.

There’s also Canal Park, the former warehouse district that’s one of Duluth’s most popular tourist destinations along the lake. Awash with restaurants, hotels and medley of shops, it’s beloved by locals and visitors alike.

The NorShor follows a passion for historic renovation of theaters around the nation.

In St. Paul, 150 miles down the Mississippi River from Duluth, the Palace Theater’s rebirth parallels the Norshor’s.

After sitting unused for more than 30 years, the city purchased the theater and spent more than $16 million on renovations while stadium projects flourished in St. Paul and Minneapolis, drawing visitors from outside the metropolitan area.

“A lot of people are focusing on the sports aspect of it, and those things can also be very attractive, but the arts community? Having a great music scene? I don’t think it can be overstated how important that is,” former St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman said in an interview. “We’ve seen it.” Minneapolis threatens to have more theaters than it knows what to do with. On Hennepin Avenue, three classic theaters underwent major renovations in the late 1980s — the State, the Orpheum and Pantages. Down the freeway in Chicago, the Congress Theater is undergoing a $65 million reconstruction and is slated to open in 2019. All these renovations have a lot in common: passionate city leaders trying to boost the economy, expensive renovations and revival in public interest in the arts. They’ve all gone through challenges as well, especially hardships in securing funding. The NorShor sat crumbling on Superior Street for more than 35 years. Owners and managers changed more than a dozen times, but had given up. It was too big, too old, too expensive to renovate. But people kept trying. Few in Duluth wanted to give up on a theater their parents and grandparents had patronized.

Everyone knew the it had to be saved, but no one knew how.

After decades of transition, the NorShor finally has realized its full potential. The capital letters on the marquee are dusted off and shouting the latest show in town each week. After eight years of work on the theater, almost the entire city of Duluth showed up for the grand re-opening performance of “Mamma Mia” earlier this year. It was a glorious comeback, a scene straight out of the last 10 minutes of a movie where everyone lives happily ever after.

It wasn’t a happy ending for everyone, however. The rebirth of the NorShor didn’t come inexpensively, including legal battles and one death.

In 1910, the Orpheum theater, the NorShor’s original name, was built for $150,000. It hosted Charlie Chaplin and the Marx brothers, among other famous performers. Duluth was booming, allegedly home to more millionaires per capita than any other U.S. city with about 100,000 residents. The rich natural resources of northern Minnesota, combined with a shipping port that linked the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, kept the city going.

In 1941, the Orpheum theater was renovated into a glamorous new movie theater named the NorShor to keep up with advancing entertainment technology.

“The Northwest’s most spectacular theater … features an entirely new style of theater architecture, a style so radical from accepted standards that the NorShor has already earned the distinction of being more sensational than New York’s Radio City,” said an article from the Duluth News Tribune.

The NorShor started running into hardships in the 1980s, however, with a revolving door of owners and managers. The theater waxed and waned with the strain of upkeep. There wasn’t a long-term manager or consistent function for the theater until 2006, when with the support of owner Eric Ringsred, lessee Jim Gradishar turned it into the NorShor Experience, an entertainment center featuring nude dancers.

Ringsred, a local physician and property owner, had long been known for trying to protect historic buildings. He had owned the NorShor for decades before Gradishar came along, and was running out of options to keep it alive.

“The other proposals for the NorShor over the past year have been for a church, for a special events venue, and variations on the bar or nightclub theme. None have come forward with funding or a concrete plan, except for Jim Gradishar’s NorShor Cabaret, which he calls the ‘NorShor Experience,’ apparently modeled after a locality in Las Vegas,” Ringsred said in a post to his personal blog in 2006.

The addition of a strip club to the quiet downtown streets of Duluth did not go over well.

“For a lot of us … the NorShor was such an important place; we felt betrayed by that decision,” former mayor Ness said in an interview. “In downtown’s most visible and prominent building, you had the marquee highlighting the strip club. There was a lot of problems for the downtown that were centered at the NorShor. There was drug dealing and gang activity and prostitution, all being run out of Duluth’s last remaining historic theater.”

In online posts, the public eviscerated Ringsred and Gradishar over their use of the building.

Legal battles over liquor licenses and other elements ensued, and only four years later Jim Gradishar ended the conversation when he shot himself to death. He was 47.

The disintegration of the NorShor Experience strip club meant the city had a choice: allow the NorShor’s fate to remain to chance, or step in. There was a harbinger nearby.

Superior, Wis. sits nearby Duluth. Together, the cities make up the Twin Ports and are separated only by a bridge over the St. Louis River.

Superior’s own Palace Theater opened just seven years after the NorShor, but was closed in 1982 and then briefly used as a church. After sitting vacant for years, the Palace was demolished in 2006.

Ness saw the Palace’s demise as a warning to Duluth.

“To me, it was clear that if the community didn’t act, the NorShor would eventually see that same fate,” he said. “There was water damage that was occurring on a regular basis, the building was not being maintained to a standard that would ensure its viability in the long run. A bold and more aggressive step had to be taken.”

The Duluth Economic Development Authority purchased the NorShor theater from Ringsred in 2010 for $2.6 million. Renovations began six years later, and the theater reopened in 2018 in partnership with the authority, developer George Sherman and the Duluth Playhouse, the city’s largest community theater company.

“There are literally hundreds of people who feel like they have a sense of ownership in the success story and a sense of pride in how it turned out,” Ness said. “That’s been clear every time that I’ve been in that space, people are not only enjoying the space and in awe of the renovation that occurred, but there is a real sense of pride that our community did this together.” Today, the NorShor is a stately northern Minnesota cultural hub that showcases plays, musicals, concerts and classic film screenings.