RKO Warner Twin Theatre
1579 Broadway,
New York,
NY
10036
1579 Broadway,
New York,
NY
10036
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Showing 351 - 375 of 378 comments
There was an aborted Andy Kaufman film which was to have used a similar process. This is not really the place to go into details…I suggest a web search is in order.
No joke =i am looking for info on movies that had SMELL ARAMA??????
The CANADIANS you mean CINEPLEX ODEON.
cinerama name had not been used for years so when you talk about the era of landis and schwartz you should call the theater warner twin.
So Schwartz and Landis kept the rights to the projected new theatre and didn’t sell them to Cineplex with the rest of the company?
RKO recieved a very generous multi-million dollar payout because of the loss of the basement theatres. I had a friend in the home office at the time.
When it was announced that the Cinerama was going to be demolished and an office building put in its place, it was also stated there would be a new multiplex theatre in the basement, similar to what happened with the Loews State. However, once the old theatre was down, the developer stated that plans changed and there would be no new theatre in the building at all. I doubt there was ever a plan for a new theatre, and it was a BS story on the part of the developer just to get the theatre down without a lot of noise from the public. The old theatres closing came at the same time as RKOs takeover by the Canadians (who were scrambling to get office space set up at 126 E. 56th St 20th flr. The RKO offices had been upstairs of the Cinerama Theatre). When the announcement came that there would be no new theatre, there was no fuss made about it by the Canadians in the trades.
this could be listed many ways depends on what era you are from.
One of the alternate ways this should be listed is RKO Cinerama. It was known that way for many years.
Am not 100% sure, but I believe this is the theater in which I saw the premiere of “Grand Prix” Found this site with some info on 70mm movies:View link (scroll all the way down) it indicates the name of the theater as “[Stanley-Warner] Warner Cinerama” but there’s nothing that comes close to that on this site. Can anyone confirm any of this? I recall watching this upstairs in the balcony and noticing the multiple beams of light from the seperate projectors (ambient smoke/dust making this visible). For a 8 year old kid, this action packed movie in 70mm and 6 track sound was pretty impressive. Thanks
Before this became the Warner Twin, RKO had dropped the Penthouse name and called it Cinerama 1 & 2.
The Strand/Warner Twin closed during the spring of and was torn down during the summer of 1987.
THIS THEATER WAS ONE OF THE FEW THAT HAD SMELL ARAMA WHEN THAT WAS A NEW IDEA IN MOVIES
This theater always had two managers both who ran the theater for almost 40 years.The second floor or the penthouse was run by a man NICK G. The main floor was run by Genave.All the RKO theaters called this theater every night with daily box office #.
Scent of Mystery, mentioned above, was part of a brief attempt at smell-o-vision, where actual scents were piped into the auditorium to go along with the movie. Needless to say, it didn’t catch on.
William, thank you for mentioning “Porgy and Bess” and “Camelot”. I attended the World Premiere of “The Greatest Story Ever Told” at the Warner on Monday, 15 February 1965 and the Los Angeles premiere at Pacific’s Cinerama Theatre on Wednesday, 17 February 1965. The film was an extraordinary cinematic work of art when seen in the curved screen 70mm Ultra Panavision process for Cinerama. My notes at the time clocked the film in at 221 minutes and a 15 minute intermission The running time was the same for the UA pre-screenings at the Warner even with the Alfred Newman (composer) music deletions and Handel and Verdi substitutes. The first edit-down was requested by UA in April 1965 (197 minutes) and UA made a final “bastardized” version March 1967 (141 minutes).
The world premiere of “The Greatest Story Ever Told” was held Feb 15th 1965 at the Warner. It was a benefit of United Nations Association of the United States of America and the Eleanor Roosevelt Memorial Foundation. In Celebration of International Cooperation Year in the 20th Anniversary of the United Nations.
I have a note that at the Cine Orleans, built in the Strand stagehouse, I saw Robert Aldrich’s “The Legend of Lylah Clare” in 1968. It starred Kim Novak, Peter Finch and Ernest Borgnine and had (gasp! horrors! egads! amend the Constitution!) a lesbian theme.
The press preview of “The Hallelujah Trail” was held at the Warner Theatre on May 21th of 1965. For the premiere at the Capitol Theatre, United Artists held the largest outdoor barbecue ever held on Broadway in connection with a 24 hour world premiere of the film.
You can see the newsreel footage of the premiere on the DVD of “Camelot”.
Finian’s Rainbow played upstairs in The Penthouse not sure if Camelot did as well.
I believe you left out Porgy and Bess, Camelot, and Finians Rainbow.
You listed South Pacific in ‘78 which was a week revival. There were other films presented here in 70mm in revival at this time that did not open originally at this theater including My Fair Lady, Paint Your Wagon, Hello Dolly, and Oklahoma. Seeing them here on the cinerama screen was a revelation. Those films will never be seen that way in NY again. And I may be one of three people who considers it a loss.
You could have. The list I posted are for the roadshow hard-ticket
reserved seat engagements only.
Did I or Didn’t I see Hitchcock’s TOPAZ there? I believe so…..
WARNER CINERAMA 1912 [1952-1987]
BROADWAY AT 47TH ST
NEW YORK, NY
Cinerama 7-Channel Stereo [1953]
This Is Cinerama [1953]
Cinerama Holiday [1955]
Seven Wonders of the World [1956]
Search For Paradise [1957]
Cinerama-South Seas Adventure [1958]
70mm 6-Channel Stereo [1959]
Scent of Mystery [1960]
South Pacific [1978]
Cinerama [70mm] Stereo [November 1963]
It’s A Mad Mad Mad Mad World [1963]
Mediterranean Holiday (Cinerama) [1964]
The Greatest Story Ever Told [1965]
The Battle of The Bulge [1965]
Cinerama Russian Adventure [1966]
Khartoum [1966]
Grand Prix [1966]
2001 a space odyssey [1968]
Ice Station Zebra [1968]
Krakatoa – East of Java [1969]
Song of Norway [1970]