In his book Downcity: Downtown Providence in the 1950s, Carmen Maiocco gives a thumbnail history of Loew’s State Theatre:
“To understand the history of Loew’s State Theater, now the Providence Performing Arts Center, at 220 Weybosset Street, you have to go back to the first decade of the twentieth century, to one of the early moguls of the American film industry, Marcus Loew. Loew got started in 1905 running peep shows in penny arcades. He began buying up vaudeville halls, and by the end of World War I, he controlled approximately 60 silent movie theaters. Not satisfied merely to exhibit films, he wanted to produce them too. In the early 1920s, Marcus Loew purchased two struggling businesses, the Metro Picture Company and the Goldwyn Picture Company. He merged the pair and hired a gentleman named Louis B. Mayer to oversee making the films, and, voilà – Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, MGM, was born. MGM cranked out the pictures, which were then shown in Loew’s theaters from coast to coast. In time, Loew’s Theaters became one of the largest movie house chains in the United States with over 300 locations. In the mid-1920s, Loew’s company decided to construct a huge theater in Providence on Weybosset Street. On opening day, October 6, 1928, over 14,000 people jammed the building to marvel at the eye-popping opulence, and to see the film Excess Baggage starring William Haines. The fans were led to their seats by 50 uniformed ushers, past perches in the lobby holding talking parrots. For the next 40 years, Loew’s State Theater, with its seating capacity of 3,200, was Providence’s premier motion picture palace.
“Arthur P. Slater was the State Theater’s chief projectionist for 40 years. The State’s final manager was M.J. Cullen. One of the major attractions of Loew’s State was always the Mighty Wurlitzer Theater Organ. On opening night, in 1928, the organ rose dramatically out of the orchestra pit, and was played by Joseph Stover, imported all the way from Paris. (The Wurlitzer can still be heard at free concerts presented to the public by the theater every summer.) In the ‘50s the organist was a very popular gentleman named Maurice Cook, who was tragically killed in an automobile accident in 1954.
(…)
"Skip ahead 20 years to the 1970s and things don’t look too bright for Loew’s State. The theater was suffering from that potentially fatal disease – empty seats. The parking lot developers who had a field day with downtown Providence in the 1970s started to eye the building, circling like vultures in the sky above a stumbling old lion. In steped downtown entrepreneur B.A. Dario. Dario purchased Loew’s State in 1971 and he and his family ran it for a few years as an arena for boxing matches and rock musical shows. But even that didn’t work, and in the mid-1970s, Dario announced his intention to tear down the building. [His RKO Albee a block over on Westminster Street was torn down in 1970 after having acquired that. ~GD] According to one account, when Dario’s wife Sylvia heard her husband’s demolition plans, she burst into tears. Those tears marked the beginning of the salvation of one of Providence’s most glamorous structures. Thank you, Mrs. Dario. In 1977 Dario sold Loew’s State to a consortium of preservationist-minded businessmen, led by the head of the Outlet Company, Bruce Sundlun. The group, aided by the city and Mayor Vincent "Buddy” Cianci, Jr., refurbished the building, and to universal acclamation, held a grand re-opening on the evening of October 6, 1978, fifty years to the day from the theater’s original start. Thousands packed the aisles to watch Ethel Merman lead a night of lively entertainment. Since then the Providence Performing Arts Center has enriched our community far more than words can ever tell, with an endless procession across its stage of musical performances and cultural events."
In his book Downcity: Downtown Providence in the 1950s, Carmen Maiocco gave the following thumbnail history of the Majestic Theatre:
“The story of the Majestic Theater at Washington and Empire Street begins around 1915 when two brothers, Allen and Burton Emery, decided to build the most elegant theater in Providence. The Emerys were already in the entertainment business; they owned vaudeville halls, bowling alleys, and billiard parlors in the downtown. Their creation on upper Washington Street was ostentatiously grand. Shiny marble at every turn; terra cotta reliefs on the walls and ceilings; plush private boxes along the sides, loges running around the front of the balcony; and a seating capacity of 3,000 people. The Emery brothers were proud; so proud they had transcribed in gold letters above the three story high entrance arch – Emery’s Majestic. The letters are still there. On opening night, April 9, 1917, the evening’s fare involved five short live performances, inclusing Amelia Bingham and Company in "Big Moments from Great Plays.” A silent movie was also shown; White Raven starring Ethel Barrymore. Many of the state’s elite were in the audience, including Providence’s mayor Gainer, and Rhode Island’s Governor Beckman. Before long, the great stars of the era were performing on the Majestic’s stage: Vamp Theda Bara, John Philip Sousa’s Band, Anna Pavlova and the Russian Ballet, John Barrymore, Jascha Heifetz, Sergei Rachmaninoff, and of course Providence’s own George M. Cohan. In 1923, the Majestic moved away from live performances and became strictly a silent movie house. The first full length silent feature film shown in the theater was called Jazzmania. In 1926, Eddie Fay…purchased the Majestic from the Emerys. Providence audiences were first introduced to talking pictures in 1928 when Fay presented Al Jolson in The Jazz Singer at the Majestic. After Jolson came Bette Davis, Shirley Temple, Edward G. Robinson, Erol Flynn, and the popular World War II feature This is the Army. In 1953, when the movie about the birth of Christianity, The Robe, premiered at the Majestic, the theater was packed with dignitaries and bright spotlights swept the sky. [introduction of CinemaScope to Providence. ~GD]
Throughout the 1950s, the manager of the Majestic was named Al Clark, a nephew of Eddie Fay’s. During this period one of the most striking physical aspects of the theater was the gigantic upright sign out in front ovber Washington Street which contained over 2,300 light bulbs and was the home of countless pigeons and sparrows. The sign was replaced in 1959 with a horizontal marquee. In 1956, Eddie Fay sold the Majestic to the giant Warner Brothers Management Company. Warner ran things during the difficult 1960s and finally closed the theater in 1970. Soon thereafter the property was purchased by the Trinity Square Repertory Company, which renovated the building and took up residence there. A generous contributor to the restoration* was the Benjamin B. Lederer family, in whose name the new Lederer Theater was dedicated in 1973. Trinity Rep has been bringing glory to Washington Street and providence ever since."
[*I cannot agree that what was done was in any sense a “restoration”…far from it, since virtually the entire interior was stripped and gutted, leaving next to nothing of its original architectural brilliance. ~GD]
In his book Downcity: Downtown Providence in the 1950s, Carmen Maiocco gives this thumbnail history of the Strand:
“When the Strand Theatre at 85 Washington Street opened in June 1915, it unabashedly advertised itself to the public as a ‘wonderful, big, beautiful place – and the shows presented will be fine always.’ The Strand’s first evening of entertainment included four silent features: The Shooting of Dan McGrew starring Edmund Breese; a comedy entitled The House of a Thousand Relations, and two dramas, The Struggle and Memory Tree. Like most of the other theaters built in downtown Providence in the early 20th century, the Strand was colossal in size, with seats for approximately 2,200 people (that’s eight to ten times larger than the theaters we sit in today at the malls.) In the early days, especially before the advent of television, the Strand didn’t have much trouble filling all those seats. Even in the 1950s and early 1960s – a period in which the Strand’s manager was Stanley Sheen – big blockbuster movies still filled the house; films like Samson and Delilah (1951), The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), The Ten Commandments (1957)… By the early 1970s, however, the public’s viewing habits had changed; big crowds just weren’t coming downtown to see movies anymore. The last legitimate film shown at the Strand was in March 1973; a comedy entitled Shamus starring Burt Reynolds and Dyan Cannon. For a while after that the Strand ran as an X-rated movie house, but that didn’t last too long. In 1978, the Strand Theater closed. Since then the building has been renovated, and in recent years the Strand has become a hot spot for the young kids, mostly by showcasing up-and-comoing, local rock music bands.”
In his book Downcity: Downtown Providence in the 1950s, Carmen Maiocco recollects the Albee:
“When the tore down the RKO Albee Theater next to Grace Church in 1970, more than one stroller along the Mall stopped near the demolition site and stood for a moment, quietly, remembering the good times they had at the grand old theater. The Albee was hard to forget. For one thing, the building had a five storey high facade to which was attached a gigantic vertical marquee which glowed like a torch visible all up and down Westminster Street. Opened in 1919 on the site of a long line of entertainment enterprises, including the well-known Nickel Theater, the Albee originally offered live performances played to full houses. By the 1930s, the Albee was part of the large RKO Theater chain, and hereafter was known primarily as a motion picture house. By the ‘60s, like most of the downtown movie palaces, the Albee was having problems filling its nearly 2,300 seats. In 1965, the downtown developer B.A. Dario purchased the building. Dario attempted to convert the theater into a performing arts center. The idea never panned out. The wreckers eventually came in to do their work and today the site is a parking lot. There’s a little plaque on the sidewalk indicating where the proud Albee Theater once stood.”
Yes, sure is still there, as an Express store. I used to go there when it was Newberry’s and the interior still had some things, if you looked closely, that suggested a former movie theatre, something evident now only from the outside rear and side.
New Bedfordians have already saved the splendid Zeiterion (State) Theatre of the whaling city, and it is now a thriving performing arts center. Lovely as the Zeiterion is, it pales in comparison with the wondrous Orpheum, slumbering in a forgotten dream, like a dusty shadow, eager to be given new life, real life.
The second floor auditorium seems to have existed long before the space was leased for cinema use. It might have been an all-purpose hall, for meetings, socials, dances. The floor is hardwood and flat. I should have enquired.
I stated in the description that I thought it was seasonal. I could not find a web site of its own, only comments on other sites by people who had visited the place and commented on its funkiness, shaky projection, etc. The owner generously allowed me to enter the auditorium even though it was a few hours before the evening show. Then he got upset when I was about to take a photo. I basically just stumbled on the place on a daytrip to Rockport by MBTA from Boston.
A sign on the building that the theatre is located in names it as Spiran Lodge #98, VASA Order of America, A Fraternal Order of Scandinavia, Chartered 1906. Here are photos of the outside of the building and part of the interior seating. OUTSIDE SEATING
On October 7, 2007 the Orpheum Theatre (French Sharpshooters Hall) will be open from 2-5 PM for a “rope light tour” of the beautiful and rarely-seen interior. Two fascinating slide shows with over 100 photos can be seen on THIS WEB PAGE.
Yes, the New Art Cinema 3, in the mall across Commercial Street, upstairs at what used to be the Provincetown Theatre decades ago. It’s a single screener. They have been showing Michael Moore’s SiCKO.
Just to give an idea of the kind of film programs offered at the Aetna, I will list the films being shown the current 2007 summer film program: The Lives of Others, Sounds of Sand, The Great Match, The Rape of Europa, The Missing Star, The Iceberg, The Namesake, DarkBlueAlmostBlack, Kontakt. Additional films include outdoor screenings of two classic American films: The Awful Truth and the 1922 silent western Big Stakes, with life musical accompaniment by the Devil Music Ensemble of Boston.
Oh yes, Warren, you are absolutely right and I rue that sad fact every time I come to the city from my Providence area residence. I was there on Sunday for an Italian movie at the Aetna. Right across from the Wadsworth Atheneum there used to be two great movie palaces, almost side by side, the Loew’s Poli and Loew’s Palace. Up a few blocks was the Strand. The Allyn and E.M. Loew’s were destroyed for the building of the misconceived and monstrous Civic Center. The Princess and Regal bit the dust in an orgy of “renewal.” I never went into those movie palaces or mini-palaces, but I remember driving by almost all of them on my way to other places in the early 1960s, when I wasn’t really interested in theatres per se, only in movies, which I generally saw near where I lived in Rhode Island. The only movie theatres I’ve visited in Hartford are the Rivoli when it was an art house, and the Art Cinema when it was indeed an art house. Both are on the outskirts. The Rivoli is gone; the Art remains as a porno house. The Lyric on Park Street, a few blocks from the state capitol building, does still stand, shuttered and decrepit. If one of the great movie palaces like the Poli or Strand had survived, it could have today been used for touring Broadway shows instead of the Bushnell Auditorium. The Bushnell is more properly a concert hall and I feel it should have been used exclusively for musical and operatic events. Never a movie theatre, the Bushnell has quite an eye-popping interior though. At least this survives, and the new smaller auditorium next to it is a pleasant concert venue. In Providence we have the magificent former Loew’s State, now the Providence Performing Arts Center. That was a real preservation success story, though most of our other palaces were razed or gutted. Hartford had no movie-palace success story, not even one.
I will attempt to scan and post them as links to a photo server in the next few days. The add-a-photo function on this website doesn’t work, and in any event would allow for only one photo per theatre page.
In the “Images of America” book Hartford, Volume II, on page 52, appears a 1960 photo of the theatre along with the nearby Allyn. Hard to read what was on the marquee at the time. The E.M. Loew’s would be be razed in 1970, along with its neighbor the Allyn, in preparation for the construction of the huge Hartford Civic Center.
In the “Images of America” book Hartford, Volume II, on page 52 appears a 1960 photo of the theatre. On the marquee is the Walt Disney program, The Jungle Cat and The Hound that Thought He Was a Raccoon. We can also see the marquee of the E.M. Loew’s up the street. Hard to read what was there. On the same page there is a sad October 1970 photo of the Allyn being demolished to make way for the construction of the Hartford Civic Center. The E.M. Loew’s would also be razed for that civic project.
Two photos with the Regal in the foreground and the Princess in the background can be found on page 25 of the “Images in America” book Hartford, Volume I. You can see the marquee displays on the Regal. The Verdict and Child of Divorce in one (both 1946), Tomorrow the World (1944)and Song of the Sarong (1945) on the other. On the Princess program in the photo 1946 was The Dark Corner.
A period photo of the theatre when it was the (New) Palace Theatre can be seen in the “Images of America” book Hartford, Volume I, page 61. The marquee displays the 1929 film The Cockeyed World.
And yet two more on page 25 of the above volume. Two photos of the Regal in the foreground and the Princess in the background. In one you can see the marquee display on the Princess as the 1946 The Dark Corner.
Part of the entrance to the theatre along with a billboard for the 1930 Marion Davies film Not So Dumb can be seen on page 23 of the volume I just mentioned in my previous post above. Also on that page is another photo of the Princess in 1930, a long shot of the area buildings. The billboard here is for the 1930 Doorway to Hell.
In his book Downcity: Downtown Providence in the 1950s, Carmen Maiocco gives a thumbnail history of Loew’s State Theatre:
“To understand the history of Loew’s State Theater, now the Providence Performing Arts Center, at 220 Weybosset Street, you have to go back to the first decade of the twentieth century, to one of the early moguls of the American film industry, Marcus Loew. Loew got started in 1905 running peep shows in penny arcades. He began buying up vaudeville halls, and by the end of World War I, he controlled approximately 60 silent movie theaters. Not satisfied merely to exhibit films, he wanted to produce them too. In the early 1920s, Marcus Loew purchased two struggling businesses, the Metro Picture Company and the Goldwyn Picture Company. He merged the pair and hired a gentleman named Louis B. Mayer to oversee making the films, and, voilà – Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, MGM, was born. MGM cranked out the pictures, which were then shown in Loew’s theaters from coast to coast. In time, Loew’s Theaters became one of the largest movie house chains in the United States with over 300 locations. In the mid-1920s, Loew’s company decided to construct a huge theater in Providence on Weybosset Street. On opening day, October 6, 1928, over 14,000 people jammed the building to marvel at the eye-popping opulence, and to see the film Excess Baggage starring William Haines. The fans were led to their seats by 50 uniformed ushers, past perches in the lobby holding talking parrots. For the next 40 years, Loew’s State Theater, with its seating capacity of 3,200, was Providence’s premier motion picture palace.
“Arthur P. Slater was the State Theater’s chief projectionist for 40 years. The State’s final manager was M.J. Cullen. One of the major attractions of Loew’s State was always the Mighty Wurlitzer Theater Organ. On opening night, in 1928, the organ rose dramatically out of the orchestra pit, and was played by Joseph Stover, imported all the way from Paris. (The Wurlitzer can still be heard at free concerts presented to the public by the theater every summer.) In the ‘50s the organist was a very popular gentleman named Maurice Cook, who was tragically killed in an automobile accident in 1954.
(…)
"Skip ahead 20 years to the 1970s and things don’t look too bright for Loew’s State. The theater was suffering from that potentially fatal disease – empty seats. The parking lot developers who had a field day with downtown Providence in the 1970s started to eye the building, circling like vultures in the sky above a stumbling old lion. In steped downtown entrepreneur B.A. Dario. Dario purchased Loew’s State in 1971 and he and his family ran it for a few years as an arena for boxing matches and rock musical shows. But even that didn’t work, and in the mid-1970s, Dario announced his intention to tear down the building. [His RKO Albee a block over on Westminster Street was torn down in 1970 after having acquired that. ~GD] According to one account, when Dario’s wife Sylvia heard her husband’s demolition plans, she burst into tears. Those tears marked the beginning of the salvation of one of Providence’s most glamorous structures. Thank you, Mrs. Dario. In 1977 Dario sold Loew’s State to a consortium of preservationist-minded businessmen, led by the head of the Outlet Company, Bruce Sundlun. The group, aided by the city and Mayor Vincent "Buddy” Cianci, Jr., refurbished the building, and to universal acclamation, held a grand re-opening on the evening of October 6, 1978, fifty years to the day from the theater’s original start. Thousands packed the aisles to watch Ethel Merman lead a night of lively entertainment. Since then the Providence Performing Arts Center has enriched our community far more than words can ever tell, with an endless procession across its stage of musical performances and cultural events."
In his book Downcity: Downtown Providence in the 1950s, Carmen Maiocco gave the following thumbnail history of the Majestic Theatre:
“The story of the Majestic Theater at Washington and Empire Street begins around 1915 when two brothers, Allen and Burton Emery, decided to build the most elegant theater in Providence. The Emerys were already in the entertainment business; they owned vaudeville halls, bowling alleys, and billiard parlors in the downtown. Their creation on upper Washington Street was ostentatiously grand. Shiny marble at every turn; terra cotta reliefs on the walls and ceilings; plush private boxes along the sides, loges running around the front of the balcony; and a seating capacity of 3,000 people. The Emery brothers were proud; so proud they had transcribed in gold letters above the three story high entrance arch – Emery’s Majestic. The letters are still there. On opening night, April 9, 1917, the evening’s fare involved five short live performances, inclusing Amelia Bingham and Company in "Big Moments from Great Plays.” A silent movie was also shown; White Raven starring Ethel Barrymore. Many of the state’s elite were in the audience, including Providence’s mayor Gainer, and Rhode Island’s Governor Beckman. Before long, the great stars of the era were performing on the Majestic’s stage: Vamp Theda Bara, John Philip Sousa’s Band, Anna Pavlova and the Russian Ballet, John Barrymore, Jascha Heifetz, Sergei Rachmaninoff, and of course Providence’s own George M. Cohan. In 1923, the Majestic moved away from live performances and became strictly a silent movie house. The first full length silent feature film shown in the theater was called Jazzmania. In 1926, Eddie Fay…purchased the Majestic from the Emerys. Providence audiences were first introduced to talking pictures in 1928 when Fay presented Al Jolson in The Jazz Singer at the Majestic. After Jolson came Bette Davis, Shirley Temple, Edward G. Robinson, Erol Flynn, and the popular World War II feature This is the Army. In 1953, when the movie about the birth of Christianity, The Robe, premiered at the Majestic, the theater was packed with dignitaries and bright spotlights swept the sky. [introduction of CinemaScope to Providence. ~GD]
Throughout the 1950s, the manager of the Majestic was named Al Clark, a nephew of Eddie Fay’s. During this period one of the most striking physical aspects of the theater was the gigantic upright sign out in front ovber Washington Street which contained over 2,300 light bulbs and was the home of countless pigeons and sparrows. The sign was replaced in 1959 with a horizontal marquee. In 1956, Eddie Fay sold the Majestic to the giant Warner Brothers Management Company. Warner ran things during the difficult 1960s and finally closed the theater in 1970. Soon thereafter the property was purchased by the Trinity Square Repertory Company, which renovated the building and took up residence there. A generous contributor to the restoration* was the Benjamin B. Lederer family, in whose name the new Lederer Theater was dedicated in 1973. Trinity Rep has been bringing glory to Washington Street and providence ever since."
[*I cannot agree that what was done was in any sense a “restoration”…far from it, since virtually the entire interior was stripped and gutted, leaving next to nothing of its original architectural brilliance. ~GD]
The Majestic Theatre can be seen in this 1956 photo.
In his book Downcity: Downtown Providence in the 1950s, Carmen Maiocco gives this thumbnail history of the Strand:
“When the Strand Theatre at 85 Washington Street opened in June 1915, it unabashedly advertised itself to the public as a ‘wonderful, big, beautiful place – and the shows presented will be fine always.’ The Strand’s first evening of entertainment included four silent features: The Shooting of Dan McGrew starring Edmund Breese; a comedy entitled The House of a Thousand Relations, and two dramas, The Struggle and Memory Tree. Like most of the other theaters built in downtown Providence in the early 20th century, the Strand was colossal in size, with seats for approximately 2,200 people (that’s eight to ten times larger than the theaters we sit in today at the malls.) In the early days, especially before the advent of television, the Strand didn’t have much trouble filling all those seats. Even in the 1950s and early 1960s – a period in which the Strand’s manager was Stanley Sheen – big blockbuster movies still filled the house; films like Samson and Delilah (1951), The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), The Ten Commandments (1957)… By the early 1970s, however, the public’s viewing habits had changed; big crowds just weren’t coming downtown to see movies anymore. The last legitimate film shown at the Strand was in March 1973; a comedy entitled Shamus starring Burt Reynolds and Dyan Cannon. For a while after that the Strand ran as an X-rated movie house, but that didn’t last too long. In 1978, the Strand Theater closed. Since then the building has been renovated, and in recent years the Strand has become a hot spot for the young kids, mostly by showcasing up-and-comoing, local rock music bands.”
In his book Downcity: Downtown Providence in the 1950s, Carmen Maiocco recollects the Albee:
“When the tore down the RKO Albee Theater next to Grace Church in 1970, more than one stroller along the Mall stopped near the demolition site and stood for a moment, quietly, remembering the good times they had at the grand old theater. The Albee was hard to forget. For one thing, the building had a five storey high facade to which was attached a gigantic vertical marquee which glowed like a torch visible all up and down Westminster Street. Opened in 1919 on the site of a long line of entertainment enterprises, including the well-known Nickel Theater, the Albee originally offered live performances played to full houses. By the 1930s, the Albee was part of the large RKO Theater chain, and hereafter was known primarily as a motion picture house. By the ‘60s, like most of the downtown movie palaces, the Albee was having problems filling its nearly 2,300 seats. In 1965, the downtown developer B.A. Dario purchased the building. Dario attempted to convert the theater into a performing arts center. The idea never panned out. The wreckers eventually came in to do their work and today the site is a parking lot. There’s a little plaque on the sidewalk indicating where the proud Albee Theater once stood.”
Yes, sure is still there, as an Express store. I used to go there when it was Newberry’s and the interior still had some things, if you looked closely, that suggested a former movie theatre, something evident now only from the outside rear and side.
New Bedfordians have already saved the splendid Zeiterion (State) Theatre of the whaling city, and it is now a thriving performing arts center. Lovely as the Zeiterion is, it pales in comparison with the wondrous Orpheum, slumbering in a forgotten dream, like a dusty shadow, eager to be given new life, real life.
The second floor auditorium seems to have existed long before the space was leased for cinema use. It might have been an all-purpose hall, for meetings, socials, dances. The floor is hardwood and flat. I should have enquired.
I stated in the description that I thought it was seasonal. I could not find a web site of its own, only comments on other sites by people who had visited the place and commented on its funkiness, shaky projection, etc. The owner generously allowed me to enter the auditorium even though it was a few hours before the evening show. Then he got upset when I was about to take a photo. I basically just stumbled on the place on a daytrip to Rockport by MBTA from Boston.
A sign on the building that the theatre is located in names it as Spiran Lodge #98, VASA Order of America, A Fraternal Order of Scandinavia, Chartered 1906. Here are photos of the outside of the building and part of the interior seating.
OUTSIDE
SEATING
On October 7, 2007 the Orpheum Theatre (French Sharpshooters Hall) will be open from 2-5 PM for a “rope light tour” of the beautiful and rarely-seen interior. Two fascinating slide shows with over 100 photos can be seen on THIS WEB PAGE.
Currently this is the only operating movie theatre in Provincetown, since the two-screen New Art Cinema 1&2 across Commercial Street has been put to other uses.
ENTRANCE FROM WITHIN MALL
POSTER AT OUTSIDE ENTRANCE TO MALL
Yes, the New Art Cinema 3, in the mall across Commercial Street, upstairs at what used to be the Provincetown Theatre decades ago. It’s a single screener. They have been showing Michael Moore’s SiCKO.
The place is now a café and bar, with the cinema auditoriums now used for Theatre Go Round events.
PHOTO
Ken,
Spellbound was made in 1945. The photo has to be from at least 1945.
A big selection of exterior and interior photos of the Avon, including the projection booth, can be seen if you CLICK HERE.
Just to give an idea of the kind of film programs offered at the Aetna, I will list the films being shown the current 2007 summer film program: The Lives of Others, Sounds of Sand, The Great Match, The Rape of Europa, The Missing Star, The Iceberg, The Namesake, DarkBlueAlmostBlack, Kontakt. Additional films include outdoor screenings of two classic American films: The Awful Truth and the 1922 silent western Big Stakes, with life musical accompaniment by the Devil Music Ensemble of Boston.
Oh yes, Warren, you are absolutely right and I rue that sad fact every time I come to the city from my Providence area residence. I was there on Sunday for an Italian movie at the Aetna. Right across from the Wadsworth Atheneum there used to be two great movie palaces, almost side by side, the Loew’s Poli and Loew’s Palace. Up a few blocks was the Strand. The Allyn and E.M. Loew’s were destroyed for the building of the misconceived and monstrous Civic Center. The Princess and Regal bit the dust in an orgy of “renewal.” I never went into those movie palaces or mini-palaces, but I remember driving by almost all of them on my way to other places in the early 1960s, when I wasn’t really interested in theatres per se, only in movies, which I generally saw near where I lived in Rhode Island. The only movie theatres I’ve visited in Hartford are the Rivoli when it was an art house, and the Art Cinema when it was indeed an art house. Both are on the outskirts. The Rivoli is gone; the Art remains as a porno house. The Lyric on Park Street, a few blocks from the state capitol building, does still stand, shuttered and decrepit. If one of the great movie palaces like the Poli or Strand had survived, it could have today been used for touring Broadway shows instead of the Bushnell Auditorium. The Bushnell is more properly a concert hall and I feel it should have been used exclusively for musical and operatic events. Never a movie theatre, the Bushnell has quite an eye-popping interior though. At least this survives, and the new smaller auditorium next to it is a pleasant concert venue. In Providence we have the magificent former Loew’s State, now the Providence Performing Arts Center. That was a real preservation success story, though most of our other palaces were razed or gutted. Hartford had no movie-palace success story, not even one.
I will attempt to scan and post them as links to a photo server in the next few days. The add-a-photo function on this website doesn’t work, and in any event would allow for only one photo per theatre page.
In the “Images of America” book Hartford, Volume II, on page 52, appears a 1960 photo of the theatre along with the nearby Allyn. Hard to read what was on the marquee at the time. The E.M. Loew’s would be be razed in 1970, along with its neighbor the Allyn, in preparation for the construction of the huge Hartford Civic Center.
In the “Images of America” book Hartford, Volume II, on page 52 appears a 1960 photo of the theatre. On the marquee is the Walt Disney program, The Jungle Cat and The Hound that Thought He Was a Raccoon. We can also see the marquee of the E.M. Loew’s up the street. Hard to read what was there. On the same page there is a sad October 1970 photo of the Allyn being demolished to make way for the construction of the Hartford Civic Center. The E.M. Loew’s would also be razed for that civic project.
Two photos with the Regal in the foreground and the Princess in the background can be found on page 25 of the “Images in America” book Hartford, Volume I. You can see the marquee displays on the Regal. The Verdict and Child of Divorce in one (both 1946), Tomorrow the World (1944)and Song of the Sarong (1945) on the other. On the Princess program in the photo 1946 was The Dark Corner.
A period photo of the theatre when it was the (New) Palace Theatre can be seen in the “Images of America” book Hartford, Volume I, page 61. The marquee displays the 1929 film The Cockeyed World.
And yet two more on page 25 of the above volume. Two photos of the Regal in the foreground and the Princess in the background. In one you can see the marquee display on the Princess as the 1946 The Dark Corner.
Part of the entrance to the theatre along with a billboard for the 1930 Marion Davies film Not So Dumb can be seen on page 23 of the volume I just mentioned in my previous post above. Also on that page is another photo of the Princess in 1930, a long shot of the area buildings. The billboard here is for the 1930 Doorway to Hell.