Modern Theatre
523-25 Washington Street,
Boston,
MA
02111
523-25 Washington Street,
Boston,
MA
02111
10 people
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From http://www.cas.suffolk.edu/43595.html :
ADAMS GALLERY PRESENTS “MODERN THEATRE ENCORE”
Modern Theatre Encore: Breathing New Life into the Theater District, at the Adams Gallery through Feb. 6, 2011, celebrates the history of the Washington Street Theater District as well as the many tradespeople and artists who labored to restore the Modern Theatre.
…
Photographs by Renee DeKona document the painstaking process of refurbishing each stone from the facade of the historic movie house, reassembling it like a giant puzzle, and adapting historic interior designs for the new theater.
The Adams Gallery is free and open to the public from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily. It is located in the first floor of David J. Sargent Hall, 120 Tremont St., Boston.
I visited the site of the demolished Modern today. The blue tarp which Ron Newman mentions above had been rolled up to 2nd floor level. The original facade has been re-erected- the only trace of the vanished Modern. The lobby of the new theater is much bigger and deeper than the tiny lobby of the original. I went down the alley to the left and found both doors open. The alley was full of construction stuff; there were open cans of paint right in front of the rear auditorium exit. I got a quick glimpse of what looked like curved, stepped rows, but with no seats installed. The new Modern is finished, except for lots of final detail work. It will apparently have about 180 seats. The original building had rows of windows along its south wall overlooking the alley. The new building also has rows of windows up there. The facade, now cleaned up and re-erected, looks great. They have even re-erected the top part of it, above the white marble section. But everything behind it is brand new.
I have been told that the alley once led to the 3rd balcony entrance for the old Boston Theatre. Many theaters 100 or more years ago had completely seperate entrances for their top balcony patrons. For example, as recently as the 1980s if you had a ticket in the top balcony at the Royal Opera House in London, you were required to enter from a dark side-street on the right side of the building.
For the first time in forever, I was able to walk down the little alley that separates the Modern from the Felt nightclub next door. There is a new Stage Door at the end of that alley, on the Modern side.
Perhaps we need a new status for this kind of thing. In any event, it’s going to be changed again to ‘Open’ soon.
But when Cinema Treasures changes the status from “Closed/Demolished” (which is correct) to “Closed/Renovating” it implies that the Modern Theatre is still there, which is not true. This situation is very similar to the Henry Miller’s Theatre in midtown New York City. At least with the Boston Paramount, the facade, signage, half of each external sidewall and half of the roof are original.
They may be trying to recreate some detail, as done in the neighboring Paramount — also basically a demo-and-replace project. We won’t know until it opens later this fall.
The original Modern Theatre is gone— completely demolished, except for the facade which was dismantled and then re-erected again. The little theater inside the new structure, called the Modern Theatre, has nothing to do with the original theater except for reusing the old name.
Although it remains covered by a blue tarp, the façade appears to now be entirely rebuilt. Work is still going on inside the new building behind the old façade. I suggest changing the Status from ‘Closed/Demolished’ back to ‘Closed/Renovating’.
Greenliner- I don’t have the actual screen size; however, when the Modern opened it undoubtedly had a small screen as movie theaters in the 1910’s era all had relatively small screens. But by the time I went to the flicks there in the 1950s, 1960s, it had a screen typical of a theater of its size (about 700 seats)– not small, but not huge, just an average movie screen.
Does anyone know how big the original movie screen was?
According to today’s Boston Globe, Suffolk University students yesterday began moving into the dormitory part of the Modern Theatre building.
Funny
Another event at the new Modern Theatre will take place in October when Emerson College will receive an award for the design of the Paramount Center nearby.
From that web page:
“Performance space
In addition to suite-style housing, the building will feature a 184-seat theater that can be converted from a classic proscenium format to a flat-floor function room. It will be used for performance, lectures, films and receptions. The lobby space in front of the theater will double as a gallery."
Also, Ford Hall Forum, a popular local lecture series, has scheduled an event at the Modern for November 4:
Election 2010 and Communities of Color
Dr. Maria Idali Torres, Director of the Mauricio Gaston Institute for Latino Community Development and Public Policy;Dr. Paul Watanabe of the Institute of Asian American Studies at UMass Boston; and Marvin Venay, Executive Director of the Massachusetts Black and Latino Legislative Caucus join State Representative Linda Dorcena Forry to explore how the newly-elected and -reelected officials will address legislation and policies affecting Asian American, Black, and Latino populations.
A light breakfast will be available at the event.
SPECIAL BREAKFAST FORUM: Thursday, November 4, 8:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m.
Link to Suffolk University’s Moern Theatre website:
http://www.suffolk.edu/offices/34286.html
http://www.suffolk.edu/offices/36085.html
Here are some photos of the Modern Theatre interior before it was dismantled: four photos at the end of the photo gallery (scroll way down). [url=http://www.suffolk.edu/offices/36085.html]
Those pics were in an exhibit Suffolk U. had in the Adams Gallery — it was in pretty bad shape. I’ll see if I can dig some out and post on the Web site. Nothing to hide here.
love how the Suffolk University web page on the Modern Theatre conviently leaves out any documentation of the interior of the building before it was demolished by the university.
Here are some photos of the restored stones being put into place:
http://www.suffolk.edu/42003.html
The facade of the new building on the site has now reached 5 or 6 stories in height and is of cinderblock at the top. The scaffolding down below is heavily shrouded in black cloth so you can’t see what is going on in there! I hope that the original facade is being reassembled behind the cloth.
Here is a 1969 night shot:
http://tinyurl.com/y7r65mr
Very true Ron.
Greenliner- OK, I thought you were referring to Brownstone residential row houses. I agree with your comment above that in order to preserve the Modern intact, the efforts would have had to start a long time ago, circa-1980 or so.