Livingston Theatre
1567 E. Livingston Avenue,
Columbus,
OH
43205
1567 E. Livingston Avenue,
Columbus,
OH
43205
4 people
favorited this theater
Showing 26 - 43 of 43 comments
I forgot to note that the “Gayety” name came with the advent of live “sentertainers”. This got a LOT of police action and attention, and I don’t recall it lasting very long.
I moved to Columbus in 1968 and recall it advertising in the Dispatch and Citizen-Journal as the Livingston Art (but showing porn), so I guess the Gayety name did not last long.
It was purchased by Leroy Griffith in 1965, so the “porn” days started sometime in that year. I believe at that time it was the Livingston Art Theatre. It became the Gayety in 1967, with the addition of a dressing room and a small stage. The theatre was involved in many censorship-related lawsuits.
By 1972, the theatre was closed and the owner of Livingston Enterprises (next door to the theatre) listed it for sale or rent.
It changed due to a change in the neighborhood, from middle class to low income. Also, people started going to the suburban malls for entertainment, not the local neighborhood theatre.
Do you have any idea when and why they changed their booking policy to porn?
The theatre opened on Saturday, 8/16/1947. The opening features were LIVING IN A BIG WAY and DARK DELUSION. THey also ran a Popeye short.
The Columbus Dispatch described the theatre as “having a distinctive facade of cut stone and pale green and brown terra cotta. The marquee, resembling the New York World’s Fair perisphere, will have space for 560 lights. The theatre is part of a new $4,000,000 business center.”
“An arcade lobby, with ticket window to the right and display windows to the left, will lead to the main foyer. Over a thousand patrons can be accommodated in the auditorium in which blue, yellow and red are dominant decorative colors. Features for convenience include a crying room for babies and hearing aids for the hard of hearing. Ample parking space has been provided.”
At one time, the theatre name was to be the Driving Park Theatre, named after the early 20th century racetrack located nearby.
By 1968 this was already a porn theatre, so sadly it did not serve its original purpose for very long.
The Livingston Theatre was designed by the Columbus firm of Alcox & Stritzel (Larry Alcox and Fred W. Stritzel.) The August 10, 1946, issue of Boxoffice Magazine reported that the house was nearing completion and was expected to open that fall.
The Livingston was to be operated by Fred W. Rowlands, president of Livingston Enterprises, who operated a chain of suburban Columbus theaters including the Main, Columbia, Parsons, and Hollywood.
The contractors on the project were Mulligan & Case, of Columbus, who also designed and built the Main Theatre.
Dave,
I lived about a block away from this theatre. (House is gone now…just a vacant lot.) The Drug Store was owned by Bernie Siegel, a pharmacist. It had a lunch counter and all the basic pharmacy stuff. Livingston Enterprises was the name of the store next to the theatre. It was a strange place that sold boats and other such things. Don’t know why they sold boats in such a landlocked place! There was also a radio-tv repair shop inside that we used for all of our TV work…back when they actually repaired TV’s.
There was a long empty area between the front doors and the doors of the theatre. There were a couple of display cases so the drugstore and Livingston Enterprises could show some wares. They only used the right door to the theatre to take tickets. The manager’s office was to the left of the theatre doors. It was always filled with papers and posters.
According to Franklin County tax records the Livingston was built in 1943 and the owner of record was Walter F. Klinger (Marian L. Klinger, also listed) who might have been the builder (?)
Jan 1946 according to the tax records it was operated as Livingston Enterprises Inc.
For a good current picutre of the theatre visit the Franklin County Ohio http://209.51.193.83/ Auditor Site and click on Properity maps and type in the address 1575 Livingstion
The current owners plan on keeping the outside of the building as orgional as possible and even plan a small scale restoration including the signage and porch roof!
Dec 2008
I work for the current owners (flex) and this is a wonderful grand old theatre. My spine tingles as I discover bits and piecies of its former glory days. From the older posters to its soft porn plackards (Rinea Ray) to its curved wall restrooms with working hidden flouresent lights (curved tubes) that still work, to its beautiful stone floors that were once the lobby it is all an art deco dream.
As of this writing the theatre is still intact minus the seating and the art deco with 60’s accents is an odd mix of old and older. The electics in the basement are “wild” and feature one of the biggest fuse -switch boxes I ever seen and it probably ran the projector room. The electrics drive modern day service people and even AEP (power company) “mad” with many 180 volt 1 phase circuits.
Flex the current owners are keeping many aspects of the building orgional and preserving many keepsakes of the place and incorporiating some features into their gym-club. Plans include an indoor pool in the former theatre area.
Looks closed and abandoned. Did the gym fail?
There is an exterior photo on the gym’s website:
http://www.flexbaths.com/columbus/
Here is a January 1969 ad from the Columbus Dispatch:
http://tinyurl.com/2t36ur
^My pic, once again.
A few more details: The Livingston had a second floor “cry room” which was isolated by glass from the main theater. The cry room had its own sound system. On the second floor, there was the cry room, the projection booth (2 projectors, where I often spent some time), offices, including the control mechanism for the Friday 12N cold war air raid drill alarm.
When I was a kid, my father was a part time manager of the Livingston Theater when it was owned (along with other theaters in Columbus) by Fred Rollins. In the ‘50’s, many first run major features were shown there. As time progressed to the early '60’s, the fare consisted of double and triple B movie bills (Hammer films, Japanese SF, Elvis Presley). I attended very often, often weekly, as my admission, and all the popcorn I could eat, was free. (I had to pay for candy, though.) The features typically changed twice a week. It was a fairly large theater (or so it semed to me), but it was not particularly ornate. Today, I am somewhat of a B-movie buff, primarily traceable to my experiences then.
This was an adult theatre, the “Livingston Art”, in the 1960s and 70s. Later it was converted to medical offices.
This was my neighborhood theatre while growing up. I lived two blocks away. Just a normal neighborhood with nothing particularly special. I did see lots of good movies there, though.
In its later theatre days, it converted to soft porn with live strip shows.