Plaza Theatre

my mother worked at the essex house hotel for many years. i remember seeing ‘darby o'gill and the little people’, i believe it was at the plaza, around 1959 or so. my mother was born in ireland so she was had a vested interest in taking me along. I have an unrelated question though . I am almost positive there is/was a small movie theater in the 59th corner of the plaza hotel but i can;t remember the name. does anyone remember that? or am i just delusional as i tried to google it to no avail

Thanks, Vinnep. I hadn’t seen the obit. Neighbor Eddie Eisner lived next door to the Plaza in the same building where I and my siblings were raised.

Uploaded the small grand opening ad in the photo section for this cinema.

D-B: I was a shareholder and went to the meetings around the corner at 595 Madison and I don’t remember Alexandra. I think she came on board after my time.

jay58: I was never in the Plaza. By the time I came to Cinema 5 “The Queen” (aka Alexandra) was reigning there. OMG the stories about her! She claimed Mr. Rugoff gave her a lifetime contract to manage the Plaza. Ass’t mgrs had a shelf life of a week, new floor staff about a day. By all accounts she was a terror so I steered clear of the place because I was new and needed my job, although I really wanted to see the inside of it. She lived over near the Beekman somewhere, and she always had the armed Burns guard walk her home at night because she thought one or all of the ass’t mgrs or staff members that she fired would kill her on the street. An older woman usher at C I&II, a very nice pleasant lady who never had anything bad to say about anybody, was sent over there to be the assistant. After two days she came back boiling mad, slamming doors, and using some very colorful language to recount her adventure at the Plaza and exactly what she thought of Miss J. – we’d never seen her in such a state. needless to say, she did not return there.

jay58: I worked at Cinema 5/City Cinemas from 84 to 94. Mr. Marks was not there when I was. I went to Loews in 94. Did you know Gene Shafran, an Austrian guy who would mumble to himself in German? He was a manager at the Plaza at one time. When I started at Cinema I-II in 84 he was a part-time mgr there, Tue & Thur evenings. During the day he worked at Saks. He had plenty of stories about the Plaza, where he met and was supposedly tight with John Cassavetes, Gena Rowland and Peter Falk.

There are a million stories from all these theaters – I once worked with a cashier who always said “With all the stories that go through this place I ought to write a book!” I think a book could be written about every theatre, but who would read them other than us?

jay58: Arthur Marks was the Managing Director at Loews 84th. You could set your watch to his routine, and one day in the fall of 1995 he failed to show up at the theatre. The police were sent to his apartment and found him, he had passed away from a heart attack. Prior to 84th St. he worked at Loews Ridgefield Park over in Jersey. Prior to that, he owned a sports bar on 3rd Av-34th St. That business failed and he came to Loews. I didn’t know he worked for Rugoff, or maybe i did and forgot. And yes he was very tall but was haunched over a little. In his youth he played basketball for Tulane. And huge shoes – once when I came to work evening shift and he had opened the theatre in the morning, I rushed up to the boxoffice and asked the cashier, with an urgent tone, “did Mr. Marks come in today?” She said yes of course. I said “thank God – i was worried – last night when I was going home I saw a tugboat pushing one of his shoes down the East River!” He put up a gruff facade, but once you got to know him he was a nice guy, as long as you did your work, that is. He didn’t put up with a lot of nonsense from the people at the home office, either. His demeanor actually scared a number of them.

I recalled seeing the movie “Montenegro” in a Manhattan theatre when it first opened in 1981. I checked the NY Times movie review archive to see what theatre it was,thinking it was The Sutton. It turned out to be The Plaza, but I recall nothing at all about the place.The film was not all that memorable either.

I worked there after graduating high school in 1963 and left after graduating college in 1967.

Well done, Tinseltoes…thanks for posting!

Vinniep: What years did you work at the Plaza? Do you know what happened to Robbie? Arthur Marx? Polly? Mr. Evans?

…so well expressed, Astyanax, and I agree!

Good day Cptblood & Jay58. I am also an alumni of The Plaza from 1978-80. I do remember Polly (older worman, always made up & Robbie who was the custodian. I’m suprised nobody mentioned Morris, the elderly jewish gent who was the doorman (I always had to lock the door open for him as he couldn’t reach the latch). Also Mike Snyder (Asst Mgr), Lori the cashier with the jealous hubby and who could ever forget (as much as one might try), Ave Jones (it’s Miss Jones to you..). Also met Mr. Rugoff (he hired me) & found out as a kid, he went to the summer camp I used to work at. It was a beautiful looking theatre. it closed up while I was living in Germany. Came back to find an Asian restaurant in it’s place. (Movies I worked: Tall Blond Man with One Black Shoe, Who killed the Great Chefs of Europe, Premiere of “The Kids Are Alright,” The Innocent, and countless other foreign & first run films like “The Wiz.”