Fine Arts Theatre
128 E. 58th Street,
New York,
NY
10022
128 E. 58th Street,
New York,
NY
10022
6 people
favorited this theater
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The Fine Arts closed in 1978 with “THE DUELLISTS”. The landlord refused to renew the lease and Walter Reade was forced to close the site and move the film to the Waverly.
A non-descript, but very convenient location with a major subway stop, shopping at Bloomingdale’s & Alexanders (with a more upscale selection that that found in branch stores). Could catch a quick burger either at Yellowfingers or Sernedipity.
Depending on starting times you could easily/literally run over to the Paris, Plaza, Sutton, Trans-Lux East, Coronet/Baronet or Cinema I & II, for the best selection of films available anywhere. Waited on sold-out lines to see They Shoot Horses Don’t They?, & Women in Love. Much less crowded when Stolen Kisses & Day for Night opened.
Does anyone know when the Fine Arts stopped functioning as a moviehouse and even possibly its final film attraction?
And is it still boarded up?
Would a passerby recognize it as a former moviehouse? (Many old theaters had a telltale architecture.)
Renewing link.
Should add that over the years enjoyed The Producers here in its opening run…I believe a holiday mid-morning show with my mom and think we stayed twice…a school Saturday trip to see Charge of the Light Brigade…Fritz the Cat…Truffaut’s Two English Girls…and am sure a couple more
Ed,
The Manhattan that I grew up is much different than it is today…There was no cable or home video, little twinning or multiplexing, and movies played out at a much diffent pace into the neighborhoods and suburbs, and the “silk stocking district” off of Park Avenue stretched out into the mid-50’s encompassing these theatres the Fine Arts, Plaza, Festival and Paris. The first three could run an exclusive, a showcase run, sometimes a roadshow or daydate with Broadway.
The pictures that the Fine Arts would pick up in solid runs are the kind today that open at the Lincoln Plaza and daydate with screens in the Village i.e. Sunshine or Angelika
Ed, according to Variety, at the time these theatres wanted clearance from both the east and west side runs. The distributors preferred the two runs instead of one since they attracted very different crowds and two runs gave them an audience profile for their films before the national roll-out.
Indeed, in this era before marketing research, Zefferilli’s “Romeo and Juliet” easily went mainstream but the more mainstream appearing “Bonnie and Clyde” did better at specialty houses.
Another real loss. Can someone explain why theaters in the vicinity of Fifth Avenue (Festival, Plaza, Fine Arts, the surviving Paris and several others) are regarded as being in a sort of no-man’s land? It seems to me that in their prime they were perfectly positioned and equally accessible from the East Side and the West Side? Is the problem that there are too few apartment buildings in this Central Park South zone?
A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS opened at the Fine Arts.
American premiere of Gillo Pontecorvo’s Kapo 1964.
When Fellini’s Nights of Cabiria had its American premiere here in October 1957, the film was known simply as CABIRIA during the first days of its run.
That second-floor windowed area was a sort of lounge, I believe, behind the projection booth, and I think that is where the rest rooms were…unless memory fails. Gee, I just noticed I am the person who originally posted this theatre.
This is what this address looks like now…it ws indeed a chapel for a number of years:
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There is an ad here for a double bill of “Lord of the Flies” and “David & Lisa” Reade-Sterling releases playing in a Reade Theatre.
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Here’s a Showbill from March, 1961:
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“A bout de souffle†was one of the defining films of the 1960s, but you wouldn’t know it from me. A friend whose judgment I respected had seen it and raved about it. I naturally rushed to see it, and left feeling it fairly hollow. It seemed so jerky, quirky, and amateurish at the time. Years passed before I began to find great things that I had overlooked in the director’s work. It was around the time of “Weekend†and “One Plus One,†I think, but by then it was too late to expect more. I find it hugely ironic that the ad opposite the credit page promotes Mike Nichols and Elaine May’s B’way anthology. Five years later Nichols could come to personify the kind of slick, prestige H’wood film direction that Godard alternately reacted against and critiqued.
When Fellini’s The Nights of Cabiria had its U.S. premiere here in October of 1957, the film was known simply as “Cabiria” for a short while. Here’s the ad.
‘The Dove’ (George Coe/Anthony Cover, USA, 1968), is found on a collection entitled ‘Classic Foreign Shorts 1940-1960 Volume One'
from (www.facets.org). It also includes
1 'The Existentialist'
2 'Loves of Franistan’ (1948)
It is NOT a great transfer.
Saw Fritz the Cat opening night at the Fine Arts
The spoof of Ingmar Bergman movies called “The Dove” or “De Düva” in fake Swedish, is utterly hilarious, especially if you’ve seen Bergman films, particularly of the 1950s and 1960s. It is one of the legendary great shorts, and there are lots of comments on IMDb pertaining to it. There is the bit about a cigar referred to a “phällica symbolë” and one particular line I’ve never forgotten in forty years: “I häve a hërnia.”
Saw Chabrol’s ‘Violette’ and a short that spoofed Ingmar Bergman called ‘The Dove’ here. It featured Madeline Kahn (RIP) as a lesbian.
Remember this film? It did quite well and was revived many times as a midnight show.
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Here is a Showbill program booklet distributed at the showings of the Italian film “Big Deal on Madonna Street” (“I soliti ignoti”) for its first-run engagement beginning in November of 1960.
One-front cover
Two-credit page
The most appalling example of this being the Mark Hellinger becoming the Times Square Church. Being that all the great theaters in Times Square have been slaughtered, this last remaining TS movie palace(albeit on the miniature side) needs to be reclaimed from the righteous and given back to the pagans it was meant for(meaning those of us who believe in the humanities.)
Richard, I believe you are right. I remember walking in once and mourning the loss of the theatre. Nothing against churches, but why aren’t more churches converted into theatres rather than the other way around?
I BELIEVE THIS THEATRE WAS LAST USED BY THE CATHOLIC DIOCESE OF NEW YORK AS AN EAST SIDE BRANCH CHAPEL. I PHOTOGRAPHED IT THIS WAY
WITH VERY LITTLE ALTERING OF THE HOUSE. THE BOOTH IN THE TINY BALCONY WAS STILL THERE. ONLY PEWS INSTEAD OF SEATS.