Nice photo, Ed! That blade sign there is fiberoptic – there are no lights on it, the lights are inside the theatre and transmitted through glass fiber cables to the glass prisms that make up each of the letters.
It’s kind of hard to believe that Lamb, the #1 theatre architect of the day, would “forget” to include dressing rooms in the flagship house of his major client. With vaudeville being a major part of the show in those days it would seem that dressing rooms would be considered part of the stage. That would be like today “forgetting” to put in the candy stand – it doesn’t happen. I could understand the architect forgeting to include a niche in the lobby for a vending machine, but not such a major part of the operation as dressing rooms. If they were indeed not there, there had to be some extenuating circumstances, such as space constraints due to an odd shaped lot, or something like that. In Richard Dziadzio’s post above, he mentions that the projectors in the original booth were mounted at a 15 degree angle to the right leading me to believe that the building was not exactly rectangular. In that case the stage would have been 15 degrees off center, which may have left inadequate space for dressing rooms on one side of the stage.
There is a transition schedule set up to convert over to AMCs systems and procedures over a period of 3 weeks so everyone (Loews people) can gradually get accustomed with the new ‘culture’. As far as signage on the marquee, I haven’t heard that part yet. The Loews website, www.enjoytheshow.com is now a AMC site, and states that “Loews Has Joined the AMC Family”.
Of the theatres Ron listed earlier, as of 4:10am eastern, the ones that still have early or no showtimes are:
Beverly
Fresh Pond
Rockville
Imax @ Metreon
State
Rt. 17
Imax @ Universal
The State, Rockville, Rt. 17 and I think the Beverly are duds. The Fresh Pond has the concession operation issue that AMC probably doesn’t want to get involved with. There may be licensing issues with the Imax units that haven’t been worked out yet – in NY the Lincoln Imax is only running 2 shows of H.Potter.
The Village was built and operated by a local chain-lette run by Bert Lefkowitz called Community Circuit Theatres in about 1968 or 69. They also had the Richmond, Riverside, Berea, Showplace and Cedar-Lee. The Village was equipped with 70mm-mag stereo and was a roadshow house following the closure of the downtown theatres. I was there once (though I forget for what movie) and I recall it appeared to have about 800 seats. Loew’s bought out Community Circuit (except for the Cedar-Lee which Lefkowitz leased to Jonathan Forman) about 1975 in one of their erratic bursts of expansion and contraction in the Cleveland area.
They said they expect the sale of the divested theatres to take about 3 months – I can’t see them changing signs, etc., just for that short time – but then stranger things have happened….
That wood-grained formica was considered fashionable back when it was built – some of the older General Cinemas, like Southgate, had real wood paneling, which was too easily damaged, and this stuff was more durable. Those areas in the lobby were originally an art gallery – there were tracks at the top of the walls where hooks were attached and then paintings were hung on brass chains from the hooks. People could come in, look at the paintings and buy them if they wanted to.
The rolling grill openings were there to give an atmosphere of spaciousness – the mall “flowed” into the theatre and vice-versa. Most of the stores in that new area of the mall had no doors and very little glass seperating them from the common area – it was to make the place feel like a big department store. In the older section, after it was roofed over many of those stores removed the doors and windows – the rolling grills and glass and gates that disappeared into the walls and ceilings were only there to secure the stores when they were closed. The theatres then each had 1050 seats, it was always sold out, and you couldn’t stack such a big crowd in the lobby alone so we used the mall as stacking area.
We had 3 big, low sofas that were in the lobby, right in the middle of the floor, one behind the boxoffice and one inside each of those wide openings with the grills, and people from the mall could come in, buy soda and popcorn, sit down, chill and look at the paintings. The furniture was in the way when there was a crowd, so we moved them on the weekends into the auditorium in the space btwn the front row of seats and the screen. Eventually we never brought them back to the lobby and later they were taken away to another theatre.
Wow, I forgot about that one, and now I’m bending my brain to remember who owned it. That area never did well with theatres – This along with the Loews Showplace (originally Community Circuit) at SOM Ctr and Euclid, and the GCC Shoregate Cinema were all duds.
BTW, to clarify my answer to your question on the Westgate page, Parmatown Shopping Center was built in several stages over many years by Forest City. The part closer to Ridge Rd. where you can park in front of the stores was the original section built in the late 1950’s. In the early 1960’s the unenclosed mall was built, from the alley-way behind the present food-court area up to and including the Mays/Kaufmanns store on one side and Lerner on the other side. In 1966-67 they extended it further west to include all the stores facing Kaufmans, the Cinema, Higbee/Dillards and the other stores in that area. At that time they also roofed over the previous section. In the late 1970’s they extended it south, built JC Penney and the stores and mall area closest to Day Drive.
In the early 1980’s when the lease was up for renewal, the mall came up with a scheme where the Cinemas restrooms on both sides would be moved upstairs and the area behind the poster cases, glass exit doors and rolling grill openings would be filled in with small stores. The Cinemas mall frontage would be reduced to only the box office and the 2 small sliding door openings on either side of it. General Cinema successfully resisted this, keeping all their original space, but that caused the bad blood btwn the mall and the theatre – they harrassed the theatre manager and the home office about every little issue with that theatre.
I have a couple of old photos on my photobucket page: View link
Somewhere I have several original 8x10 glossy photos and the full-page Plain Dealer ad from the grand opening and a program booklet that I fished out of the managers trash long ago. They aren’t here in New York, but I’ve got stuff in storage (for 22 years) back in Ohio that someday I’m going to have to go through, and they may be there. I’ve moved so many times over the years stuff gets lost. It was billed as ‘Parmatown’s Million Dollar Showplace’. They had the Parma HS Marching band in the mall in front of the theatre, which had a big marquee at the time. There are a couple of shots of the crowd waitiing in the lobby and one in the auditorium with the mayor at the time, I think it was Petruska, and the Mgr and other GCC people having a grand opening ceremony.
When the theatre opened, the stores on the opposite side of the mall, Rosenblums, Susan Ives, Petries, were still under construction and did not have the back wall built up yet, only the roof. The theatre was, of course, open on the mall and the two auditoriums did not have doors on them in those days (the doors were added when Cinema I was split in 1973), so the cold November wind blew right threw the place and even though they had the heat crankin it was cold in there for the first month or so.
Yes, Parmatown was open-air. up as far as The May Co. When they roofed it over they also built the area where the Cinema and Higbees was. That section you’ll notice has no posts holding the roof up like the other areas of the mall where the roof was added.
They’ve got it backwards – they need to get rid of the residents, then you will see the town improve – and they won’t need the new school.
Nice photo, Ed! That blade sign there is fiberoptic – there are no lights on it, the lights are inside the theatre and transmitted through glass fiber cables to the glass prisms that make up each of the letters.
Warner Bros. had it for a short time…
It’s kind of hard to believe that Lamb, the #1 theatre architect of the day, would “forget” to include dressing rooms in the flagship house of his major client. With vaudeville being a major part of the show in those days it would seem that dressing rooms would be considered part of the stage. That would be like today “forgetting” to put in the candy stand – it doesn’t happen. I could understand the architect forgeting to include a niche in the lobby for a vending machine, but not such a major part of the operation as dressing rooms. If they were indeed not there, there had to be some extenuating circumstances, such as space constraints due to an odd shaped lot, or something like that. In Richard Dziadzio’s post above, he mentions that the projectors in the original booth were mounted at a 15 degree angle to the right leading me to believe that the building was not exactly rectangular. In that case the stage would have been 15 degrees off center, which may have left inadequate space for dressing rooms on one side of the stage.
Yes, exactly! Although it’s too late now, Sloan-Kettering should have taken it for their radiation clinic and left the Beekman alone…
There is a transition schedule set up to convert over to AMCs systems and procedures over a period of 3 weeks so everyone (Loews people) can gradually get accustomed with the new ‘culture’. As far as signage on the marquee, I haven’t heard that part yet. The Loews website, www.enjoytheshow.com is now a AMC site, and states that “Loews Has Joined the AMC Family”.
Of the theatres Ron listed earlier, as of 4:10am eastern, the ones that still have early or no showtimes are:
Beverly
Fresh Pond
Rockville
Imax @ Metreon
State
Rt. 17
Imax @ Universal
The State, Rockville, Rt. 17 and I think the Beverly are duds. The Fresh Pond has the concession operation issue that AMC probably doesn’t want to get involved with. There may be licensing issues with the Imax units that haven’t been worked out yet – in NY the Lincoln Imax is only running 2 shows of H.Potter.
The Village was built and operated by a local chain-lette run by Bert Lefkowitz called Community Circuit Theatres in about 1968 or 69. They also had the Richmond, Riverside, Berea, Showplace and Cedar-Lee. The Village was equipped with 70mm-mag stereo and was a roadshow house following the closure of the downtown theatres. I was there once (though I forget for what movie) and I recall it appeared to have about 800 seats. Loew’s bought out Community Circuit (except for the Cedar-Lee which Lefkowitz leased to Jonathan Forman) about 1975 in one of their erratic bursts of expansion and contraction in the Cleveland area.
There was also a Seneca Mall Cinema (General Cinema) in West Seneca NY, suburban Buffalo – that may be what ‘DJD-Nyed’ is thinking of.
Any of the New York projectionists on this site know if the old State had Todd-AO 70s in the booth?
According to the 11/2005 Loews directory, the exact seat counts and digital audio processor in each auditorium is:
01 – 266 – SDDS, 8 channel
02 – 219 – Dolby 6 ch. + Boeing Digital Projector
03 – 178 – Dolby 6 ch.
04 – 199 – Dolby 6 ch.
05 – 199 – Dolby 6 ch.
06 – 199 – Dolby 6 ch.
07 – 199 – Dolby 6 ch.
08 – 197 – SDDS, 6 ch. + Boeing Digital Projector
09 – 200 – SDDS, 6 ch.
10 – 177 – SDDS, 6 ch.
11 – 176 – SDDS, 6 ch.
12 – 481 – SDDS, 6 ch.
13 – 528 – SDDS, 8 ch.
——– 3218 – Total
Movieguy718’s approximations are just about right on!
Do any of the ‘senior’ projectionists on this site know if the 83rd Street had Todd-AO 70’s in the booth??
The Loew’s 167th Street was also aquired by GCC and was known as the Cinema 167th Street.
They said they expect the sale of the divested theatres to take about 3 months – I can’t see them changing signs, etc., just for that short time – but then stranger things have happened….
That wood-grained formica was considered fashionable back when it was built – some of the older General Cinemas, like Southgate, had real wood paneling, which was too easily damaged, and this stuff was more durable. Those areas in the lobby were originally an art gallery – there were tracks at the top of the walls where hooks were attached and then paintings were hung on brass chains from the hooks. People could come in, look at the paintings and buy them if they wanted to.
The rolling grill openings were there to give an atmosphere of spaciousness – the mall “flowed” into the theatre and vice-versa. Most of the stores in that new area of the mall had no doors and very little glass seperating them from the common area – it was to make the place feel like a big department store. In the older section, after it was roofed over many of those stores removed the doors and windows – the rolling grills and glass and gates that disappeared into the walls and ceilings were only there to secure the stores when they were closed. The theatres then each had 1050 seats, it was always sold out, and you couldn’t stack such a big crowd in the lobby alone so we used the mall as stacking area.
We had 3 big, low sofas that were in the lobby, right in the middle of the floor, one behind the boxoffice and one inside each of those wide openings with the grills, and people from the mall could come in, buy soda and popcorn, sit down, chill and look at the paintings. The furniture was in the way when there was a crowd, so we moved them on the weekends into the auditorium in the space btwn the front row of seats and the screen. Eventually we never brought them back to the lobby and later they were taken away to another theatre.
Wow, I forgot about that one, and now I’m bending my brain to remember who owned it. That area never did well with theatres – This along with the Loews Showplace (originally Community Circuit) at SOM Ctr and Euclid, and the GCC Shoregate Cinema were all duds.
BTW, to clarify my answer to your question on the Westgate page, Parmatown Shopping Center was built in several stages over many years by Forest City. The part closer to Ridge Rd. where you can park in front of the stores was the original section built in the late 1950’s. In the early 1960’s the unenclosed mall was built, from the alley-way behind the present food-court area up to and including the Mays/Kaufmanns store on one side and Lerner on the other side. In 1966-67 they extended it further west to include all the stores facing Kaufmans, the Cinema, Higbee/Dillards and the other stores in that area. At that time they also roofed over the previous section. In the late 1970’s they extended it south, built JC Penney and the stores and mall area closest to Day Drive.
In the early 1980’s when the lease was up for renewal, the mall came up with a scheme where the Cinemas restrooms on both sides would be moved upstairs and the area behind the poster cases, glass exit doors and rolling grill openings would be filled in with small stores. The Cinemas mall frontage would be reduced to only the box office and the 2 small sliding door openings on either side of it. General Cinema successfully resisted this, keeping all their original space, but that caused the bad blood btwn the mall and the theatre – they harrassed the theatre manager and the home office about every little issue with that theatre.
I have a couple of old photos on my photobucket page: View link
Somewhere I have several original 8x10 glossy photos and the full-page Plain Dealer ad from the grand opening and a program booklet that I fished out of the managers trash long ago. They aren’t here in New York, but I’ve got stuff in storage (for 22 years) back in Ohio that someday I’m going to have to go through, and they may be there. I’ve moved so many times over the years stuff gets lost. It was billed as ‘Parmatown’s Million Dollar Showplace’. They had the Parma HS Marching band in the mall in front of the theatre, which had a big marquee at the time. There are a couple of shots of the crowd waitiing in the lobby and one in the auditorium with the mayor at the time, I think it was Petruska, and the Mgr and other GCC people having a grand opening ceremony.
When the theatre opened, the stores on the opposite side of the mall, Rosenblums, Susan Ives, Petries, were still under construction and did not have the back wall built up yet, only the roof. The theatre was, of course, open on the mall and the two auditoriums did not have doors on them in those days (the doors were added when Cinema I was split in 1973), so the cold November wind blew right threw the place and even though they had the heat crankin it was cold in there for the first month or so.
Yes, Parmatown was open-air. up as far as The May Co. When they roofed it over they also built the area where the Cinema and Higbees was. That section you’ll notice has no posts holding the roof up like the other areas of the mall where the roof was added.
The Fillmore East was 105 2nd Ave, at 6th St.
Yes, it was (aka Gotham Cinema).
Yup, it is the last Loews State –
‘LostMemory’, who posts on this site somehow finds original C of O’s for a lot of these NYC theatres – if you contact him he may be able to help you.
I’m told the date is now Jan 31 – arrangements are being made to strip out all the equipment.
………so they are really dismembering him – I hope they at least gave the old Beek a good stiff drink or some other anesthesia -
Sloan-Kettering SUCKS!