Todd Haimes Theatre

Benjamin,
I have a postcard from the Museum of the City of NY with a 1950 shot of a crowd going into the Garden. Send me your email address and I’ll try to get a scanned copy to you.

I just tried the link above to the video clip and it worked. After clicking on the link, it should take you to the getty images website then click on “play clip”. It’s a great clip (from 8mm in a moving car?) of the entire north side. Jerry

I don’t recall a snack stand inside any of the entrances. There was a Nedicks next to the New Amsterdam (see the photo I posted under the New Amsterdam earlier this week). The only Nedicks that I recall on the north side was in the subway entrance at 8th ave.

See the video clip of the north side from the mid 50s that I posted earlier Here’s the link View link

And yes, Benjamin, the old MSG at 50th & 8th had a Davega Sporting Goods and a Nedick’s in the arcade entrance. Jerry

From the descriptions in the two previous posts (hardbop and br91975), it seems to me that people might get the mistaken idea that the eatery (at one time, I believe, a “Nedick’s”) was actually intended primarily for the patrons of the Selwyn, and that pedestrians walking by on 42nd St. could somehow go into the theater to patronize it. (And that theater patrons could somehow go to this snack stand without leaving the theater.)

However, if I am remembering the theater entrance correctly, I would describe the relationship between the theater and the snack stand somewhat differently. Basically, if I recall it correctly, the theater had a very wide entrance that was somewhat “arcade-like,” and the “Nedick’s” storefront opened up onto this “arcade” instead of directly out onto the street. (My fuzzy recollection is that the doorway to the small office building that was located above the Selwyn’s “tunnel lobby” was on the other side of this wide entrance.)

So although a Selwyn patron wouldn’t have to go out into the rain, for instance, to patronize this Nedick’s, he or she still would have to walk down the long ticket lobby and actually exit the theater — for good — past the ticket taker to get to this 42nd St. snack stand. And of course, to a 42nd St. pedestrian, the “Nedick’s” would appear to be just another 42nd St. snack stand, although one that happened to open off a wide movie theater entrance instead of directly onto the street.

These very wide “arcade” type entrances (which I’ve always liked) are, unfortunately, rare in New York City. The New Amsterdam (as a movie theater grind house) had a somewhat similarly wide entrance (but no snack stand that I recall). And there are three or four “older” NYC office buildings that come to mind, that also have something that is somewhat similar. But perhaps the best example along these lines was the old Madison Sq. Garden on Eighth Ave. It’s arcade entrance (before you got to the ticket takers) seemed to be a recessed “mini-plaza” with a number of stores / snack stands, etc. opening off of it (at least that’s the way it seemed to me as a child).

But getting back to the case of the Selwyn, I think it’s more accurate to describe the “snack bar/restaurant” as just another 42nd St. snack stand / hot dog stand / luncheonette(?) — but one that happened, however, to open up onto a very wide theater entrance instead of directly onto the street.

I was never brave enough to attend a film in any of the 42nd Street grindhouses in their heyday, but I do remember occasionally venturing on that block of 42nd Street and I remember one of those theatres, on the north side of the street, had a snack bar/restaurant that could be accessed by the general public. You did not have to enter the theatre to patronize the snack bar. It was under the marquee.

Anyone know what the theatre was? The snack bar and maybe the theatre was one of the last to stay open if my faulty memory serves me correctly.

Casper… The original Selwyn Building — with theater marquee, entrance and front lobby on the ground floor and offices above — collapsed completely. I suppose the auditorium itself was not structurally attached to this building in any significant way as there was little if any damage to the theater itself. The building that now serves as entrance, lobby and offices, is entirely new construction built in 2000 – 2001.

I love reading the recollections on this site… particularly of how most of these theaters (save the New Amsterdam and Lyric) did not advertise in newspapers nor did their attractions appear in the “movie times” listings. Ads for individual films would list the theaters — that is, if the main attraction was still in wide release and running ads. Also, the New York Post had an odd feature called “Movie Clock”, if memory serves, that ran separately from their more comprehensive “movie timetable” listings. Most of the theaters listed in this column were Porn houses (the Mayfair and Austin Theaters in Queens, The Globe in the Bronx, etc.), but the 42nd Street grind houses found a home here as well.

But as AndyT accurately portrayed in his post, we’d just hit 42nd and check out the movie titles and those lurid cardboard advertising placards that festooned the area beneath the Marquees as well as the publicity stills and lobby cards displayed behind the glass of the outer foyers looking for something that piqued our interests or fit our moods on a particular day. Didn’t matter if you walked in half-way through one of the films… you’d just stay until you caught up to where you came in. On an island void of drive-ins, this is where you’d come to see “The Corpse Grinders” and “Count Dracula and His Vampire Brides” or “That Man Bolt” and “Shaft in Africa” or “The Five Deadly Venoms” and “The Streets of Hong Kong”.

Those days are gone forever.

I find it quite interesting how the front of this theatre just happened to “collapse”, and now there is bright neon lights on its front, was the current home of Pax a part of the Selwyn’s lobby, and was their just office space in the floors above the original and current entrances?

I don’t think so —– I know I didn’t. I believe that these theaters were not even included in specific movie display ads, and the owners certainly didn’t spend money on advertising.

I think that most of us were unable to distinguish between the various theaters even when they were showing films. Ownership did little to establish identities for the grind houses —– the prospective customer simply walked up the street until they were seduced by a triple feature. I think there were few of us that said “Let’s go to the Selwyn.”

In everyday conversation, do New Yorkers actually call it the ‘American Airlines Theatre’, or do they still call it the Selwyn?

A former doorman at City Cinemas, who had previously worked at the Selwyn in the late 80s-early 90s, told me that at some point while he worked there they closed the orchestra and made all the customers sit upstairs in the balcony. This was because the rats in the orchestra section were chasing the customers away.