Google Maps has its pin icon way off again. The Melody Theatre was on the east side of Moorpark Road just south of Columbia Road, somewhat more than a mile south of the pin’s location. I’ve moved Street View. The entire shopping center in which the theater was located has been rebuilt, so the Melody Theatre has been demolished.
As RickB pointed out, this theater was of similar design to the Community Theatre in Eatontown, New Jersey. In fact, comparing photos of the Cherry Hill house with those of the Eatontown location that appear in this article from Boxoffice of November 9, 1964, the two are virtually identical. The article attributes the design of the Eatontown house to architect David Marner, so it’s probably safe to assume that he designed the Cherry Hill project as well.
The Boxoffice article Tinseltoes linked to says that the Community Theatre in Eatontown was designed by architect David Marner. As the article says (and photos demonstrate) that the Community Theatre in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, opened in 1963, was almost identical to this house, it’s probable that Marner designed that house as well.
Both the Boxoffice article that Tinseltoes linked to and this page of the October, 1964, issue of International Projectionist attribute the design of the Fox Rossmoor Theatre to the firm of Burke, Kober & Nicolais. However, Millard Archuleta joined the firm in 1961, so the design should probably be attributed to Burke, Kober, Nicolais & Archuleta. Archuleta was probably left off the list because the original firm had begun designing the shopping center in which the theater was located four years before the theater itself was built.
The June, 1964, issue of International Projectionist featured a two page article about the Lenox Square Threatre which can be seen at this link. The house was designed for Georgia Theatres by architect J. B. Finch, of the firm Finch, Alexander, Barnes, Rothchild & Paschal.
This page of the May, 1964, issue of International Projectionist was devoted to the Wayne Theatre, and features four photographs (click the + sign in the toolbar at lower right of the page to enlarge.) The Wayne Theatre was designed by architect Drew Eberson.
Half a dozen photos of the 34th Street Theatre appear on this page of the April, 1964, issue of International Projectionist. (Enlarge the images by clicking on the + sign in the toolbar at lower right corner of the page.)
A brief article with photos of the last RKO 23rd Street Theatre appears on this page of the March, 1964, issue of International Projectionist. The house was designed by architect John J. McNamara, in collaboration with Herman J. Jessor, architect of the Penn Station South development, in which the theater was located.
Maybe somebody who saw Mutiny on the Bounty at the Jesse James Drive-In will recognize their car in the nocturnal photo that appears on this page of the October, 1963, issue of International Projectionist. (Click on the + sign in the toolbar at the lower right of the page to enlarge the image.)
This house opened as the Shoppers' Haven Cinema. A small photo of the screen end of the auditorium appeared in the October, 1963, issue of International Projectionist. The house featured a maskless Schlanger screen, which suggests that theater designer Benjamin Schlanger was probably the consulting architect for the house. He played that role for Genreal Cinema’s Cinema Shoppers' World in Framingham, Massachusetts, an a number of other General Cinema projects of the period.
The architect’s surname is Zelnik, not Selnik. His surname is spelled correctly on the Playhouse Theatre and Joyce Theatre pages, but his middle initial is missing from both.
A two-page article about the Festival Theatre with photos appeared in the July, 1963, issue of International Projectionist. See it at this link.
The 1962 remodeling of the Empire Theatre is the subject of an article starting on this page of the June, 1963, issue of International Projectionist. There are two photos of the auditorium. Enlarge the image by clicking on the + sign in the tool bar at lower right of the page. Scroll down for the second page of the article.
The Cinema Theatre is the name given for this house in the article That appeared in the July, 1963, issue of International Projectionist. Stewart & Everett’s new 600-seat house was designed in a spare, Modern style by architects Charles H. Wheatley & Associates.
this page of the magazine has four photos showing the theater’s front and public interior. Not surprisingly, subsequent pages feature a couple of photos of the projection room and a description of its equipment.
The April, 1963, issue of International Projectionist ran a brief article about Walter Reade-Sterling’s new Continental Theatre in Forest Hills, which had opened on March 21 with director Joseph Strick’s film adaptation of Jean Genet’s play The Balcony. The 600-seat Continental Theatre was designed by architect John J. McNamara, and featured rooftop parking and a permanent art gallery that was to be devoted to exhibiting the works of artists from Queens.
Thanks, Jesse. If there was no room for expansion then it’s likely that whoever put the web site together for Vanney Associates simply recorded the wrong number of screens for the Anoka Theatre project. The only other explanation would be that an expansion was planned but never carried out.
Three photos on this web page show the General Custer Hotel when the theater entrance was in place. It was on North Main Street, in the building with the cornice and the balustraded parapet, not in the plainer building right on the corner.
The buildings at the intersection are all still standing in the Street View, which is dated 2008, but in the satellite view, which is dated 2013, the roofs of several look like they are being demolished. I’ve been trying to puzzle out of the building toward the center of the block, which also looks partly roofless, was actually the theater’s auditorium. As the theater entrance was under the second and third upper floor window bays at the south end of the hotel, the lobby would have led straight back to the south end of the building that might have been the auditorium, and I’m inclined to think that’s what it was.
This page of The Film Daily for February 17, 1929, features a photo showing part of the soffit of the Strand Theatre’s marquee and a fancy bracket at the side of the arched entrance. (Click on the + sign in the toolbar at lower right of the page to repeatedly enlarge the image. It can get pretty big before it goes pixely.)
Down the block there is a marquee that looks like it might say The Owl. Was that another theater, or some other business? California had a chain of Owl Drug Co. stores, but I don’t think they had stores in Cincinnati. It might also be a tobacconist’s shop touting Owl Cigars, a popular brand at one time.
The Rialto Theatre at Boone, Iowa, was mentioned in the January 13, 1929, issue of The Film Daily, so it must have been open by 1928 at the latest. This comment by IowaBackroads on our Boone Theatre page says that the Rialto Theatre was destroyed by a fire and was subsequently replaced by the Boone Theatre on the same site. CinemaTour’s Rialto page says that the fire took place on September 10, 1966.
Google Street View is currently set to the wrong block. The Luna-Lite Theatre was on West Fourth Street, probably just past the alley behind the seven-story bank building at Fourth and Washington Streets. It was almost across the street from the Lyric Theatre, which was at 116-118 W. Fourth, about where the driveway of the modern building with the maroon awnings is now.
This PDF listing theaters that have operated in Indiana lists a total of 19 houses in Marion, and two of them are called the Orpheum. One is listed simply as the Orpheum Theater, and the other as the Orpheum Theater; Luna-Lite Theater.
I have found references to a New Orpheum Theatre operating at Marion as part of the Gus Sun circuit in 1910, and I have also found an Orpheum Theater at Marion operating in 1922. As the Luna-Lite was mentioned in The Moving Picture World in 1916, my guess would be that it was the old Gus Sun house, renamed.
One reference to the other Orpheum is on this page at BoxRec, listing a match between local boxer Vaughn Treber and Joe Lohman at the Orpheum on August 7, 1922. The only other reference I can find is on this page, which says that the Denishawn Dance Company appeared at the Orpheum in Marion, Indiana, on November 30, 1923. It’s possible that the second Orpheum never operated as a movie theater.
Here is the web site of the Bijou Art Cinema.
The official web page of the Bijou Metro gives the address as 43 W. Broadway.
Google Maps has its pin icon way off again. The Melody Theatre was on the east side of Moorpark Road just south of Columbia Road, somewhat more than a mile south of the pin’s location. I’ve moved Street View. The entire shopping center in which the theater was located has been rebuilt, so the Melody Theatre has been demolished.
A few photos of the Coronet Theatre appear on this page of the July, 1963, issue of International Projectionist.
A couple of photos illustrate an article about the Town Theatre that begins on this page of the July, 1961, issue of International Projectionist.
As RickB pointed out, this theater was of similar design to the Community Theatre in Eatontown, New Jersey. In fact, comparing photos of the Cherry Hill house with those of the Eatontown location that appear in this article from Boxoffice of November 9, 1964, the two are virtually identical. The article attributes the design of the Eatontown house to architect David Marner, so it’s probably safe to assume that he designed the Cherry Hill project as well.
The Boxoffice article Tinseltoes linked to says that the Community Theatre in Eatontown was designed by architect David Marner. As the article says (and photos demonstrate) that the Community Theatre in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, opened in 1963, was almost identical to this house, it’s probable that Marner designed that house as well.
Both the Boxoffice article that Tinseltoes linked to and this page of the October, 1964, issue of International Projectionist attribute the design of the Fox Rossmoor Theatre to the firm of Burke, Kober & Nicolais. However, Millard Archuleta joined the firm in 1961, so the design should probably be attributed to Burke, Kober, Nicolais & Archuleta. Archuleta was probably left off the list because the original firm had begun designing the shopping center in which the theater was located four years before the theater itself was built.
Three photos of the renovated Strand Theatre can be seen on this page of the July, 1964, issue of International Projectionist.
The June, 1964, issue of International Projectionist featured a two page article about the Lenox Square Threatre which can be seen at this link. The house was designed for Georgia Theatres by architect J. B. Finch, of the firm Finch, Alexander, Barnes, Rothchild & Paschal.
This page of the May, 1964, issue of International Projectionist was devoted to the Wayne Theatre, and features four photographs (click the + sign in the toolbar at lower right of the page to enlarge.) The Wayne Theatre was designed by architect Drew Eberson.
Half a dozen photos of the 34th Street Theatre appear on this page of the April, 1964, issue of International Projectionist. (Enlarge the images by clicking on the + sign in the toolbar at lower right corner of the page.)
A brief article with photos of the last RKO 23rd Street Theatre appears on this page of the March, 1964, issue of International Projectionist. The house was designed by architect John J. McNamara, in collaboration with Herman J. Jessor, architect of the Penn Station South development, in which the theater was located.
Maybe somebody who saw Mutiny on the Bounty at the Jesse James Drive-In will recognize their car in the nocturnal photo that appears on this page of the October, 1963, issue of International Projectionist. (Click on the + sign in the toolbar at the lower right of the page to enlarge the image.)
This house opened as the Shoppers' Haven Cinema. A small photo of the screen end of the auditorium appeared in the October, 1963, issue of International Projectionist. The house featured a maskless Schlanger screen, which suggests that theater designer Benjamin Schlanger was probably the consulting architect for the house. He played that role for Genreal Cinema’s Cinema Shoppers' World in Framingham, Massachusetts, an a number of other General Cinema projects of the period.
The architect’s surname is Zelnik, not Selnik. His surname is spelled correctly on the Playhouse Theatre and Joyce Theatre pages, but his middle initial is missing from both.
A two-page article about the Festival Theatre with photos appeared in the July, 1963, issue of International Projectionist. See it at this link.
The 1962 remodeling of the Empire Theatre is the subject of an article starting on this page of the June, 1963, issue of International Projectionist. There are two photos of the auditorium. Enlarge the image by clicking on the + sign in the tool bar at lower right of the page. Scroll down for the second page of the article.
The Cinema Theatre is the name given for this house in the article That appeared in the July, 1963, issue of International Projectionist. Stewart & Everett’s new 600-seat house was designed in a spare, Modern style by architects Charles H. Wheatley & Associates.
this page of the magazine has four photos showing the theater’s front and public interior. Not surprisingly, subsequent pages feature a couple of photos of the projection room and a description of its equipment.
The April, 1963, issue of International Projectionist ran a brief article about Walter Reade-Sterling’s new Continental Theatre in Forest Hills, which had opened on March 21 with director Joseph Strick’s film adaptation of Jean Genet’s play The Balcony. The 600-seat Continental Theatre was designed by architect John J. McNamara, and featured rooftop parking and a permanent art gallery that was to be devoted to exhibiting the works of artists from Queens.
Thanks, Jesse. If there was no room for expansion then it’s likely that whoever put the web site together for Vanney Associates simply recorded the wrong number of screens for the Anoka Theatre project. The only other explanation would be that an expansion was planned but never carried out.
Three photos on this web page show the General Custer Hotel when the theater entrance was in place. It was on North Main Street, in the building with the cornice and the balustraded parapet, not in the plainer building right on the corner.
The buildings at the intersection are all still standing in the Street View, which is dated 2008, but in the satellite view, which is dated 2013, the roofs of several look like they are being demolished. I’ve been trying to puzzle out of the building toward the center of the block, which also looks partly roofless, was actually the theater’s auditorium. As the theater entrance was under the second and third upper floor window bays at the south end of the hotel, the lobby would have led straight back to the south end of the building that might have been the auditorium, and I’m inclined to think that’s what it was.
This page of The Film Daily for February 17, 1929, features a photo showing part of the soffit of the Strand Theatre’s marquee and a fancy bracket at the side of the arched entrance. (Click on the + sign in the toolbar at lower right of the page to repeatedly enlarge the image. It can get pretty big before it goes pixely.)
Down the block there is a marquee that looks like it might say The Owl. Was that another theater, or some other business? California had a chain of Owl Drug Co. stores, but I don’t think they had stores in Cincinnati. It might also be a tobacconist’s shop touting Owl Cigars, a popular brand at one time.
The Rialto Theatre at Boone, Iowa, was mentioned in the January 13, 1929, issue of The Film Daily, so it must have been open by 1928 at the latest. This comment by IowaBackroads on our Boone Theatre page says that the Rialto Theatre was destroyed by a fire and was subsequently replaced by the Boone Theatre on the same site. CinemaTour’s Rialto page says that the fire took place on September 10, 1966.
Google Street View is currently set to the wrong block. The Luna-Lite Theatre was on West Fourth Street, probably just past the alley behind the seven-story bank building at Fourth and Washington Streets. It was almost across the street from the Lyric Theatre, which was at 116-118 W. Fourth, about where the driveway of the modern building with the maroon awnings is now.
This PDF listing theaters that have operated in Indiana lists a total of 19 houses in Marion, and two of them are called the Orpheum. One is listed simply as the Orpheum Theater, and the other as the Orpheum Theater; Luna-Lite Theater.
I have found references to a New Orpheum Theatre operating at Marion as part of the Gus Sun circuit in 1910, and I have also found an Orpheum Theater at Marion operating in 1922. As the Luna-Lite was mentioned in The Moving Picture World in 1916, my guess would be that it was the old Gus Sun house, renamed.
One reference to the other Orpheum is on this page at BoxRec, listing a match between local boxer Vaughn Treber and Joe Lohman at the Orpheum on August 7, 1922. The only other reference I can find is on this page, which says that the Denishawn Dance Company appeared at the Orpheum in Marion, Indiana, on November 30, 1923. It’s possible that the second Orpheum never operated as a movie theater.