Kings Theatre
1027 Flatbush Avenue,
Brooklyn,
NY
11226
1027 Flatbush Avenue,
Brooklyn,
NY
11226
86 people
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Showing 801 - 825 of 1,564 comments
I am trying to get in touch with Marty Markowitz through E-Mail, but the problem is I am not from Brooklyn (though that’s where I come from originally). I wonder if any of you would be willing to contact him. I just sent an E-Mail on a construction company that has been doing restoration projects around the city and Long Island.
Please accept my apologies. I finally heard from OHNY and, despite the blurb in their email, they were in the end unable to get permission to include the Loew’s Kings on their tour this year.
I am very sorry to have promulgated this false bit of news, particularly because I know you will be as disappointed as I am.
Dan
PlanetPLG.com
I know, but I’m still very hopeful!
Fantastic News!!!! I hope to be there!
Loew’s Kings to be open to the public for tours for two days in October for the first time since the 70s!
See www.PlanetPLG.com
Dan
A little deceptive advertising. The opening month of 1776 broke RCMH attendance records due to the live Christmas Nativity show being so popular.
What record could 1776 possibly have broken at the music hall?
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Does anyone know how I can get in touch with Mister Markowitz?
There is a new comment on the Loew’s Kings from Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz on PlanetPLG.com:
http://www.planetplg.com
The A&E program aired on Sunday August 20th. What a theatre. At least the theatre is still standing. Hamilton Ontario has lost all of it’s grand theatres of which most are still parking lots when the destruction started in the 70’s.
Rebroadcast of Breakfast with the arts on A&E
Monaco/Wonder Theatres â€
Rated: TVPG
Running Time: 120 Minutes
Genre:
Closed Captions: Yes
Upcoming Airings:
Sunday, August 20 @ 8am/7C
Search for other upcoming episodes
I haven’t heard from this section of the site for a while, are there people still out there?
Well, “Life” I may be at the age for a coronary, but your comment above re the San Francisco FOX book won’t give me one. The 7-pound tome you are referring to is titled: “FOX—The Last Word” by the late Preston Kaufmann in 1980. It is still sometimes for sale used at www.amazon.com for hundreds of dollars, but one could order it through Inter-Library Loan at most libraries. It is probably the high water mark in theatres books, and well worth owning if one can afford this voloume about a fabulous theatre! Yes, it does have color photos, but all of them are from the 1950s on, since there was no COLOR STILL photography until after the second world war. It also does have color renderings (paintings) of the place at opening.
By the way, I got an E-mail from one:
“Adrienne OBrien” who says that she is trying to contact you re Paul Warshauer. I explained that you give no contact information on your Profile page (obtained for any Registered member when one clicks one a person’s name in blue at the bottom of a comment). If you wish people to contact you, merely click on the word Profile in the upper right corner of any page (if you have manually or automatically signed-in) and correct the CONTACT INFO field as you wish. If you also choose to put your name at the top, you will probably get more intelligent messages from more people; and your E-mail service will allow you to block the addresses of those whom you would rather not talk to.
I was over at the Staten Island Paramount section of this site, that theater was designed by Rapp and Rapp. I suggested that they may try to help restore the Kings because, from what I read over there that theater may not be restorable. What do you all think?
No doubt this is true. The Uptown in Chicago is fast approaching the point you describe. I think one of the main things that has kept the Uptown standing is the fact that it would cost a ton of money to bring it down. Who would pay to do this in a seedy area of Chicago? But with the neighborhood around it fast improving I think the cost-benefit analysis is going to start working against the old place one of these days. Some people have commented about improvements on Flatbush Avenue. So the same may be true here.
At the risk of giving Jim Rankin a coronary, I will respond here to Vincent’s San Francisco Fox comment. There are color photos of the entire building. If memory serves they can be found in a comprehensive hard cover book written on the Fox many years ago. I believe this book was called something like:“the Fabulous Fox.” I also believe that it is now out of print. But it can probably be found at the Theatre Historical Society.
(all in good fun Jim, I know that you are a stickler when it comes to comments being placed on the correct page)
The theater itself on the ouside looks like it’s in decent shape, just looks dirty (just needs cleaning and TLC, lol). Beautiful building.
I hear everyone talking about everything besides what the real concern here is with regards to saving the Kings. I agree with the idea that the kings should be used for a Performing Arts Center. It would really revitalize the area. If you all can get the ball rolling to get to a capital campaign stage I can get some celebrities who may want to do a dramatic reading for the theater but you have a long way to go.
I hear everyone talking about everything besides what the real concern here is with regards to saving the Kings. I agree with the idea that the kings should be used for a Performing Arts Center. It would really revitalize the area. If you all can get the ball rolling to get to a capital campaign stage I can get some celebrities who may want to do a dramatic reading for the theater but you have a long way to go.
The front of the Loew’s KIngs needs to be cleaned up by the City to get the ball rolling. The City needs to spend a little money cleaning the front and make the marquee presentable where it could be used to post messages until the theatre is operational. The lobby could be worked on first to show people what could be done with the rest of the theatre. The Auditorium could be worked on in stages.The necessary repairs need to be made so no more damage occurs to the theatre. When I saw the Kings in 2002 many seats were in good shape and they should be covered and protected. The City should provide some heat so no more damage occurs. I only hope city government is really serious about saving the Kings becuase I see very little action being done to stabalize this theatre.brucec
How unfortunate is it that we have no color photos of the interiors of the Chi Paradise, the Roxy or the Brooklyn and Times Square Paramounts and Kings. I believe the color plates are all illustrations. The only color picture I’ve seen of the San Francisco Fox is of the Lobby.
Thanks, Jim.
Ed: the caption in bold is on the bottom of page 136 of the First Edition, though the later editions may not follow the pagination of the First exactly. The plates I mentioned are actually six images: the first being the Frontice piece: a rendering of the aud. of the ROXY. The others are on pages 137 through 140: the aud. of the MISSOURI in St. Joseph; the lobby mural of the STATE in Syracuse. Pgs 138/9 are a spread of the rendering of the aud. of the PARADISE in the Bronx; pg. 140 has the aud. of the KIMO in Albuquerque (pre fire); and the proscenium of the PARAMOUNT in Plainfield, NJ. All of these are surrounded by black ink artwork from the AVALON (now NEW REGAL) in Chicago, though not attributed there.
If you want to tip in these color plates to your edition, you don’t have to resort to color photocopies from the First Edition; you can look in used books stores for collections of the defunct hardbound magazine “American Heritage” from October, 1961. Therein are the 5 color plates with slightly different captions within the article: “The Best Ree-maining Seats” by the same Mr. Hall.
Jim… I have a later edition of the book. I haven’t taken note of the orphaned captions yet… on which page(s) do they appear?
“THE BEST REMAINING SEATS, The Story of the Golden Age of the Movie Palace” is available under that full title of the hard bound first edition, or truncated titles of two later reprintings with some editing. It can be found at many larger libraries or they can have it lent to you on Inter-Library Loan. You can also find copies for sale (used) at such as www.amazon.com Note that only the first edition of 1961 contains the 5 color plates — though the latter editions retain the caption for the missing plates! Its author, the late Ben M. Hall, would have been delighted to see how well his magnum opus has stood the test of time!