You are correct in that it used to seat more than 400. In fact I want to say capacity was 982 or 983 when I was the projectionist there in 1981. It was larger than the Bethesda up the street (MD 410…aka East-West Hwy) that only had 949 (as a conventional movie theatre).
The Avalon DOES have a 70mm projector but that is about it. It is a Century JJ. I’m not sure the 70mm kit is there (Gate/Trap) and their primary processor, Panastereo CSP1200 CAN play 70mm with the CSP4600 Accessory unit but that is currently absent.
The Avalon only installed one projector on each screen so it would have a difficult time booking archival films (which all 70mms are being treated as since they are not for mass distribution). No one want’s their few prints cut up.
As to the AFI running ‘80s films…Why Not? The AFI should run films from ALL eras. I hear that Friday the 13th actually did REALLY well….as did Fast Times. I personally went to see Scarface and it seemed to be doing well too.
I completely agree though that it should be running MUCH more 70mm than it does and dipping into the same well (Lawrence) all the time will dilute its appeal.
Yes, it was just lights with blue glass covers. In fact, I remember them using one as a coin dish in the boxoffice to return change. As for spelling…mine has always been unique! You will no doubt find many spelling errors. I used to have a really nifty program for my old Mac SE/30 called Thunder 7…it always was working in the background and helped me a lot.
What was behind the screen at the Fine Arts was a Cement shelf that went up about 13-feet or so, as I recall. The speakers sat in front of that on three foot tall stands (Altec A-4s are 10-feet tall with a horn on top of that). The subwoofers sat on that shelf. You got to the speaker room by going out of the theatre by the right front door and up the steps one flight…there was a door that lead to the room. If you kept going up you could leave the building.
As to photographs…I don’t have many of the old theatres. I have them of most of the current ones I’m associated with. I’m real bad about posting them on Film-Tech (except the South Branch Cinema 6 in Moorefield, WV). I always get permission before posting those though.
If I could go back in time…yes I would want to have snapped a lot of pictures of the theatres I worked in. I’ve normally been accorded access to most every place in the theatres and could have documented them well. As much of a shutter-bug I was back then, I never shot the theatres…for shame.
Okay…I dug out Headley’s book. You’ll note that the line about the curtain (the last line, actually, and is found on page 261) was not in quotes as was the Washington Post article quoted from December 23, 1967. Note the article does mention the “Procenium-less screen” which is where a curtain would go (curtains don’t tend to hang in free-space…they hang behind a valance or go up behind a procenium to hide their rigging.
What clearly had changed since that article was written was the ticket counter actually faced the court outside…from there everything was DOWNSTAIRS. Not upstairs as was indicated in the article. So either there was a change in boxoffice or there was a typo in the article.
After the first flight of steps down you came to the theatre level where the concession stand lived (and inside boxoffice for slower times…most KB theatres had a ticket dispenser on the concession stand for slower times to cut down on labor of staffing a separate boxoffice). From there you either entered the theatre or you could go down a short flight of stairs to the lower lobby where the restrooms were (and manager’s office). This lower lobby was handy for special functions too.
The little four theatres were never near certification…the rest were to be and I think were. The little four do not have the THX baffle wall, are a bit under amped and have other compromises in them.
As to moving a DCinema system around…no it isn’t as simple as moving the projector and flipping a switch though if need be it could be made to be not too painful. The DCinema installation is every bit as complex as a film installation.
The original DCinema projector in theatre #11 was part of the original Technicolor DCinema systems. They were 1.3K systems. The projector at the Mall was the Christie DCP-I, I believe was its model number. While it did well, it is true that the 1.3K systems became unsupported by the Cinema industry (not the manufacturers of the projectors). That is one of the scary things about DCinema as it stands…it is easy for the studios to suddenly cease support of a format in common use…not just 1.3K systems but it has happened to MPEG servers too. That would have been another problem with the original system at the Mall…the server was Qualcom’s and they got out of the game too.
I have not been in the booth (shaped like a gigantic “T” since the 2K systems were installed so I can’t commment on what is up there now.
I suppose I don’t mind…I forgot to mention Theatre #2…which was also largish.
When the theatre opened…all but the little theatres (3, 4, 7, 8) were to be THX certified. They all have the THX crossovers, walls and I think all at one time had certification or were within reach of certification if one or two corrections were made.
The big theatres all had SDDS-8 capability and in fact use the SDDS-3000 systems as their primary sound system. These theatres had ports to plug in either DTS or Dolby Digital as needed.
I always thought of the Cinema 7 as the last of the grand ornate theatres of yesteryear. Opening in the 1960s…it was past they great heyday of movie palaces yet it boasted greater than 1100 seats.
The theatre was indeed quite large and one was easily winded getting to the projection booth!
The golden drapes were beautiful. The screen rigging and front end were clearly from a day when things were done right…everything was perfectly balanced and the drape machines were built like tanks (and were huge by todays standards).
The projection equipment there was no slouch either…Norelco Todd-Ao projectors. When the theatre was twinned, they moved downstairs to say with the “big” auditorium.
I never liked the twin job much…you had this ornate theatre downstairs with 70mm and a decent picture/sound. Upstairs, the picture, while largish (around 40-feet wide) was way too dim and only mono sound.
First, THX would not have approved the Altec A-4…second, why would one pay THX for the certification and annual recertifications when the theatre already had the reputation of 1st class picture and sound? It is more expensive to retrofit a theatre for THX and progressively more difficult in a situation like the Fine Arts where the theatre was essentially part of another building…HVAC might have needed to be redesigned to hit their NC figures, which might not have been doable….and the list goes on. Where THX made sense was in a competitive market to distinguish oneself from the rest of the crowd.
Yes, the Fine Arts screen is smaller that the larger theatres at the Annapolis Mall XI. Theatre 1 there is 50-feet wide with theatres 10 and 11 coming in at 40 feet or thereabouts. Theatres 5 and 6 are the next largest and I don’t recall them hitting 40 feet but they might….yes I helped install that one and serviced it for the first couple of years.
Your memory is correct about the surrounds…they were made by Community and were called the DSS or DDS…I forget which. The Fine Arts is the only theatre we tried them in…while they did okay…they were considered unsightly by some and not particularly great. The stage speakers were Altec A-4s (five of them when they went to 70mm) and JBL subwoofers.
Believe it or not…the screen was closer to 35-feet wide, nowhere near 40-50'. The shadowbox type front end was meant to convey this sense of largeness since it tapers towards the screen and is white like the screen.
The Fairfax Square was like the Cinema in that it is underground…but unlike the Cinema…its entrance didn’t face the street but faced a parking garage and was 180 degrees from the street.
The Fine Arts…while I can’t speak to it before 1980…after 1980 it had no curtain and there were no indication one had ever existed. The shadow box went all of the way to the exit doors by the screen (that had alarms on them if you used them) so there was no place to stack the curtain. It would have been really odd to have a crtain that far in front of the screen (over 3 feet in front).
sguttag
commented about
Cinemaon
Jul 22, 2007 at 8:20 pm
Ah, the Cinema…I was the chief projectionist there from the end of 1982 (after the MacArthur Closed) and well into 1983. Sam Brooks was the projectionist there for most of its life…in fact he worked it until it closed. I only got the lead position when Sam transitioned from the Army to the Post Office and couldn’t work there full time for a brief period.
In the summer of 1982 I swapped quite a bit of time between the MacArthur running Star Trek II and the Cinema running ET. The following year at the Cinema we had Wargames which was a bit of a surprise hit (and in 70mm). I seem to recall showing Amadeus and Temple of Doom there in 70mm quite a bit too.
The Cinema did indeed have some of the best pair of Norelcos (as Mungo pointed out above) I ever laid hands on. They came from the KB Apex.
The Cinema had one of the very first Dolby CP200s (installed for The Empire Strikes Back).
One should also mention Mrs. Lange…she was a fixture in the boxoffice for many years and we even had a party for one of her birthdays where the price of admission was her age…I remember that during Amadeus.
The Cinema was also one of the first theatres in the area of any size that really put the right amount of light on the screen…in fact, after the Cinema purchased its lamphouses…the Uptown followed suit.
I had many good times at the Cinema and met/worked with some really great people….the MacArthur remains my favorite though (as a single).
What exterior? Its lobby is HUGE and under ground but the exterior? There really isn’t one (and yes, I’ve even worked this theatre once or twice shortly after it opened. I also worked the Tyson’s IV across the street which this theatre replaced (the Tyson’s 4 was a HUGE twin that was turne dinto 4 decent sized theatres).
From 1980 to 1987…I defy anyone to produce any picturs that show a curtain in that theatre. I couldn’t imagine anyone removing a curtained front-end to put in a shadowbox front end. I can guarantee that there was no curtain there from 1980 onwards. Just a blue screen wash (lights). I love curtains. There were none in the Fine Arts…in fact, there was very little fabric of any kind in the auditorium.
Hold on there Howard….I ran that theatre pretty extensively in the 1980s…installed 70mm there too. There was NO curtain in that theatre nor do I believe there ever was a curtain. The Fine Arts had what was referred to as a “Shadow Box” Imagine a trapizoid on its side so you are looking up its bottom. The sides were chamfered towards the screen. The screen wash was indeed blue. The walls were Alpro.
A big problem with the Shadowbox screen is the complete lack of masking…just a thin black boarder going around. Another problem is that it was fixed 2:1 ratio. We changed that when 70mm went in by adding more material top and bottom to make it more to the scope ratio but for 1.85…you still got the fuzzy sides of the aperture plate.
The K-B Crystal had the same front end but used an orange screen wash.
The Fine Arts could sound REALLY good with 70mm. It always seemed to have good crowds.
An oddity for the projectionist…s/he had to enter the booth from the FCC building as there was no path between the booth and the theatre!
From what I can tell…The was not a lot of money around for the Harbour when it was built…mostly of existing equipment in the projection booth. It has traditionally been a busy theatre though it is tough being 2nd bannana behind the Mall.
The Calvert 5 does not have really big theatres…one is in the 300 seat range. They are marked by as steep a slope as one could build in its day (you couldn’t do it today for ADA reasons). The sightlines are great.
As to how the Goldmans would run things with their theatres today is just speculation. It is a family business but Marvin has to be nearly 90 and Ronnie isn’t that young anymore either. I don’t believe Ronnie’s children have any desire to run the business so I think that would limit how they would decide to run a larger chain. The era of the small family run chain has past (with few exceptions). The Kogod and Burka families still own real estate.
You know…it is a funny thing about campaigns to save theatres…if these same people loyally came to the theatre…it wouldn’t close. They tend to get all upset when the prospect of losing their familiar landmark. However, it is a business and the key to the business is patronage. Now if these same people were to demand quality when the business is open, they would be more effective. It is cheaper to keep a business going than it is to open new ones. But when the business demands fall into non-profitability…how can you blame the owners of the business for leaving?
As of DC Filmfest 2007…the 70mm projectors (Simplex 35/70s) still were there as was most of the “permanent” equipment. I don’t think the 70mm conversion kits remained though. I believe Fannie Mae has control of the space at this point. For the most part everything fired right back up after a little bit of TLC (and replacing some “missing” items).
I would not dispute that description. Compared to the Baronet it was not that phenominal at all. It never even had stereo sound. As for drab…it had the K-B carpet. The walls were Alpro in the theatres (think GCC of the day too). The theatre could do some business at times but mostly…a drab duplex fits the description pretty well.
Jeff, I think you have your theatres off…the Baronet West was a theatre unto itself. Its only connection to the Baronet or the Bethesda was the K-B chain and its proximity to the original Baronet.
The families still exist but they have nothing to do with theatres. The Goldman family married into the Kogod family. K/B was really a reality company that got into the theatre business on a forclosure, as I recall (The Princess Theatre). Anyway…Marvin Goldman married into the Kogod family. They formed Fremar Corp (based on the names FREd Burka and MARvin Goldman). If you looked at any of our paper work, we were Fremar Corp, Trading As K-B Theatres. I came into the company as the Burka family was exiting. At that time David Burka was still around but it was clear that Marvin’s son, Ronnie was coming up and taking over the day-to-day. Marvin and Ronnie ran/owned the company for my tenure there with Marvin handing over the reins just about completely by the time I left.
K-B did not sell to Cineplex though I can understand the confusion. K-B theatres sold to Ron Nadler’s company but they kept the K-B name enough (it wasn’t exactly the same…something like K-B Theatres Inc or LLC or something like that…it was a different company though…no more Fremar Corp). They bought most of what was K-B at the time except for the Annapolis, Calver, and oddly enough, the Aspen Hill. Not being with the company at the time, I have no idea about the politics behind what got sold and when.
The Goldman family formed Apex Cinemas. I have to think they were paying homage to their former crown jewel, the Apex theatre in Washington, DC (before my time as a projectionist but I did see films there as a yute…last film was Logan’s Run in 70mm…those projectors found their way to the K-B Cinema…but I digress).
The Apex theatres continued on until Crown Theatres bought all of them, except the Calvert. Crown closed the Aspen Hill and then built a new Annapolis Mall theatre and subsequently closed the older 4-plex that was built during my time.
Apex Cinemas continues to this day with the Apex Calvert…still owned and operated by the Goldmans
There is a good book on Washington DC theatres by Hedley (he also did one on Baltimore theatres) that will let you see the history of the theatres and the movie men in the Washington DC area.
I understand your dismay about the grain…but at least you could see it…nice and sharp. As I recall Star Trek II in 70mm…I remember noting that the image had a steaky feel to it…like it was not developed uniformly…I saw it in the gate and on screen. If you recall…the subwoofers for the MacA were on stage and visible. There was no more room behind the screen and it was believed when they were installed that the MacA’s days were numbered.
Here is another bit of trivia for you. The MacArthur had a notably narrow front-end. As such we cropped a bit too much in width. If we projected Paramount’s opening title card “Paramount Pictures Presents”…it would read “aroumnt Pictures Present” We opted to keep the curtains closed (and douser closed) for that card and then open the douser and curtain after the card passed so what you, the audience, saw first was the star field but you may recall the musical score started first. I actually really liked that progression…like going to a stage play with the orchestra starting it off first.
Another bit of triva…the last film to play at the MacArthur as a single was “Raiders of the Lost Ark” (reissue) in 70mm.
I did work the Langley from time to time in relief…it was never a permanent job for me. In fact, there were very few theatres that bore the KB or Circle/Showcase badge that I didn’t work at least one shift or two in. I was with KB from 1980 to 1987 and then Circle (and its successors) from 1987 until 2005.
Hey, you won’t get any arguement from me which venue brings you more into the picture…the Uptown can beat em all (and I’m not limiting it to the DC-Metro area). But in its present state…the Uptown is incapable of handling such shows. I agree that the AFI needs to expand its 70mm play list to be more like the Egyptian in Hollywood. BTW…add Playtime to your repeat list for the AFI. Lawrence is coming back to the AFI soon.
Yes the State Theatre is definately open and worth visiting. The current decor looks great to me. For a multi-purpose venue, the State Theatre can put out exceptional film presentations for both image and sound (with genuine projectionists). It has 2K video projection as well (not DCinema…A/V grade.
I have no doubt that their live events are exceptional too. The room has a really great feel to it.
If I lived closer, I know I would catch as many events there as possible. So if you do live near it…please support it.
Your best bet for 70mm in the DC area at this time is the AFI/Silver. As for the Uptown’s projection quality…I know the operator there and the equipment…it just isn’t likely that they doing a very good job.
While I don’t fault the church for seeking the venue, it is something that should never have been done to this theatre…it is yet another nail in the coffin.
You are correct in that it used to seat more than 400. In fact I want to say capacity was 982 or 983 when I was the projectionist there in 1981. It was larger than the Bethesda up the street (MD 410…aka East-West Hwy) that only had 949 (as a conventional movie theatre).
SG
The Avalon DOES have a 70mm projector but that is about it. It is a Century JJ. I’m not sure the 70mm kit is there (Gate/Trap) and their primary processor, Panastereo CSP1200 CAN play 70mm with the CSP4600 Accessory unit but that is currently absent.
The Avalon only installed one projector on each screen so it would have a difficult time booking archival films (which all 70mms are being treated as since they are not for mass distribution). No one want’s their few prints cut up.
As to the AFI running ‘80s films…Why Not? The AFI should run films from ALL eras. I hear that Friday the 13th actually did REALLY well….as did Fast Times. I personally went to see Scarface and it seemed to be doing well too.
I completely agree though that it should be running MUCH more 70mm than it does and dipping into the same well (Lawrence) all the time will dilute its appeal.
SG
Yes, it was just lights with blue glass covers. In fact, I remember them using one as a coin dish in the boxoffice to return change. As for spelling…mine has always been unique! You will no doubt find many spelling errors. I used to have a really nifty program for my old Mac SE/30 called Thunder 7…it always was working in the background and helped me a lot.
What was behind the screen at the Fine Arts was a Cement shelf that went up about 13-feet or so, as I recall. The speakers sat in front of that on three foot tall stands (Altec A-4s are 10-feet tall with a horn on top of that). The subwoofers sat on that shelf. You got to the speaker room by going out of the theatre by the right front door and up the steps one flight…there was a door that lead to the room. If you kept going up you could leave the building.
As to photographs…I don’t have many of the old theatres. I have them of most of the current ones I’m associated with. I’m real bad about posting them on Film-Tech (except the South Branch Cinema 6 in Moorefield, WV). I always get permission before posting those though.
If I could go back in time…yes I would want to have snapped a lot of pictures of the theatres I worked in. I’ve normally been accorded access to most every place in the theatres and could have documented them well. As much of a shutter-bug I was back then, I never shot the theatres…for shame.
Okay…I dug out Headley’s book. You’ll note that the line about the curtain (the last line, actually, and is found on page 261) was not in quotes as was the Washington Post article quoted from December 23, 1967. Note the article does mention the “Procenium-less screen” which is where a curtain would go (curtains don’t tend to hang in free-space…they hang behind a valance or go up behind a procenium to hide their rigging.
What clearly had changed since that article was written was the ticket counter actually faced the court outside…from there everything was DOWNSTAIRS. Not upstairs as was indicated in the article. So either there was a change in boxoffice or there was a typo in the article.
After the first flight of steps down you came to the theatre level where the concession stand lived (and inside boxoffice for slower times…most KB theatres had a ticket dispenser on the concession stand for slower times to cut down on labor of staffing a separate boxoffice). From there you either entered the theatre or you could go down a short flight of stairs to the lower lobby where the restrooms were (and manager’s office). This lower lobby was handy for special functions too.
The little four theatres were never near certification…the rest were to be and I think were. The little four do not have the THX baffle wall, are a bit under amped and have other compromises in them.
As to moving a DCinema system around…no it isn’t as simple as moving the projector and flipping a switch though if need be it could be made to be not too painful. The DCinema installation is every bit as complex as a film installation.
The original DCinema projector in theatre #11 was part of the original Technicolor DCinema systems. They were 1.3K systems. The projector at the Mall was the Christie DCP-I, I believe was its model number. While it did well, it is true that the 1.3K systems became unsupported by the Cinema industry (not the manufacturers of the projectors). That is one of the scary things about DCinema as it stands…it is easy for the studios to suddenly cease support of a format in common use…not just 1.3K systems but it has happened to MPEG servers too. That would have been another problem with the original system at the Mall…the server was Qualcom’s and they got out of the game too.
I have not been in the booth (shaped like a gigantic “T” since the 2K systems were installed so I can’t commment on what is up there now.
SG
I suppose I don’t mind…I forgot to mention Theatre #2…which was also largish.
When the theatre opened…all but the little theatres (3, 4, 7, 8) were to be THX certified. They all have the THX crossovers, walls and I think all at one time had certification or were within reach of certification if one or two corrections were made.
The big theatres all had SDDS-8 capability and in fact use the SDDS-3000 systems as their primary sound system. These theatres had ports to plug in either DTS or Dolby Digital as needed.
SG
I always thought of the Cinema 7 as the last of the grand ornate theatres of yesteryear. Opening in the 1960s…it was past they great heyday of movie palaces yet it boasted greater than 1100 seats.
The theatre was indeed quite large and one was easily winded getting to the projection booth!
The golden drapes were beautiful. The screen rigging and front end were clearly from a day when things were done right…everything was perfectly balanced and the drape machines were built like tanks (and were huge by todays standards).
The projection equipment there was no slouch either…Norelco Todd-Ao projectors. When the theatre was twinned, they moved downstairs to say with the “big” auditorium.
I never liked the twin job much…you had this ornate theatre downstairs with 70mm and a decent picture/sound. Upstairs, the picture, while largish (around 40-feet wide) was way too dim and only mono sound.
What a grand old theatre this one was.
First, THX would not have approved the Altec A-4…second, why would one pay THX for the certification and annual recertifications when the theatre already had the reputation of 1st class picture and sound? It is more expensive to retrofit a theatre for THX and progressively more difficult in a situation like the Fine Arts where the theatre was essentially part of another building…HVAC might have needed to be redesigned to hit their NC figures, which might not have been doable….and the list goes on. Where THX made sense was in a competitive market to distinguish oneself from the rest of the crowd.
Yes, the Fine Arts screen is smaller that the larger theatres at the Annapolis Mall XI. Theatre 1 there is 50-feet wide with theatres 10 and 11 coming in at 40 feet or thereabouts. Theatres 5 and 6 are the next largest and I don’t recall them hitting 40 feet but they might….yes I helped install that one and serviced it for the first couple of years.
Steve
Jodar,
Your memory is correct about the surrounds…they were made by Community and were called the DSS or DDS…I forget which. The Fine Arts is the only theatre we tried them in…while they did okay…they were considered unsightly by some and not particularly great. The stage speakers were Altec A-4s (five of them when they went to 70mm) and JBL subwoofers.
Believe it or not…the screen was closer to 35-feet wide, nowhere near 40-50'. The shadowbox type front end was meant to convey this sense of largeness since it tapers towards the screen and is white like the screen.
The Fairfax Square was like the Cinema in that it is underground…but unlike the Cinema…its entrance didn’t face the street but faced a parking garage and was 180 degrees from the street.
The Fine Arts…while I can’t speak to it before 1980…after 1980 it had no curtain and there were no indication one had ever existed. The shadow box went all of the way to the exit doors by the screen (that had alarms on them if you used them) so there was no place to stack the curtain. It would have been really odd to have a crtain that far in front of the screen (over 3 feet in front).
Ah, the Cinema…I was the chief projectionist there from the end of 1982 (after the MacArthur Closed) and well into 1983. Sam Brooks was the projectionist there for most of its life…in fact he worked it until it closed. I only got the lead position when Sam transitioned from the Army to the Post Office and couldn’t work there full time for a brief period.
In the summer of 1982 I swapped quite a bit of time between the MacArthur running Star Trek II and the Cinema running ET. The following year at the Cinema we had Wargames which was a bit of a surprise hit (and in 70mm). I seem to recall showing Amadeus and Temple of Doom there in 70mm quite a bit too.
The Cinema did indeed have some of the best pair of Norelcos (as Mungo pointed out above) I ever laid hands on. They came from the KB Apex.
The Cinema had one of the very first Dolby CP200s (installed for The Empire Strikes Back).
One should also mention Mrs. Lange…she was a fixture in the boxoffice for many years and we even had a party for one of her birthdays where the price of admission was her age…I remember that during Amadeus.
The Cinema was also one of the first theatres in the area of any size that really put the right amount of light on the screen…in fact, after the Cinema purchased its lamphouses…the Uptown followed suit.
I had many good times at the Cinema and met/worked with some really great people….the MacArthur remains my favorite though (as a single).
SG
What exterior? Its lobby is HUGE and under ground but the exterior? There really isn’t one (and yes, I’ve even worked this theatre once or twice shortly after it opened. I also worked the Tyson’s IV across the street which this theatre replaced (the Tyson’s 4 was a HUGE twin that was turne dinto 4 decent sized theatres).
From 1980 to 1987…I defy anyone to produce any picturs that show a curtain in that theatre. I couldn’t imagine anyone removing a curtained front-end to put in a shadowbox front end. I can guarantee that there was no curtain there from 1980 onwards. Just a blue screen wash (lights). I love curtains. There were none in the Fine Arts…in fact, there was very little fabric of any kind in the auditorium.
Hold on there Howard….I ran that theatre pretty extensively in the 1980s…installed 70mm there too. There was NO curtain in that theatre nor do I believe there ever was a curtain. The Fine Arts had what was referred to as a “Shadow Box” Imagine a trapizoid on its side so you are looking up its bottom. The sides were chamfered towards the screen. The screen wash was indeed blue. The walls were Alpro.
A big problem with the Shadowbox screen is the complete lack of masking…just a thin black boarder going around. Another problem is that it was fixed 2:1 ratio. We changed that when 70mm went in by adding more material top and bottom to make it more to the scope ratio but for 1.85…you still got the fuzzy sides of the aperture plate.
The K-B Crystal had the same front end but used an orange screen wash.
The Fine Arts could sound REALLY good with 70mm. It always seemed to have good crowds.
An oddity for the projectionist…s/he had to enter the booth from the FCC building as there was no path between the booth and the theatre!
SG
From what I can tell…The was not a lot of money around for the Harbour when it was built…mostly of existing equipment in the projection booth. It has traditionally been a busy theatre though it is tough being 2nd bannana behind the Mall.
The Calvert 5 does not have really big theatres…one is in the 300 seat range. They are marked by as steep a slope as one could build in its day (you couldn’t do it today for ADA reasons). The sightlines are great.
As to how the Goldmans would run things with their theatres today is just speculation. It is a family business but Marvin has to be nearly 90 and Ronnie isn’t that young anymore either. I don’t believe Ronnie’s children have any desire to run the business so I think that would limit how they would decide to run a larger chain. The era of the small family run chain has past (with few exceptions). The Kogod and Burka families still own real estate.
You know…it is a funny thing about campaigns to save theatres…if these same people loyally came to the theatre…it wouldn’t close. They tend to get all upset when the prospect of losing their familiar landmark. However, it is a business and the key to the business is patronage. Now if these same people were to demand quality when the business is open, they would be more effective. It is cheaper to keep a business going than it is to open new ones. But when the business demands fall into non-profitability…how can you blame the owners of the business for leaving?
Yes, for meetings and such. I believe they are the current lease holder for the space. This is entirely speculation though.
As of DC Filmfest 2007…the 70mm projectors (Simplex 35/70s) still were there as was most of the “permanent” equipment. I don’t think the 70mm conversion kits remained though. I believe Fannie Mae has control of the space at this point. For the most part everything fired right back up after a little bit of TLC (and replacing some “missing” items).
I would not dispute that description. Compared to the Baronet it was not that phenominal at all. It never even had stereo sound. As for drab…it had the K-B carpet. The walls were Alpro in the theatres (think GCC of the day too). The theatre could do some business at times but mostly…a drab duplex fits the description pretty well.
Jeff, I think you have your theatres off…the Baronet West was a theatre unto itself. Its only connection to the Baronet or the Bethesda was the K-B chain and its proximity to the original Baronet.
It is Kogod and Burka…
The families still exist but they have nothing to do with theatres. The Goldman family married into the Kogod family. K/B was really a reality company that got into the theatre business on a forclosure, as I recall (The Princess Theatre). Anyway…Marvin Goldman married into the Kogod family. They formed Fremar Corp (based on the names FREd Burka and MARvin Goldman). If you looked at any of our paper work, we were Fremar Corp, Trading As K-B Theatres. I came into the company as the Burka family was exiting. At that time David Burka was still around but it was clear that Marvin’s son, Ronnie was coming up and taking over the day-to-day. Marvin and Ronnie ran/owned the company for my tenure there with Marvin handing over the reins just about completely by the time I left.
K-B did not sell to Cineplex though I can understand the confusion. K-B theatres sold to Ron Nadler’s company but they kept the K-B name enough (it wasn’t exactly the same…something like K-B Theatres Inc or LLC or something like that…it was a different company though…no more Fremar Corp). They bought most of what was K-B at the time except for the Annapolis, Calver, and oddly enough, the Aspen Hill. Not being with the company at the time, I have no idea about the politics behind what got sold and when.
The Goldman family formed Apex Cinemas. I have to think they were paying homage to their former crown jewel, the Apex theatre in Washington, DC (before my time as a projectionist but I did see films there as a yute…last film was Logan’s Run in 70mm…those projectors found their way to the K-B Cinema…but I digress).
The Apex theatres continued on until Crown Theatres bought all of them, except the Calvert. Crown closed the Aspen Hill and then built a new Annapolis Mall theatre and subsequently closed the older 4-plex that was built during my time.
Apex Cinemas continues to this day with the Apex Calvert…still owned and operated by the Goldmans
There is a good book on Washington DC theatres by Hedley (he also did one on Baltimore theatres) that will let you see the history of the theatres and the movie men in the Washington DC area.
SG
I understand your dismay about the grain…but at least you could see it…nice and sharp. As I recall Star Trek II in 70mm…I remember noting that the image had a steaky feel to it…like it was not developed uniformly…I saw it in the gate and on screen. If you recall…the subwoofers for the MacA were on stage and visible. There was no more room behind the screen and it was believed when they were installed that the MacA’s days were numbered.
Here is another bit of trivia for you. The MacArthur had a notably narrow front-end. As such we cropped a bit too much in width. If we projected Paramount’s opening title card “Paramount Pictures Presents”…it would read “aroumnt Pictures Present” We opted to keep the curtains closed (and douser closed) for that card and then open the douser and curtain after the card passed so what you, the audience, saw first was the star field but you may recall the musical score started first. I actually really liked that progression…like going to a stage play with the orchestra starting it off first.
Another bit of triva…the last film to play at the MacArthur as a single was “Raiders of the Lost Ark” (reissue) in 70mm.
I did work the Langley from time to time in relief…it was never a permanent job for me. In fact, there were very few theatres that bore the KB or Circle/Showcase badge that I didn’t work at least one shift or two in. I was with KB from 1980 to 1987 and then Circle (and its successors) from 1987 until 2005.
Hey, you won’t get any arguement from me which venue brings you more into the picture…the Uptown can beat em all (and I’m not limiting it to the DC-Metro area). But in its present state…the Uptown is incapable of handling such shows. I agree that the AFI needs to expand its 70mm play list to be more like the Egyptian in Hollywood. BTW…add Playtime to your repeat list for the AFI. Lawrence is coming back to the AFI soon.
Yes the State Theatre is definately open and worth visiting. The current decor looks great to me. For a multi-purpose venue, the State Theatre can put out exceptional film presentations for both image and sound (with genuine projectionists). It has 2K video projection as well (not DCinema…A/V grade.
I have no doubt that their live events are exceptional too. The room has a really great feel to it.
If I lived closer, I know I would catch as many events there as possible. So if you do live near it…please support it.
Your best bet for 70mm in the DC area at this time is the AFI/Silver. As for the Uptown’s projection quality…I know the operator there and the equipment…it just isn’t likely that they doing a very good job.
While I don’t fault the church for seeking the venue, it is something that should never have been done to this theatre…it is yet another nail in the coffin.
SG