Glad to see the Ziegfeld page is up and running once again. I just wanted to report that the ticket price has gone down since the last time I saw a new movie there. “Iron Man”, which was very good by the way, cost $12, down from $14 for “Shine a Light”. I guess the Rolling Stones were the ones responsible for the price gouging.
As far as I know, “Nights in White Satin” is part of every show the Moody Blues give. The woman who plays the flute in place of Ray Thomas is quite good, too. What bothers me most is that Mike Pinder left the group under bad circumstances so none of his compositions are ever performed anymore, and he wrote a lot of my very favorite Moody Blues songs. Oh well.
Wow – I knew movies would look good in there! How wide was the screen? From the width of the proscenium it looked to be as big as the Ziegfeld’s, or even bigger.
When you see a theater like that it’s hard to believe anyone would even think of tearing it down, but of course we all know it happens all the time.
TheaterBuff 1 is right: the Moody Blues put on a great show at the State Theater in Easton, PA. You never saw so many 60-year-olds rockin' out and dancing in the aisles. The theater itself is so spectacularly beautiful it’s hard to believe anyone could even think of demolishing it, but as we all know theaters just like it are being demolished even as we speak.
Justin Hayward is still the lead singer. Other original members are John Lodge on bass and Graeme Edge on drums. The band has four other members: a flute player (replacing Ray Thomas), a second drummer, and keyboard players. They put on quite a show, too!
Ross: can you check out what happened to the Ziegfeld’s page? It’s been dead for a week. I sent an e-mail through the proper channels but got no response. Thanks!
I always figured as long as we’re talking about movies here, past present or future, it’s fair game. I know what JSA means about some of the other pages getting clogged with hundreds of posts about the old neighborhood, etc., but not necessarily about going to the movies in that neighborhood. The 2nd most posted-about theater on Cinema Treasures, the Ridgewood in Queens NY, is totally undeserving of that high rank if you deleted all the non-movie-related posts from its page.
So, Rizzo, please stay. You’ve NEVER gone off-topic as far as I can see!
Justin’s got the right idea, but I think Michael lives in the Los Angeles area.
Michael: I may be able to find out the dates for you the next time I go to the Hackensack Public Library. They have The Bergen Record on microfilm, which always carried ads for the Clairidge. I have a day off coming up on May 8th, so maybe then … I’ll let you know.
Pete: Thanks for playing the music from “The Red Shoes” after yesterday’s excellent “Stairway to Heaven” show. #1 Michael Powell fan Martin Scorsese would’ve been proud of you!
I saw The Moody Blues in concert last night at this incredibly beautiful theater. It must’ve been amazing seeing widescreen movies here back in the ‘50s and '60s – the proscenium space is huge!
It sure was a thrill seeing my favorite James Bond movie, “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”, at the Ziegfeld tonight. Except for some sound issues in the final reel, the print was in first-class condition. It even had the animated United Artists logo from 1969 (“Entertainment from Transamerica Corporation”) which I haven’t seen in years.
This movie opened the same week the Ziegfeld opened its doors for the first time, in December 1969. The Ziegfeld was showing “Marooned” at the time – it took 39 years but they finally screened “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”.
I wish I did. I was lucky enough to see two 70mm roadshows at the Criterion: “Tora! Tora! Tora!” and “Nicholas and Alexandra”, both extremely impressive. If I was about 10-15 years older than I am, I would’ve seen “South Pacific” there for sure.
At the NY branch of the Academy’s screening of “Carrie” last year, the print never arrived at the theater due to a delivery foulup. The show was sold out and they were considering cancelling it, but at the last minute they projected the DVD version instead. And they apologized profusely for not being able to show the best possible version of the film. They seemed really embarrassed by the whole thing – this is the Academy we’re talking about here, and Amy Irving and Brian De Palma were in attendance – but the movie looked good on the big screen and I’m glad they didn’t cancel the show.
It doesn’t go into detail about the print except to say that it’s from the Academy Film Archive, so it was probably the best possible print in existence. It’s always been one of the most beautiful Technicolor films, which you might not expect considering it’s a borderline horror movie (that’s always the way I looked at it, anyway).
The resolution on “Goldfinger” was so good that I was able to tell, for the first time, that the guy playing Bond in the opening gun barrel logo sequence was NOT Sean Connery. I believe the opening of “Thunderball” was the first time he actually appeared there.
The digital presentation of “Goldfinger” tonight was excellent, and was made even better by the use of the curtains before and after. I’m not an expert like some of the regulars here, but as a lifelong moviegoer I found it hard to differentiate between this version and a 35mm print. I even gave it the Front Row test, and noticed a small detail I’d never seen before: in the Fort Knox fight scene between Bond and Oddjob, all the gold bars in the background were engraved with their own individual numbers. I love it when moviemakers care enough to add some slight detail like that which most people will never see, on the off chance that some fan in the front row might notice it.
About 150-200 people there tonight. Based on the Classics shows I’ve been to, some of the weeknight shows have been more crowded than the weekend ones. I wonder what can account for that? Maybe a lot of people work in the city and go after work, like me. And, as Peter said, there’s always so much more to do on a weekend.
When I first saw the original ads for “King Kong” in the early ‘70’s, that always confused me. I just assumed that the movie played in both Radio City and the Roxy at the same time. I didn’t know anything about the “New Roxy”. I wonder if that confused New York moviegoers back then, too.
JSA: I’ve always wondered about that too. I saw that double bill, when I was 15. It ran 5 ½ hours, and it was my first time seeing “Around the World in 80 Days”. I can recall both films looking great up on that screen (it was also my first time at the Ziegfeld) and I could swear they had multi-track stereo sound. I talked myself into believing that both films were shown in 70mm at the time, but of course I had no way of knowing for sure. I didn’t know then about the oval-shaped cue marks (35mm) vs. the round cue marks (70mm) at the end of every reel.
This is an excerpt from Michael Musto’s blog at the Village Voice:
“What are YOU doing on the PATH train?” asked a bemused commuter last Saturday, his jaw dropping to the spit-out gum on the floor. Well, believe it or not, I do venture out of Manhattan every few yearsâ€"especially when there’s a screening of All About Eve in the glorious Loews Jersey City Theater, featuring a live appearance by its only surviving star, Celeste Holm. I expected to be completely alone out there, only to find swarms of peopleâ€"all kinds of peopleâ€"lining up for the event and fastening their seatbelts for a night that made them pretty happy rabbits.
Irv: to give the Loew’s its due, they did already screen both “Ben-Hur” and “The Ten Commandments”, and both were excellent shows. “All About Eve” isn’t a big film on the scale of those two, unless you take its record-setting 14 Oscar nominations into account, but it sure was a one-of-a-kind experience seeing it with that many other people who loved the film so much.
Glad to see the Ziegfeld page is up and running once again. I just wanted to report that the ticket price has gone down since the last time I saw a new movie there. “Iron Man”, which was very good by the way, cost $12, down from $14 for “Shine a Light”. I guess the Rolling Stones were the ones responsible for the price gouging.
Thanks, LM! 1967 – that must be one of the first rock videos ever. The Beatles did a few around that time too (“Strawberry Fields Forever”).
As far as I know, “Nights in White Satin” is part of every show the Moody Blues give. The woman who plays the flute in place of Ray Thomas is quite good, too. What bothers me most is that Mike Pinder left the group under bad circumstances so none of his compositions are ever performed anymore, and he wrote a lot of my very favorite Moody Blues songs. Oh well.
Wow – I knew movies would look good in there! How wide was the screen? From the width of the proscenium it looked to be as big as the Ziegfeld’s, or even bigger.
When you see a theater like that it’s hard to believe anyone would even think of tearing it down, but of course we all know it happens all the time.
TheaterBuff 1 is right: the Moody Blues put on a great show at the State Theater in Easton, PA. You never saw so many 60-year-olds rockin' out and dancing in the aisles. The theater itself is so spectacularly beautiful it’s hard to believe anyone could even think of demolishing it, but as we all know theaters just like it are being demolished even as we speak.
Justin Hayward is still the lead singer. Other original members are John Lodge on bass and Graeme Edge on drums. The band has four other members: a flute player (replacing Ray Thomas), a second drummer, and keyboard players. They put on quite a show, too!
Here’s their official site:
http://www.moodyblues.co.uk/index_main.html
Ross: can you check out what happened to the Ziegfeld’s page? It’s been dead for a week. I sent an e-mail through the proper channels but got no response. Thanks!
I always figured as long as we’re talking about movies here, past present or future, it’s fair game. I know what JSA means about some of the other pages getting clogged with hundreds of posts about the old neighborhood, etc., but not necessarily about going to the movies in that neighborhood. The 2nd most posted-about theater on Cinema Treasures, the Ridgewood in Queens NY, is totally undeserving of that high rank if you deleted all the non-movie-related posts from its page.
So, Rizzo, please stay. You’ve NEVER gone off-topic as far as I can see!
Justin’s got the right idea, but I think Michael lives in the Los Angeles area.
Michael: I may be able to find out the dates for you the next time I go to the Hackensack Public Library. They have The Bergen Record on microfilm, which always carried ads for the Clairidge. I have a day off coming up on May 8th, so maybe then … I’ll let you know.
Does anybody know why the Ziegfeld page is not working?
/theaters/12/
Pete: Thanks for playing the music from “The Red Shoes” after yesterday’s excellent “Stairway to Heaven” show. #1 Michael Powell fan Martin Scorsese would’ve been proud of you!
I saw The Moody Blues in concert last night at this incredibly beautiful theater. It must’ve been amazing seeing widescreen movies here back in the ‘50s and '60s – the proscenium space is huge!
It sure was a thrill seeing my favorite James Bond movie, “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”, at the Ziegfeld tonight. Except for some sound issues in the final reel, the print was in first-class condition. It even had the animated United Artists logo from 1969 (“Entertainment from Transamerica Corporation”) which I haven’t seen in years.
This movie opened the same week the Ziegfeld opened its doors for the first time, in December 1969. The Ziegfeld was showing “Marooned” at the time – it took 39 years but they finally screened “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”.
I wish I did. I was lucky enough to see two 70mm roadshows at the Criterion: “Tora! Tora! Tora!” and “Nicholas and Alexandra”, both extremely impressive. If I was about 10-15 years older than I am, I would’ve seen “South Pacific” there for sure.
At the NY branch of the Academy’s screening of “Carrie” last year, the print never arrived at the theater due to a delivery foulup. The show was sold out and they were considering cancelling it, but at the last minute they projected the DVD version instead. And they apologized profusely for not being able to show the best possible version of the film. They seemed really embarrassed by the whole thing – this is the Academy we’re talking about here, and Amy Irving and Brian De Palma were in attendance – but the movie looked good on the big screen and I’m glad they didn’t cancel the show.
Jeff: This is the screening Gary was talking about:
View link
It doesn’t go into detail about the print except to say that it’s from the Academy Film Archive, so it was probably the best possible print in existence. It’s always been one of the most beautiful Technicolor films, which you might not expect considering it’s a borderline horror movie (that’s always the way I looked at it, anyway).
The resolution on “Goldfinger” was so good that I was able to tell, for the first time, that the guy playing Bond in the opening gun barrel logo sequence was NOT Sean Connery. I believe the opening of “Thunderball” was the first time he actually appeared there.
The digital presentation of “Goldfinger” tonight was excellent, and was made even better by the use of the curtains before and after. I’m not an expert like some of the regulars here, but as a lifelong moviegoer I found it hard to differentiate between this version and a 35mm print. I even gave it the Front Row test, and noticed a small detail I’d never seen before: in the Fort Knox fight scene between Bond and Oddjob, all the gold bars in the background were engraved with their own individual numbers. I love it when moviemakers care enough to add some slight detail like that which most people will never see, on the off chance that some fan in the front row might notice it.
About 150-200 people there tonight. Based on the Classics shows I’ve been to, some of the weeknight shows have been more crowded than the weekend ones. I wonder what can account for that? Maybe a lot of people work in the city and go after work, like me. And, as Peter said, there’s always so much more to do on a weekend.
When I first saw the original ads for “King Kong” in the early ‘70’s, that always confused me. I just assumed that the movie played in both Radio City and the Roxy at the same time. I didn’t know anything about the “New Roxy”. I wonder if that confused New York moviegoers back then, too.
I think Gary was introducing the show today. He must still be there. I’m sure we’ll hear all about it from him before the night’s out.
I can’t go till Monday night (“Goldfinger”) but I will post a full report.
OK, thanks JSA. That means my first 70mm experience at the Ziegfeld must have been “That’s Entertainment” in 1974, followed by “2001” later that year.
JSA: I’ve always wondered about that too. I saw that double bill, when I was 15. It ran 5 ½ hours, and it was my first time seeing “Around the World in 80 Days”. I can recall both films looking great up on that screen (it was also my first time at the Ziegfeld) and I could swear they had multi-track stereo sound. I talked myself into believing that both films were shown in 70mm at the time, but of course I had no way of knowing for sure. I didn’t know then about the oval-shaped cue marks (35mm) vs. the round cue marks (70mm) at the end of every reel.
This is an excerpt from Michael Musto’s blog at the Village Voice:
“What are YOU doing on the PATH train?” asked a bemused commuter last Saturday, his jaw dropping to the spit-out gum on the floor. Well, believe it or not, I do venture out of Manhattan every few yearsâ€"especially when there’s a screening of All About Eve in the glorious Loews Jersey City Theater, featuring a live appearance by its only surviving star, Celeste Holm. I expected to be completely alone out there, only to find swarms of peopleâ€"all kinds of peopleâ€"lining up for the event and fastening their seatbelts for a night that made them pretty happy rabbits.
Irv: to give the Loew’s its due, they did already screen both “Ben-Hur” and “The Ten Commandments”, and both were excellent shows. “All About Eve” isn’t a big film on the scale of those two, unless you take its record-setting 14 Oscar nominations into account, but it sure was a one-of-a-kind experience seeing it with that many other people who loved the film so much.