We had a Century Theater in Paramus NJ where I’ve posted. It was a beauty just like this one. But unfortunately it was twinned in the very early 70s so I only saw very few films when it was single screen. It was split down the middle so you were watching a small screen from the side. Kind of like the Quad in Manhattan but at least there you were looking at the screen head on. It was a very sad harbinger of things to come when showmanship began to be discarded. But you hardly needed showmanship for a lot of the films they began making in the 70s. That died out with Oliver and Funny Girl.
Does anyone know of a picture of the auditorium facing the proscenium before the drapes were added? I can’t find one online anywhere. On this site the earliest looks like it was from the 30s or 40s. The design of the curtain and the covering of the side columns is definitely not the original look of the theater in 1919 or the 20s. They did the same to the Roxy but we have pictures of that theater with its original proscenium.
The film of Porgy and Bess was not shown for years because the Gershwin estate suppressed it. I guess they hated it. It was shown at the Ziegfeld for a one time showing. The musical/opera is done regularly and was done at the Met last year.
The Houston Grand Opera production done on Broadway many years ago(done first at the Uris and then at the Mark Hellinger) was one of the greatest things I’ve seen in my life. There is a recording of it on RCA but it was better than what is captured on the recording. Still it’s worth having to hear Clamma Dale and Donnie Ray Albert.
A good movie that is little known today but not exactly Easter holiday fare for the Hall. I guess it was MGM’s bid to make Tom Drake a star but didn’t. I believe Dean Stockwell said he never even saw it. One of those LB Mayer films that has a happy ending but is fairly dark which LB never got enough credit for.
I thought because Miami had so many tourists and older snowbirds it would be a major roadshow town. My parents had their honeymoon there in the 50s. From the photos people dressed so well. I would have loved to have seen it.
The late 50s postcard DavidZornig posted is even more spectacular than the early 50s. What colors! Like a dream Miami out of a 20th Century Fox musical. I imagine the street is pretty depressing today.
Just saw this housed the Miami roadshow engagement of Funny Girl. Was anyone in it to see roadshow films? Were there other roadshows here? Was there a widescreen with a curtain placed in front of the proscenium to allow for a much larger image?
This really looks like a spectacular place to have seen a movie. Especially a roadshow film.
A disappointment for the Hall no matter how good a movie.
Not a film to bring in the summer tourists or even the Hall’s regulars. That would be the following year with Show Boat.
Right next to Loew’s American was the Franklin Savings Bank whose picture I uploaded at the south east corner of 42nd and 8th Av. You can also see it in Ken Roe’s photo uploaded on Jan. 22, 1016. I remember going inside and it was a magnificent building. I was awestruck. Its destruction in the early 70s only hasted the seediness of the deuce. Forever it was a parking lot until the paper that isn’t worth the ink it spills built their monstrosity on the site.
Have never seen it but it sounds like an interesting but surprisingly B movie quickie for the glamorous theater especially for a summer film. Not even a big star.
Bill Huelbig: Yes it was! Their musical 70MM festival was great. Don’t know if you went to any of them. Lucky you to have seen Krakatoa there but I remember that great billboard in Times Square. And the sound system was incredible. I was in the Penthouse a couple of times and that former balcony was huge. I’m not sure if it was that large during the roadshow era. They might have made it smaller (like they did the Capitol)then opened it up to its Strand size when it became a single theater.
The Warner Cinerama orchestra had been what it was for years with just the balcony walled off turned into the Penthouse. The Rivoli had moments where it recalled its roadshow glory when it showed the 70MM GWTW and 2001 in the ‘70s. (GWTW had its original 70MM roadshow run there in ‘67-'68.)
I think if I had known these theaters as they originally stood I would have been disappointed as well by their widescreen transformations. A poster said after he saw Oklahoma in Todd AO at the Rivoli he was angry at the altering of the theater and never went in it again. I totally understand that but what I would have given to see all those Todd AO films there.
People who were born at the turn of the 20th Century or shortly after and lived in NY City and lived into their 80s saw these theaters being built, filling up, then being multiplexed(if that)and then torn down. If you were 19 when you saw the Capitol open you were 68 when you saw it being torn down. If you were 27 when the Roxy was built you saw it torn down when you were 60.
DavidZornig’s Easter photo made me think of Clifton Webb.
When I first was in Atlantic City Odd Couple was at the Apollo while it was playing at Radio City in NY. When I went again in ‘71 Shaft was playing. AC had already changed enormously in those few years. It was if at the end of the 60s the middle class suddenly stopped going there.
I probably saw that many years ago which is why the one with the curtains looks so wrong. Unfortunately I haven’t seen that book in decades.
Does anyone have it? Can you scan the photo?
We had a Century Theater in Paramus NJ where I’ve posted. It was a beauty just like this one. But unfortunately it was twinned in the very early 70s so I only saw very few films when it was single screen. It was split down the middle so you were watching a small screen from the side. Kind of like the Quad in Manhattan but at least there you were looking at the screen head on. It was a very sad harbinger of things to come when showmanship began to be discarded. But you hardly needed showmanship for a lot of the films they began making in the 70s. That died out with Oliver and Funny Girl.
How else would they have run it in 1942? This does not look first run.
Does anyone know of a picture of the auditorium facing the proscenium before the drapes were added? I can’t find one online anywhere. On this site the earliest looks like it was from the 30s or 40s. The design of the curtain and the covering of the side columns is definitely not the original look of the theater in 1919 or the 20s. They did the same to the Roxy but we have pictures of that theater with its original proscenium.
The film of Porgy and Bess was not shown for years because the Gershwin estate suppressed it. I guess they hated it. It was shown at the Ziegfeld for a one time showing. The musical/opera is done regularly and was done at the Met last year.
The Houston Grand Opera production done on Broadway many years ago(done first at the Uris and then at the Mark Hellinger) was one of the greatest things I’ve seen in my life. There is a recording of it on RCA but it was better than what is captured on the recording. Still it’s worth having to hear Clamma Dale and Donnie Ray Albert.
No interior photos of this great Miami House? I’d love to know what it was like.
Would have liked very much to have seen its Cinerama screen.
Opened continuous run in New York at Radio City. I wonder where else it was roadshowed in the US. Also were the lengths exactly the same?
A good movie that is little known today but not exactly Easter holiday fare for the Hall. I guess it was MGM’s bid to make Tom Drake a star but didn’t. I believe Dean Stockwell said he never even saw it. One of those LB Mayer films that has a happy ending but is fairly dark which LB never got enough credit for.
I thought because Miami had so many tourists and older snowbirds it would be a major roadshow town. My parents had their honeymoon there in the 50s. From the photos people dressed so well. I would have loved to have seen it.
The late 50s postcard DavidZornig posted is even more spectacular than the early 50s. What colors! Like a dream Miami out of a 20th Century Fox musical. I imagine the street is pretty depressing today.
Just saw this housed the Miami roadshow engagement of Funny Girl. Was anyone in it to see roadshow films? Were there other roadshows here? Was there a widescreen with a curtain placed in front of the proscenium to allow for a much larger image?
This really looks like a spectacular place to have seen a movie. Especially a roadshow film.
Cool program but wrong theater. This is the old theater which has a different page.
One of the great French films that many people are not familiar with.
A disappointment for the Hall no matter how good a movie. Not a film to bring in the summer tourists or even the Hall’s regulars. That would be the following year with Show Boat.
Right next to Loew’s American was the Franklin Savings Bank whose picture I uploaded at the south east corner of 42nd and 8th Av. You can also see it in Ken Roe’s photo uploaded on Jan. 22, 1016. I remember going inside and it was a magnificent building. I was awestruck. Its destruction in the early 70s only hasted the seediness of the deuce. Forever it was a parking lot until the paper that isn’t worth the ink it spills built their monstrosity on the site.
Have never seen it but it sounds like an interesting but surprisingly B movie quickie for the glamorous theater especially for a summer film. Not even a big star.
As the theater was being destroyed.
This was a fall movie at the Music Hall so I wonder why they wouldn’t have released it in December so that it would have cleaned up at Christmas time.
This is a lost film isn’t it?
Bill Huelbig: Yes it was! Their musical 70MM festival was great. Don’t know if you went to any of them. Lucky you to have seen Krakatoa there but I remember that great billboard in Times Square. And the sound system was incredible. I was in the Penthouse a couple of times and that former balcony was huge. I’m not sure if it was that large during the roadshow era. They might have made it smaller (like they did the Capitol)then opened it up to its Strand size when it became a single theater.
The Warner Cinerama orchestra had been what it was for years with just the balcony walled off turned into the Penthouse. The Rivoli had moments where it recalled its roadshow glory when it showed the 70MM GWTW and 2001 in the ‘70s. (GWTW had its original 70MM roadshow run there in ‘67-'68.)
I think if I had known these theaters as they originally stood I would have been disappointed as well by their widescreen transformations. A poster said after he saw Oklahoma in Todd AO at the Rivoli he was angry at the altering of the theater and never went in it again. I totally understand that but what I would have given to see all those Todd AO films there.
People who were born at the turn of the 20th Century or shortly after and lived in NY City and lived into their 80s saw these theaters being built, filling up, then being multiplexed(if that)and then torn down. If you were 19 when you saw the Capitol open you were 68 when you saw it being torn down. If you were 27 when the Roxy was built you saw it torn down when you were 60.
That’s when I saw it at the drive in with my family. I wanted us to go see Hawaii but my father was like no.
Great ad but I think it might be August?
DavidZornig’s Easter photo made me think of Clifton Webb.
When I first was in Atlantic City Odd Couple was at the Apollo while it was playing at Radio City in NY. When I went again in ‘71 Shaft was playing. AC had already changed enormously in those few years. It was if at the end of the 60s the middle class suddenly stopped going there.
Saluting somebody’s 80th birthday.