There were some scenes of the men gambling in the street, and Sammy Davis Jr. sold “happy dust” which most likely was cocaine, but people of all races do stuff like that in big cities even today. The lyrics are written in dialect (“I Loves You, Porgy”) but the songs are so beautifully composed and performed that I soon forgot to notice it.
I think we all grew up hearing horror stories about Otto Preminger, but now I’m starting to wonder how justified that reputation really is. If he was such a terror to work with, why did so many actors and film artists work with him multiple times? Hope Preminger talked last night about cinematographer Leon Shamroy and how he and Otto tried to work together whenever they could. Carol Lynley told me personally that she really enjoyed working with him. Even Tom Tryon, whom Otto supposedly badgered to a level close to torture on the set of “The Cardinal”, came back to make “In Harm’s Way” with him two years later. And after the story Robert Endres told … well, Otto certainly was a fascinating person.
If any Star Trek fans are going tonight, look for Nichelle Nichols. She’s part of the large chorus and I believe I saw her in the background center screen during “It Ain’t Necessarily So”.
For the benefit of tonight’s audience, I hope the Ziegfeld crew takes William’s advice and obtains a copy of that Dolby card!
At the end of the show, someone called out that it was also George Gershwin’s birthday. September 26th sure was an important day in the history of the American musical.
Vito, you mentioned “West Side Story”. You may be interested to know that it all started 50 years ago last night, when it opened on Broadway at the Winter Garden Theatre, 9/26/57. I passed the Winter Garden on my walk to the Port Authority after leaving the Ziegfeld, with “West Side Story” playing on my iPod all the way.
Foster Hirsch started speaking right after 8 PM, for around 10 minutes. There was a 10 minute intermission, and after the show Hirsch interviewed Hope Preminger and the man who owned the print. The entire show ended at 11:08 PM.
I didn’t hear anything coming out of the surrounds, and I sat right underneath one just for that purpose. After intermission I moved up to the third row to take full advantage of that big screen. I didn’t notice the high pitched noise Bob mentioned.
It was shown reel to reel, and one changeover missed a second or two. Hirsch made a point to mention it, saying the Ziegfeld’s projection booth had to be “downgraded” for this show.
The audience applauded several times: for Dorothy Dandridge and Otto Preminger in the credits; after the song “My Man’s Gone Now”, because it was sung so beautifully and we just naturally reacted to it; and after Sammy Davis Jr.’s big number “It Ain’t Necessarily So”.
Just got back from the show. It was quite an evening. Foster Hirsch, author of a book about Otto Preminger, spoke before the movie and called “Porgy and Bess” the best Preminger film. I wouldn’t go that far – I don’t even think it’s the best film he made in 1959, which would be “Anatomy of a Murder” – but it was definitely one of his most unusual. The lack of cutting, close-ups and camera movement would probably drive a contemporary audience crazy, but it somehow fit here. It felt like you were watching it being performed in an opera house. It was shot in Todd-AO and there was always plenty of stuff going on in the background and all around the edges of the screen. Best of all, the singing and choral work were among the finest I’ve ever heard in a Hollywood musical, beautifully rendered in magnetic sound. And Dorothy Dandridge was heartbreaking just to look at her.
Otto’s wife and son, aome other Preminger relatives, Ira Gershwin’s nephew and the guy who owned the print and brought it here personally from L.A. were all introduced from their seats in the audience.
The presentation had some problems. The curtains were closed during the overture and opened right on cue, but they left the lights on during the credits until Otto Preminger’s name came on, when the lights went off all at once as if someone pulled out the plug. It seemed like the projectionists were working very hard to keep the film in focus, but they did their best. At the start of Act II (the Intermission title card was taken from a print of “Doctor Zhivago” for some reason) the movie was projected over the closed curtains for about 20 seconds. And as the curtains closed over “The End”, they stopped halfway and then opened again when the cast list appeared. Maybe whoever was in charge of the curtains was nervous with all those Gershwins and Premingers in the house.
As for the logos and onscreen curtains, there were none in the beginning (it started off with “Samuel Goldwyn Presents”), but an onscreen curtain did close over the cast list at the very end. It looked blue to me, but I’m color blind. It was most likely green, like Veyoung said above.
The audience was quite large. Center section was almost full except for the first few rows. Hirsch asked how many audience members had seen the film at the Warner in 1959, and quite a few hands went up.
Bob: I’d say, based on the Classics shows, that the doors open around 7:30.
I hope you’ll be able to tell US some of those Otto stories. I once met Carol Lynley at a sci-fi/horror convention. She was extremely nice, and she had nothing but good things to say about Otto! I figure she was in the minority :)
I agree, Justin – Paramount had a good one too. I just saw it last night with “Robinson Crusoe on Mars”, in Techniscope. The CGI one isn’t as impressive somehow. I’m confident that Spielberg and Lucas will go back to the old one with their new Indiana Jones movie. They did that for the other three in the series.
I agree with Jeff that the 20th Century Fox logo is the best, but I think the most impressive logo I’ve ever seen on a screen was the MGM lion with “How the West Was Won”, at the Cinerama Dome in 2003. I hadn’t seen Cinerama in years and was unprepared for the sheer size of that image. The actual credits were well under way when the curtains finally finished opening.
Speaking of logos, and it has a connection to the Ziegfeld since that’s where I first saw it, does anyone know why the restored 1989 70mm version of “Lawrence of Arabia” had a fake-looking hand-painted Columbia logo instead of the one we’re all used to?
“Porgy and Bess” is another Columbia release originally shot in 70mm. I’m curious as to what the logo (if any) will look like tonight.
Howard: There is an Amtrak train from New York to Philadelphia on weekday nights, at 11:15 PM. The movie ends at around 10:30 so you could conceivably make it to Penn Station in time:
639 Regional Service
New York, NY
– Penn Station
(NYP)
11:15 pm
26-SEP-07
Philadelphia, PA
– 30th Street Station
(PHL)
12:40 am
27-SEP-07
1h 25m 1 Reserved Coach Seat
$60.00
The Ziegfeld is usually pretty good about the curtains being closed when there’s an overture. “2001”, “Lawrence of Arabia” and “Doctor Zhivago” were all done right during the Classics series in 2006. There were a couple of no-curtain blank-screen shows in that time too, unfortunately, but maybe that guy won’t be working on the “Porgy and Bess” nights.
Thanks for clearing that up, Al. I saw it on the ABC Sunday Night Movie so it must’ve been back in 1967. Also, we finally had a color TV by 1974 and I definitely remember seeing it in black and white. Really looking forward to Wednesday night’s show.
To Ed Solero: If Wikipedia can be trusted, we saw “Porgy and Bess” on TV much earlier than we thought:
“The Gershwin estate was disappointed with the film, as the score was edited to make it more like a musical. Much of the music was omitted from the film, and many of Gershwin’s orchestrations were either changed or completely scrapped. It was shown on network television in the U.S. only once, in 1967. It was pulled from release in 1974, and prints can now only be seen in film archives or on bootleg videos.”
1967 sounds about right, come to think of it. When I see it on Wednesday, it’ll be the first time in 40 years.
I sure hope the AFI is going to record all the celebrity introductions and make them available for viewing on their website. This is the kind of event we could never pull off in New York City, sad to say.
Chris Utley: I really hope you score a ticket to “Spartacus” in the Dome. Wow – seeing it on that screen, with Spartacus himself in the house … it doesn’t get any better than that.
Rory: when you saw “2001” it was still playing only in 70mm Cinerama. Besides Hicksville, it played that way in Montclair, NJ until March 1969, when it opened wide in neighborhood theaters in 35mm. New York City’s Cinerama run ended in December 1968, because at that time there was only one Cinerama screen in the city (the Cinerama, formerly the Warner, formerly the Strand) and MGM wanted to open their new Cinerama film “Ice Station Zebra” before year’s end.
So you were very lucky to see it the best possible way. I was too – I saw it at the Capitol in June 1968. The way movies are today, I can safely say I’ll never have a better experience seeing a movie in a theater for as long as I live.
I’m definitely looking forward to the special edition DVD, with the commentaries, etc. Counting both VHS and DVD, this will be the 8th version of “2001” I’ve purchased!
What about all those people who contribute information to this site? Without them, there probably would be no Cinema Treasures.
With me it was the other way around. I had tons of movie ads and clippings collected over many years, but nowhere to show them and share them with people until I found Cinema Treasures.
Saps: it’s very tempting. At least I did make the trip to this great theater twice in my life on a kind of impulse, to see “How the West Was Won” and “Mad Mad World”. Not this year, though.
There were some scenes of the men gambling in the street, and Sammy Davis Jr. sold “happy dust” which most likely was cocaine, but people of all races do stuff like that in big cities even today. The lyrics are written in dialect (“I Loves You, Porgy”) but the songs are so beautifully composed and performed that I soon forgot to notice it.
I think we all grew up hearing horror stories about Otto Preminger, but now I’m starting to wonder how justified that reputation really is. If he was such a terror to work with, why did so many actors and film artists work with him multiple times? Hope Preminger talked last night about cinematographer Leon Shamroy and how he and Otto tried to work together whenever they could. Carol Lynley told me personally that she really enjoyed working with him. Even Tom Tryon, whom Otto supposedly badgered to a level close to torture on the set of “The Cardinal”, came back to make “In Harm’s Way” with him two years later. And after the story Robert Endres told … well, Otto certainly was a fascinating person.
Jeff: From now on, whenever I see your panic button, I’ll be reminded of the great Otto Preminger. Thanks for that wonderful story, Robert.
If any Star Trek fans are going tonight, look for Nichelle Nichols. She’s part of the large chorus and I believe I saw her in the background center screen during “It Ain’t Necessarily So”.
For the benefit of tonight’s audience, I hope the Ziegfeld crew takes William’s advice and obtains a copy of that Dolby card!
At the end of the show, someone called out that it was also George Gershwin’s birthday. September 26th sure was an important day in the history of the American musical.
I think he meant the word “downgraded” facetiously. Some people laughed when he said it.
Vito, you mentioned “West Side Story”. You may be interested to know that it all started 50 years ago last night, when it opened on Broadway at the Winter Garden Theatre, 9/26/57. I passed the Winter Garden on my walk to the Port Authority after leaving the Ziegfeld, with “West Side Story” playing on my iPod all the way.
Foster Hirsch started speaking right after 8 PM, for around 10 minutes. There was a 10 minute intermission, and after the show Hirsch interviewed Hope Preminger and the man who owned the print. The entire show ended at 11:08 PM.
I didn’t hear anything coming out of the surrounds, and I sat right underneath one just for that purpose. After intermission I moved up to the third row to take full advantage of that big screen. I didn’t notice the high pitched noise Bob mentioned.
It was shown reel to reel, and one changeover missed a second or two. Hirsch made a point to mention it, saying the Ziegfeld’s projection booth had to be “downgraded” for this show.
The audience applauded several times: for Dorothy Dandridge and Otto Preminger in the credits; after the song “My Man’s Gone Now”, because it was sung so beautifully and we just naturally reacted to it; and after Sammy Davis Jr.’s big number “It Ain’t Necessarily So”.
Just got back from the show. It was quite an evening. Foster Hirsch, author of a book about Otto Preminger, spoke before the movie and called “Porgy and Bess” the best Preminger film. I wouldn’t go that far – I don’t even think it’s the best film he made in 1959, which would be “Anatomy of a Murder” – but it was definitely one of his most unusual. The lack of cutting, close-ups and camera movement would probably drive a contemporary audience crazy, but it somehow fit here. It felt like you were watching it being performed in an opera house. It was shot in Todd-AO and there was always plenty of stuff going on in the background and all around the edges of the screen. Best of all, the singing and choral work were among the finest I’ve ever heard in a Hollywood musical, beautifully rendered in magnetic sound. And Dorothy Dandridge was heartbreaking just to look at her.
Otto’s wife and son, aome other Preminger relatives, Ira Gershwin’s nephew and the guy who owned the print and brought it here personally from L.A. were all introduced from their seats in the audience.
The presentation had some problems. The curtains were closed during the overture and opened right on cue, but they left the lights on during the credits until Otto Preminger’s name came on, when the lights went off all at once as if someone pulled out the plug. It seemed like the projectionists were working very hard to keep the film in focus, but they did their best. At the start of Act II (the Intermission title card was taken from a print of “Doctor Zhivago” for some reason) the movie was projected over the closed curtains for about 20 seconds. And as the curtains closed over “The End”, they stopped halfway and then opened again when the cast list appeared. Maybe whoever was in charge of the curtains was nervous with all those Gershwins and Premingers in the house.
As for the logos and onscreen curtains, there were none in the beginning (it started off with “Samuel Goldwyn Presents”), but an onscreen curtain did close over the cast list at the very end. It looked blue to me, but I’m color blind. It was most likely green, like Veyoung said above.
The audience was quite large. Center section was almost full except for the first few rows. Hirsch asked how many audience members had seen the film at the Warner in 1959, and quite a few hands went up.
Bob: I’d say, based on the Classics shows, that the doors open around 7:30.
I hope you’ll be able to tell US some of those Otto stories. I once met Carol Lynley at a sci-fi/horror convention. She was extremely nice, and she had nothing but good things to say about Otto! I figure she was in the minority :)
Jeff, I think you did show that to me once. Recently I remember you were looking for it again. Hope you find it!
I agree, Justin – Paramount had a good one too. I just saw it last night with “Robinson Crusoe on Mars”, in Techniscope. The CGI one isn’t as impressive somehow. I’m confident that Spielberg and Lucas will go back to the old one with their new Indiana Jones movie. They did that for the other three in the series.
I agree with Jeff that the 20th Century Fox logo is the best, but I think the most impressive logo I’ve ever seen on a screen was the MGM lion with “How the West Was Won”, at the Cinerama Dome in 2003. I hadn’t seen Cinerama in years and was unprepared for the sheer size of that image. The actual credits were well under way when the curtains finally finished opening.
Speaking of logos, and it has a connection to the Ziegfeld since that’s where I first saw it, does anyone know why the restored 1989 70mm version of “Lawrence of Arabia” had a fake-looking hand-painted Columbia logo instead of the one we’re all used to?
“Porgy and Bess” is another Columbia release originally shot in 70mm. I’m curious as to what the logo (if any) will look like tonight.
William Castle staged a big premiere for “Homicidal” here in 1961. The theater is heavily featured in the documentary about the movie on the DVD.
Howard: There is an Amtrak train from New York to Philadelphia on weekday nights, at 11:15 PM. The movie ends at around 10:30 so you could conceivably make it to Penn Station in time:
639 Regional Service
New York, NY
– Penn Station
(NYP)
11:15 pm
26-SEP-07
Philadelphia, PA
– 30th Street Station
(PHL)
12:40 am
27-SEP-07
1h 25m 1 Reserved Coach Seat
$60.00
The Ziegfeld is usually pretty good about the curtains being closed when there’s an overture. “2001”, “Lawrence of Arabia” and “Doctor Zhivago” were all done right during the Classics series in 2006. There were a couple of no-curtain blank-screen shows in that time too, unfortunately, but maybe that guy won’t be working on the “Porgy and Bess” nights.
Thanks for clearing that up, Al. I saw it on the ABC Sunday Night Movie so it must’ve been back in 1967. Also, we finally had a color TV by 1974 and I definitely remember seeing it in black and white. Really looking forward to Wednesday night’s show.
To Ed Solero: If Wikipedia can be trusted, we saw “Porgy and Bess” on TV much earlier than we thought:
“The Gershwin estate was disappointed with the film, as the score was edited to make it more like a musical. Much of the music was omitted from the film, and many of Gershwin’s orchestrations were either changed or completely scrapped. It was shown on network television in the U.S. only once, in 1967. It was pulled from release in 1974, and prints can now only be seen in film archives or on bootleg videos.”
1967 sounds about right, come to think of it. When I see it on Wednesday, it’ll be the first time in 40 years.
Just got an online ticket for Wednesday night. Thanks, Peter!
Whether in 70mm or 35mm, it should still be a great show.
I sure hope the AFI is going to record all the celebrity introductions and make them available for viewing on their website. This is the kind of event we could never pull off in New York City, sad to say.
Chris Utley: I really hope you score a ticket to “Spartacus” in the Dome. Wow – seeing it on that screen, with Spartacus himself in the house … it doesn’t get any better than that.
Be sure to tell us all about the show.
Rory: when you saw “2001” it was still playing only in 70mm Cinerama. Besides Hicksville, it played that way in Montclair, NJ until March 1969, when it opened wide in neighborhood theaters in 35mm. New York City’s Cinerama run ended in December 1968, because at that time there was only one Cinerama screen in the city (the Cinerama, formerly the Warner, formerly the Strand) and MGM wanted to open their new Cinerama film “Ice Station Zebra” before year’s end.
So you were very lucky to see it the best possible way. I was too – I saw it at the Capitol in June 1968. The way movies are today, I can safely say I’ll never have a better experience seeing a movie in a theater for as long as I live.
I’m definitely looking forward to the special edition DVD, with the commentaries, etc. Counting both VHS and DVD, this will be the 8th version of “2001” I’ve purchased!
Warren said:
What about all those people who contribute information to this site? Without them, there probably would be no Cinema Treasures.
With me it was the other way around. I had tons of movie ads and clippings collected over many years, but nowhere to show them and share them with people until I found Cinema Treasures.
Saps: it’s very tempting. At least I did make the trip to this great theater twice in my life on a kind of impulse, to see “How the West Was Won” and “Mad Mad World”. Not this year, though.