Bellows Falls Opera House

50sSNIPES on August 13, 2024 at 10:59 pm

Edited from my previous comment from last night which includes some corrections:

While the original Union Hall was still under construction during both 1869 and 1870, a meeting on January 22, 1870 was voted to call the large public hall by the name “Union Hall”. As of January 1870, Bellows Falls had two halls. There’s the Masonic Hall and the Union Hall. The original Union Hall consists of five stores on the first floor and several offices on the second floor. The Union Hall opened the following month in February 1870.

In the Spring of 1887, the proprietor of the Union Hall announced that he was considering the project of changing the hall into an Opera House, which it did. The Bellows Falls Opera House opened its doors on September 11, 1887 with a live presentation of “The Old Homestead” costing an estimate $100,000 in upgrades, and the historic clock tower was built four years later in 1891 by the estates of Dr. Daniel Campbell and John Robertson.

The Bellows Falls Opera House began showing movies in 1914. Bellows Falls already had a Nickelodeon across the street from the Opera House. After 1914, the Sunshine Theater Company leased the Opera House for $100 a month with Charles Buchanan as manager, but this venture lasted for only a year and the chain leased the house to H. DeMotte Perry who carried on many moving picture ventures locally. Perry left the house in 1920 and was leased by the Bellows Falls Amusement Company led by incorporator Henry D. Sparrow.

The fire on the early morning of May 10, 1925 destroyed both the theater and the next-door United States Post Office building, which originated from the basement debris of the USPS office (not the theater). The fire became statewide headlines and for the damage cost an estimate $200,000 in damages.

After two years of reconstruction and a few ownership issues before reopening, the Bellows Falls Opera House reopened its doors on October 10, 1927, and a large rectangular marquee was erected a few years later in the early-1930s. Since its 1927 reopening, the house has been a longtime dominant first-run movie mainstreamer for more than five decades, although it did had a couple of name changes from here and there.

The Falls Cinema name was introduced in the Spring of 1970. In January 1982, the Falls Cinema received a very short closure due to the lack of a heating system, although the temperatures were not really cold though. The Falls Cinema reopened less than a couple weeks later.

Unfortunately four years later after a special event on May 5, 1986, the Falls Cinema closed again because of a prospective lease and the selectmen failing on finding private ownership who can take over the Falls Cinema, stating that the show must go on and promised that movies will return soon. Some selectmen went to other theaters across the Vermont/New Hampshire area, one of which went to the Colonial Theatre in Keene to see how their work was doing, and did very well. Right after the selectmen failed to find a private investor to reopen and operate, they authorized the Rockingham Recreation Department to run the theater originally on a 22-week basis, which later turned into many years. It officially became the first and only movie theater in the state of Vermont to be operated by the town itself, and not by a chain nor local management.

The Falls Cinema reopened as the New Falls Cinema on February 20, 1987 with “Star Trek IV - The Voyage Home”, and throughout the first two months since its reopening, more than 3,500 people attended movies at the Falls from Bellows Falls and surrounding towns.

Right when it reopened, the first show drew good crowds with former governor Thomas Salmon in attendance, and over time received really good business, especially its largest draw during the reopening week was its showing of “Crocodile Dundee” the following month. Despite being planned as a second-run basis, during its early years as the New Falls Cinema was generically a first-run theater. The New Falls Cinema’s run of “Crocodile Dundee” was so popular that according to Rockingham Recreation Department manager Allen Halberg, he added in his interview that for the first time he had to turn people away at the door until the next showing. Almost 500 children showed up for the two matinee showings of Disney’s 1986 reissue of the 1955 CinemaScope classic “Lady And The Tramp”, but unfortunately “Outrageous Fortune” a few days later drew the smallest crowds due to its R-rating policy. Halberg said that the Falls Cinema had to focus on the 12-to-25-year-old audiences and would book a few if any R-rated movies in the future, but with one exception is the then-already-reserved “The Color Of Money” for unknown reasons. Halberg ended up running the movie in early April 1987 with an idea coming out of his head during the newspaper interview saying that he should bring matinees for younger audiences during R-rated runs. He did, and Halberg ended up booking “Labyrinth” as the run’s matinee for children. His idea was so grand that he added more matinees to PG and PG-13 shows as well at times, such as “An American Tail” being added as a matinee to “Mannequin” a few days later.

Halberg even booked some titles from the previous year that was never picked up in Bellows Falls because of its 10-month closure such as “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” among others. He contacted with other theater managers in Springfield, Brattleboro, and Keene to help with the theater before its February 1987 reopening. Despite its initial success, the theater did receive some problems with its projection. Halberg reported that the projector bulb, a Xenon lamp that was originally purchased for the Ellis Theatre 1 & 2 in Springfield, was failing and had to be replaced and other parts would be needed in the near future, which it did.

With an addition to its original mix of both first-run/second-run movie policies, the Rockingham Recreation Department also booked some classic movies in its Falls Cinema lineup at very rare occasions. Live performances didn’t start at the New Falls Cinema until the following year in Spring 1988, and performing arts were also added around a decade later.

The New Falls Cinema closed in October 2005 for major renovation, which lasted for two months, and the theater reopened under its original Bellows Falls Opera House name in December 2005, showing live performances, performing arts, second-run films, independent films, classic films, and special events.

rsalters (Ron Salters) on April 28, 2015 at 7:58 pm

The Theatre Historical Society archive has the MGM Theatre Report for the Bellows Falls Opera House. It’s Card # 569. It has an exterior photo taken in March 1941, showing a marquee over the entrance. The Report says it’s on Main Street, is in Good condition, Built about 1925, shows MGM product, and has 686 seats on the main floor and 250 balcony, total: 936 seats. The 1941 population was 4,200.

crownx on March 21, 2010 at 8:17 pm

Any news on this theater

rsalters (Ron Salters) on February 19, 2007 at 3:16 pm

In the 1942-43 edition of the Motion Picture Almanac, the Opera House in Bellows Falls VT is listed as being operated by Interstate Theatre Corp. of Boston.

Ken Roe on August 19, 2006 at 12:14 pm

Listed in the Film Daily Yearbook;1950 edition as the Opera House with a seating capacity of 946.

Originally opened as the Opera House. Later operating as the Falls Cinema & New Falls Cinema for many years, it has now been refurbished and re-named the Bellows Falls Opera House. Plans are going ahead to refurbish the stage and backstage areas so that live perfomances will be able to take place again to complement to film performances.