Sedgwick Theatre

raymondgordonsears on August 19, 2009 at 1:16 pm

Still no activity and the lobby is empty. The center must be out of business. The video store th the left of the theatre built a small screening room and shows movies. I guess it would cost to much to do it at the center. rg

raymondgordonsears on August 19, 2009 at 6:20 pm

Is the moving and storage co. still the owner of the building. Many years ago the owner gave me a tour again you must use the loading dock doors to get auditorium. He took the time to show me the entire building. What a great theatre it once was. When it was open my buddie and go to this theatre along with the others on Germantown Ave and the one ones on Chelton Ave. As a kid my grandmother ran the Chelten theatre one of the small houses in the area. rg

xian87 on May 6, 2010 at 5:53 pm

A new life for the Sedgwick?
View link

“In a recent interview Burns noted that when he first started cleaning up the Sedgwick for ‘Measure for Measure,’ he spent four days just removing the dust and grime that had collected since the place had been turned into a warehouse some years ago.”

suggests that maybe they’ll reopen the main theater? for now they’re just in the lobby. this NEEDS to be done!

spectrum on January 4, 2015 at 10:34 pm

Some more info at the Sedlewick’s Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sedgwick_Theater

It seems they had a webpage which is now defunct (the Wikipedia mpage has a link to the Archive.org version) – also at one time the “Sedgewick Theatre” and “sedgewick cultural center” became separate entities. Currently, the theatre is being used by the Quintessance Theatre Group (http://quintessencetheatre.org/) which has an active calendar of events.

teegee on October 17, 2016 at 4:59 am

I came across this article in MOTION PICTURE HERALD March 15, 1941 about a police raid on the Sedgwick.

POLICE RAID COOKING SCHOOLS AS LOTTERIES

Philadelphia Circuit Promotion Halted Because of Door Prize; Two Theatre Games Allowed

As the courts in Philadelphia ruled theatre chance games were games of skill, the city police were raiding a cooking show at a theatre on the charge that it was an illegal lottery because of a door prize feature.

“Quizzo” and “Lucky 13,” successors to “Bingo” in the city’s neighborhood movie houses, were officially pronounced games of skill by Quarter Sessions Court Judge Eugene V. Alessandroni, in a test suit. His ruling carried a “but” which is big enough to warrant police action if operators yield to temptation to turn the games into lotteries. Police, however, permitted the cooking schools conducted in Warner houses by the Philadelphia Record to continue on Wednesday after the paper agreed to award prizes for a quiz contest rather than for door-stub numbers.

“The conduct of this game was apparently legal,” said the court. “We cannot help but feel that since control over not only the choice of the question but also over its composition and the answer thereto considered to be correct, is vested exclusively in the management, unscrupulous manipulation of these factors can readily change this from what appears to be a game of skill into one of chance.” It was pointed out that this possibility left final supervision of the conduct of the game to police authorites.

Police Raid Theatre

Also last Thursday, police raided the Sedgewick Theatre, a Warner Brothers house, where more than 700 women were attending a kitchen and cooking show prior to the matinee. Entry was made after ten door prizes had been awarded with 20 additional lucky numbers to be selected for as many additional prizes.

The cooking sessions were sponsored by the Philadelphia Record in co-operation with the Electrical Association of Philadelphia and conducted on Tuesdays and Thursdays, rotating at 21 neighborhood Warner theatres in the city. Police action at this time came as a surprise since the cooking schools have been in session for two years, this being the third time around the circuit.

Police contended that the award of door prizes was akin to Bank Night, every admission ticket being numbered with the wininng numbers drawn as for a Bank Night. Value of the prizes for the entire series of 21 sessions was set at $25,000 with a grand prize of a 1941 Ford De Luxe Tudor Sedan. The sessions were an advertising promotion on part of the newspaper, merchants buying space to exploit the school and contributing the prizes as well. . . . The article went on about legal attacks on theaters throughout the country for conducting games of chance like door prizes.