Royal Theatre

bigjoe59 on April 20, 2014 at 1:44 pm

to Ed S.–

i’m guessing the pic above is fairly new since the building was torn rather recently.

a few questions.

1.while the building was standing for almost 100 years it hadn’t been a movie theater for decades. so what would you say is the longest lived movie theater built as such and operated as such? my guess would be the Bunny at Bway & 145 St.. it opened Dec. 1913 and closed the fall of 2010? the runner up i’m guessing would be the Coliseum at Bway & 181 St, which opened in 1920 and closed at the fall of 2012.

2.in the listing of comments for this theater is one that states a rare photo of the façade can be found on nyc.org. I tried finding it but zippo. I can’t help but wonder if its the same photo in the issue of Motion Picture News from the beginning of 1918.

Al Alvarez on February 6, 2010 at 8:01 am

This is still listed in the 1947 Film Daily Yearbook although the New York Times reports that the property was sold in 1945 and intended for other use.

Al Alvarez on July 1, 2009 at 11:54 am

According to boxoffice magazine this was operated by the same manager as the Lido (147th street, aka Bluebird) in 1945.