"AT THE MOVIES"
We already know that early Bronxites always found ways to keep entertained and have
fun. Today's Bronx is no different!
We asked people of various age groups what their favorite form of entertainment was
and most answered the same thing. "The Movies". It seems that people just enjoy going to the movies!
In the 1920s the movies were silent. Each showing was accompanied by a
piano player during the daytime and by a full orchestra at night. Most of the movie houses (later called theaters),
began in the early 1920s as vaudeville places.
Many Bronx families would attend the Keith's Royal Theater to see a complete vaudeville
program. Other theaters would feature both a film and a vaudeville show especially as soon as sound was introduced
in movies.
Ed Sullivan once brought his show to the RKO Chester near West Farms Square but the
depression forced these types of shows to disappear. Soon most Bronx theaters began showing double feature movies.
Back then, to visit a movie theater meant more than just watching movies.
These theaters were very large and highly adorned. Lobbys were covered with plush carpeting. They had beautiful
designs. Some theaters had flowers, statues, carved wooden tables, beautiful paintings hanging from the walls.
Aisles were dimly lit to assist patrons in finding their way back to their seats. Others had beautiful drapes
hanging from the upper boxes. Huge chandeliers hung from the ceilings. With such
beautiful surroundings you felt not like in a movie theater but rather inside a palace of some sort.
And speaking of palaces... remember the Loew's Paradise Theater?
Located on Grand Concourse just south of 188th Street. This beautiful
theater had no marquee overhanging the sidewalk to announce the movie titles it was showing. Instead, it had a
sign with movable white letters on a blue background. It was flushed against the wall. Over that
was a clock with a statue of St. George slaying a dragon. Every hour on the hour, the statue would become animated.
Upon entering the Loew's Paradise you would see a lobby designed to strike you with
its glamour! Beautiful flowers, paintings, statues, chandeliers, fish tank, a huge clock, plush carpeting, mahogany
wood walls, the ceiling which resembled the night sky complete with twinkling stars and clouds. The Paradise Theater...
it was the perfect name for such a beautiful and wonderful place! The place for a perfect date.
However, not all theaters were as elegant or as big as the Paradise Theater.
In the late 1930s theaters became somewhat smaller.
The Earl Theater on 161st Street near Yankee Stadium was small and poorly lit with
green light bulbs. The Interborough Theater in Throgs Neck was a very famous little theater, not for its beauty
or art deco but because this place was totally infested with lice. The patrons would leave the place scratching
and therefor aptly named it "The Itch". Luckily, this problem did not exist in most other theaters.
After a movie completed its Broadway showing, the same movie would then open up in
The Bronx in one of the first-run theaters such as The Loew's Paradise or RKO Fordham.
After the movie completed its run in these first-run movie houses, it would
then be sent to other movie theaters scattered throughout the Bronx for a second run. After five days in one of
these theaters, the same movie would then be sent to yet other third-run movie houses.
If for any reason you missed a first-run film at The Paradise Theater, you were absolutely
certain that you would catch the same film three weeks later at the Loew's 167th Street Theater.
The Fleetwood Theater on Morris Avenue near 165th Street and The Zenith Theater on
170th Street near Jerome Avenue, specialized in showing these third-run films. They even featured at times movies
that were several years old. These theaters were not as elegant as the others but were not as crowded either.
Sometimes they were not very well kept. But the fact was that no one really cared how these theaters looked
as long as they got to watch the movies.
The movie theater was for Bronxites an escape from the everyday world.
The movie theater was indeed a fun place to visit and it still is today!
Below you will find some photos of old movie houses. Some of them are
still there today, although they are operating as something else. Like the RKO Chester in West Farms.
It has been a clothing store, a pizza shop and around three years ago it was a spanish food restaurant. Today
the place is closed.
The old Deluxe Theater on E. Tremont Avenue is now a Rite-Aid Pharmacy.
The Dover Theater on Boston Road and 174th Street is now a non-denominational church.
But the memories of yesterday are all inside these places and that can never be turned
or transformed into anything else.
They can destroy the old theaters and even build something else in its place, but
the memories will forever live! No one can take that away from us! NO ONE!
Let's all cheer for The Bronx!
