Prospect Hall and the Venetian Gardens

 

Brooklyn's historic Prospect Hall is slated for demolition. In 1908, the hall and its outdoor gardens  were also the studios of the Crescent Film Company operated by Herman Kolle (brother of hall proprietor William Kolle) and Fred J. Balshofer.

Excerpts from One Reel a Week by Fred J. Balshofer and Arthur C. Miller, University of California Press 1967:

“Next to and in connection with the dance hall was an open air summer beer garden. On warm summer evenings neighborhood families would sit around at the separate tables, drink nickel schooners of beer, and watch second-rate vaudeville on a stage raised about seven feet above the ground. A screen rolled down from the arch over the stage and this was used to show movies.

“A song plugger sang popular tunes, accompanied by a piano, while the hand-colored lantern slides on the screen changed according to the lyrics of the song. There was only enough business to warrant operating on Saturday and Sunday evenings. If it rained, people would move into the dance hall and the show would continue there.” 

“We used one corner of the summer garden for our open-air studio and, as in the early days of Lubin, daylight was our only source of light for photography. We arranged a tiny laboratory under the stage and bought a used Pathe field camera that had seen better days.”

The Moving Picture World, November 28, 1908

National Register of Historic Places

The Real Deal

Since 1997 theatre historian,  Cezar Del Valle, has conducted a popular series of  theatre talks and walks, available for  historical societies, libraries, senior centers, etc.

Del Valle is the author of the Brooklyn Theatre Index, a three-volume history of borough theatres.

The first two chosen 2010 OUTSTANDING BOOK OF THE YEAR by the Theatre Historical Society. Final volume published in September 2014.

Currently seeking funding for “Editing & Formatting” the first three volumes of the Brooklyn Theatre Index, 3rd Edition

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Pavilion Theatre Updated

The old Sanders Theatre was closing for the second time when I moved to the Slope in 1978.  The neighborhood had not yet been gentrified. There were bodegas, greasy fried chicken and soft ice cream on 7th Avenue. The Miami fruit market had been around since the 1940s. The Shirts, a “power pop band” rented a loft for $250 a month.  Harriet Hoffman had a pottery studio on 9th Street at 7th Avenue. She gave free lessons to school classes.
The Park Slope brownstone community begun to change, rents went up, many of the older places couldn’t afford to hold on and closed their doors. The Sanders stood decaying on the corner of Prospect Park West and 15th Street. Plans to multiplex the balcony, while converting the first floor to a hardware store, never came to fruition. One movie house remained in the neighborhood, the worn Plaza Theatre on Flatbush.
In September 1994 Manhattan theatre exhibitor, Norman Addie, purchased the Sanders, renaming it the Pavilion, converting it to a triplex and adding a café to the balcony level. Carl Giangrande served as architect. Addie also acquired the Plaza, the theatre’s ceiling collapsed as the workers were starting renovations.
Additional screens were added with the Pavilion seemingly popular with the local neighborhood. Eventually, however, Addie  failed. American Apparel took over the Plaza and Cinedign the Pavilion as its digital showcase theatre.
Recently the Pavilion has come under adverse criticism. It fell under the bed bug hysteria that  gripped so much of  New York. A woman claimed to have been bitten  while watching a film. However no solid evidence was forthcoming. The same could not be said for the deteriorating condition of the cinema.  The sorry state of the Pavilion became a topic with numerous blogs. The Brooklynian reported “seats with no backs, seats with no…seats,  seats with stains and random food particles and hair.” The article illustrated with five photos.
The beleaguered staff sent an email apology to Park Slope Parents about the state of the Pavilion, blaming ownership for the current state of the theatre. Finally Jill Calcaterra, Chief Marketing Officer for Cinedigm, came forward, stating that there would be “big changes” with the Pavilion undergoing a major renovation (Park Slope Patch).
Many remain cynical about the future of the Pavilion as a movie house. A comment on one of the blogs stated that an “upscale neighborhood deserved better.”

The Pavilion had just opened when I gave my first Park Slope theatre tour for the Brooklyn Center of the Urban Environment.  The new multiplex had met with opposition. A person living on 15th Street demanded in the local press that a study be conducted on the impact of opening a  movie house in a residential community. Not realizing there had been cinema on that corner since 1908 (the original Sanders Marathon).
At the start of the walk, I quoted this individual and posed the question what was the impact on the neighborhood when the Sanders opened in 1928 with eleven other theatres in the Slope.  What was it like on the streets of Park Slope when these places spilled out on a Saturday night? What was it like at the restaurants and the soda fountains?

Updates March 3, 2011:

The Brooklyn Paper, with a slight dig at the Park Slope Patch blog, states that the “Pavilion will be a movie palace again.” That it was never actually a movie palace doesn’t enter into the equation.

F in the Slope is wondering if  a battle is brewing between Park Slope Patch and the Brooklyn Paper? They also take time to explain why the “Pavilion movie theatre will so not be a palace again.” It seems that just about every movie house built in the 1920s and 30s was a palace. Anyway it is a rather amusing look at “fabric swatches-again.”

According to L Magazine the “”Pavilion’s absentee corporate overlords” are allowing 23-year-old theatre manager, Ross Brunetti, to “pick out the new upholstery.”

Oh, by the way, there is no word from the Patch about the suppose feud with the Brooklyn Paper.

Brooklyn Collection April 28, 2010

My recent talk at the Brooklyn Collection garner positive reviews in two blogs.
Save the Slope found the talk “fascinating” but had some doubts about Alger Hiss being introduced to a Soviet spy chief in the mezzanine of the Prospect Theatre. The only support they could find for this claim was my essay in The Brooklyn Film, edited by John Manbeck and Robert Singer. Save the Slope also mentioned that Pete Hamill  ”cites the same tale.”  They thought it was a great story but was it really true?
I added as a comment the following from the Brooklyn Eagle, June 6, 1949:
“Each time, the perjury consisted of suppressing the espionage role he [Whittaker Chambers] accused [Alger] Hiss of playing after he introduced Hiss to a Soviet spy chief in the United States in the mezzanine of the Prospect Theater at 9th St. and 5th Ave. in January or February of 1937, he admitted under the battering questions of defense council Lloyd Paul Stryker.”
Richard Grayson at Dumbo Books “learned an awful lot” at my talk while having “a great time with a charming, knowledgeable and funny man who seems to know more Brooklyn theater history than anyone in captivity.”
Thanks Richard and HDEC at Save the Slope.

Interior, Prospect Theatre, 1919

When it opened in September 1914, the Prospect Theatre, with 2400 seats,  was the largest vaudeville house in Greater New York. A large section of the upper interior still survives above the C-Town at 327 Ninth Street in Park Slope. Prior to climbing up a twenty-foot ladder to see the remains, an excited stock boy told me with a great deal of glee “it is like the mummy’s tomb up there!”