I don’t rightly know either, but that information was taken from a Providence Journal blurb about the theatre and announcing its closing. The issue was September 8, 2000. I just re-checked it, and that’s what it said.
Here is a photo of the interior from 1900. The theatre had been built 12 years earlier, in 1888. It was the last large Victorian theatre built in the state. The stage is said to have been second in size only to the later Veterans' Memorial Auditorium, still standing in Providence.
This 1974 photo shows the efforts of local preservationists to save the Opera House/Park Theatre. The following year, on September 22, 1975, the venerable old institution was completely destroyed by a huge fire.
This theatre was not also called the Music Hall, as I inquired in an earlier comment. The Music Hall in Pascoag was another building that burned down a few years ago.
I think I actually saw only one movie here, and that was Thunderball in June, 1966. The place was called the Burrillville Cinema at the time and was being run seasonally, mostly for the young crowd. Another time, in the early 1970s, I drove here (about 35 minutes) hoping to see Two-Lane Blacktop but the show was cancelled because I was the only one who showed up!
The theatre is now being used by the Theater Company of Rhode Island. The current name of the theatre is Assembly Theatre, its original name when built. Oddly, there seems to be no name of the theatre on the building itself.
When Austin T. Levy, the man who had the theatre and other buildings built as a gift for Burrillville, had the Duke of Windsor as his guest in 1944, he showed him his local textile mills, and no doubt the Assembly Theatre and the other buildings. Austin Levy ran as a Republican candidate for R.I. senator in 1950, losing to John O. Pastore. When Levy died in 1951, a memorial was held for him at the Assembly on November 27. In 1953 a memorial stone with bronze plaque was dedicated to him and placed on a small hillside behind the Assembly.
The theatre building on East Avenue near Main Street, known as “The Assembly,” was constructed in 1934 and was one of a group of four buildings built by by local textile-producer, entrepreneur, and philanthropist Austin T. Levy and given to the town of Burrillville. The buildings were the Jesse H. Smith Memorial Library, “The Assembly” (next to the library), the Ninth District Courthouse, and the town office building.
An article in a newspaper of the time said of “The Assembly”:
“The most modern improvements in lighting, heating, and other equipment, will be featured in ‘The Assembly’ which is to be used for motion picture shows, dramatic productions and town gatherings.
“From the spacious lobby, flanked on each side by cloak rooms, one enters the assembly proper, which has a seating capacity of 354. The floor of the lobby is slate and brick, while that of the assembly is of rubber tile and maple.
“The artificial lighting in this building…is indirect, coming from covers in the umbrella ceiling. Interior walls and ceilings are of sand-finished plaster with a color scheme of green prevailing.
“The large stage will be equipped all modern stage appliances necessary for theatrical productions. A complete and modern stage-lighting system has been installed.
“The latest sound motion picture equipment will be installed shortly as it is planned to have regular performances to aid in the upkeep of the buildings. (…)
“The flagstone-floored porch at the entrance to the lobby has four large columns in Colonial style and in keeping with the architectual style featured in the group buildings.”
That is one interesting photo. I never saw anything of this theatre. I believe the film Monpti (phonetic German for the French phrase “mon petit”) and starring Romy Schneider, had bookings in other more “mainstream” art houses in a subtitled verion.
Although The Naked and the Dead was a major 1958 release and based on an important literary work, it generally got tepid reviews, particularly for portrayals and performances. Pauline Kael, for one, said Raoul Walsh had turned it into a “third-rate action movie.” She praised the battle sequences but she found the characterizations poor and the acting lacklustre. A. H. Weiler of the Times similarly concluded, “Director Walsh and his associates have carefully drawn an impressively stark face of war from ‘The Naked and the Dead’ but only seldom do they deeply dissect the people involved in it.”
That doesn’t make it a B-movie, of course. That term is applied to low budgets, not low artistic results. But it is to some degree a failed A-film.
From the Old Stone Bank History of R.I., Vol. 4, on the very first presentation of a film in Rhode Island:
“If Mr. [Abe] Spitz’s memory serves him right, and according to the recollections of Mr. Frank Page, life-long associate of Spitz, the first motion picture seen in Rhode Island was exhibited in his Olympic [later named Nickel] Theatre on Westminster Street, probably during the year 1896.
“The title of this first picture was ‘Fireman, Fireman, Save My Child,’ and both the projection machine and the film were procured from Lubin of Philadelphia, a pioneer in the industry. The machine was nearly nine feet long, and with considerable difficulty was placed in the balcony on a series of jacks. A generator was set up on the stage and connected by cable to the projector in the balcony and a small screen was erected on the stage. Strange as it may seem, our first local movie was a sound picture, in a sense, for as the sequence flickered away, from the peaceful family scene around the fireside to the sudden burst of flames, and from then to the fire-house and the wild scramble of hoses and ladders and finally to the daring rescue, none other than the famed song writer, Joe Howard, who with his partner wife, then billed under the name of Emerson, stood in the darkened wings and sang an appropriate ballad. What they sang is not known, except that, for certain, it was not Joe Howard’s immortal ‘I wonder Who’s Kissing Her Now,’ for at that time Joe had no good reason to say it in the song as he did later, ‘Good Bye, My Lady Love.’ Emerson was still in the act, and still Mrs. Howard, when the two accompanied with song ‘Fireman, Fireman, Save My Child,’ Rhode Island’s first movie in the now long-forgotten Olympic in Providence.
“For many years thereafter, a motion picture remained on the bill of local theatres as a novelty, a chaser, or trailer, and Edward M. Fay, leading showman in these parts, remembers well how the customers at the old Keith Theatre started putting on their coats when the variety program rang down the final curtain on the acrobats or the trained bears, and the house was darkened for one reel of ‘Old Madrid,’ ‘Plantation Capers’ or ‘How Susie Captured the Burglar.’”
Ten years later in 1906 the former Olympic, now called the Nickel, became the first full-time movie theatre in Providence and in Rhode Island.
At one time Saint John’s Church, almost next to the Majestic Building, used to run the Odeon Theatre, a kind of French-American dramatic society hall, created in 1909 by one Father Bourgeois of the parish. It had been the old Cadets' Hall. It was located about a block away from the church, on Legion Way. It was to be a showcase of French culture, a small performing arts center as well as a concert and lecture hall. It was modeled after the famous Odeon Theatre and opera house of Paris. I don’t know if the wooden structure was every used for movies. Later it became a furniture store and then years later burned down. I remember driving past it many times.
The church this theatre “aroused the ire of,” per my description, was St. John the Baptist, at 20 Washington Street. It is now called Saints John & James, having “merged” with Saint James down at the corner of Main and Washington after that one was closed.
At one time Saint John’s church used to run the Odeon Theatre, a kind of French-American dramatic society hall, created in 1909 by one Father Bourgeois of the parish. It had been the old Cadets' Hall. It was located about a block away from the church, on Legion Way. It was to be a showcase of French culture, a small performing arts center as well as a concert and lecture hall. It was modeled after the famous Odeon Theatre and opera house of Paris. I don’t know if the wooden structure was every used for movies. Later it became a furniture store and then years later burned down. I remember driving past it many times.
A 1927 city directory lists four town theatres: Majestic, Gem, Palace, Thornton’s. I have found newspaper ads for all except the Majestic and for this theatre, the Star, listed in 1928.
The building that housed the Star seems still to exist. It is a residence at what is now 614 Providence Street, right next to the Pawtuxet River and the bridge which crosses it. Looking at the residence, you can see that it has an odd shape, more like a former social hall of some kind than a place originally meant to be a home. It is here that the Star Theatre must have been located, though I consider that an educated guess.
I have no idea when it opened or how long it operated. The village of Natick actually straddles the border of two municipalities, Warwick and West Warwick, on opposite sides of Providence Street. The former theatre was on the West Warwick side.
A 1927 city directory lists four town theatres: Majestic, Gem, Palace, Thornton’s. I have found newspaper ads for all except the Majestic. Also, the Star, in the Natick section of West Warwick, remains a mysterious early-silent-era cinema.
A 1927 city directory lists four town theatres: Majestic, Gem, Palace, Thornton’s. I have found newspaper ads for all except the Majestic. Also, the Star, in the Natick section of West Warwick, remains a mysterious early-silent-era cinema.
A 1927 city directory lists four town theatres: Majestic, Gem, Palace, Thornton’s. I have found newspaper ads for all except the Majestic. Also, the Star, in the Natick section of West Warwick, remains a mysterious early-silent-era cinema.
I don’t rightly know either, but that information was taken from a Providence Journal blurb about the theatre and announcing its closing. The issue was September 8, 2000. I just re-checked it, and that’s what it said.
And this is a photo of the theatre location in the weeks after the fire of September 22, 1975.
Here is a photo of the interior from 1900. The theatre had been built 12 years earlier, in 1888. It was the last large Victorian theatre built in the state. The stage is said to have been second in size only to the later Veterans' Memorial Auditorium, still standing in Providence.
This 1974 photo shows the efforts of local preservationists to save the Opera House/Park Theatre. The following year, on September 22, 1975, the venerable old institution was completely destroyed by a huge fire.
Here is a 1945 photo of Arthur Darman behind the candy counter of his Park Theatre. See above entry.
Here is a photo of the Woonsocket Cinemas in 1993.
Here is a photo of the Rivoli I took in 1989. Thanks to Mike Rivest for indentifying it, and the “R” visible in front seconds that identification.
This theatre was not also called the Music Hall, as I inquired in an earlier comment. The Music Hall in Pascoag was another building that burned down a few years ago.
I think I actually saw only one movie here, and that was Thunderball in June, 1966. The place was called the Burrillville Cinema at the time and was being run seasonally, mostly for the young crowd. Another time, in the early 1970s, I drove here (about 35 minutes) hoping to see Two-Lane Blacktop but the show was cancelled because I was the only one who showed up!
The exact address of the Assembly Theatre/ Burrillville Theatre is 26 East Avenue.
Here is a nice B/W period photo, circa the 1940s, of the Assembly Theatre.
The theatre is now being used by the Theater Company of Rhode Island. The current name of the theatre is Assembly Theatre, its original name when built. Oddly, there seems to be no name of the theatre on the building itself.
When Austin T. Levy, the man who had the theatre and other buildings built as a gift for Burrillville, had the Duke of Windsor as his guest in 1944, he showed him his local textile mills, and no doubt the Assembly Theatre and the other buildings. Austin Levy ran as a Republican candidate for R.I. senator in 1950, losing to John O. Pastore. When Levy died in 1951, a memorial was held for him at the Assembly on November 27. In 1953 a memorial stone with bronze plaque was dedicated to him and placed on a small hillside behind the Assembly.
These three photos show this attractive and underused theatre in its lovely pastoral setting.
(1) Front and side and lawn
(2) Theatre and waterfall from Freedom Park
(3) Front entrance and columns
The theatre building on East Avenue near Main Street, known as “The Assembly,” was constructed in 1934 and was one of a group of four buildings built by by local textile-producer, entrepreneur, and philanthropist Austin T. Levy and given to the town of Burrillville. The buildings were the Jesse H. Smith Memorial Library, “The Assembly” (next to the library), the Ninth District Courthouse, and the town office building.
An article in a newspaper of the time said of “The Assembly”:
“The most modern improvements in lighting, heating, and other equipment, will be featured in ‘The Assembly’ which is to be used for motion picture shows, dramatic productions and town gatherings.
“From the spacious lobby, flanked on each side by cloak rooms, one enters the assembly proper, which has a seating capacity of 354. The floor of the lobby is slate and brick, while that of the assembly is of rubber tile and maple.
“The artificial lighting in this building…is indirect, coming from covers in the umbrella ceiling. Interior walls and ceilings are of sand-finished plaster with a color scheme of green prevailing.
“The large stage will be equipped all modern stage appliances necessary for theatrical productions. A complete and modern stage-lighting system has been installed.
“The latest sound motion picture equipment will be installed shortly as it is planned to have regular performances to aid in the upkeep of the buildings. (…)
“The flagstone-floored porch at the entrance to the lobby has four large columns in Colonial style and in keeping with the architectual style featured in the group buildings.”
That is one interesting photo. I never saw anything of this theatre. I believe the film Monpti (phonetic German for the French phrase “mon petit”) and starring Romy Schneider, had bookings in other more “mainstream” art houses in a subtitled verion.
Although The Naked and the Dead was a major 1958 release and based on an important literary work, it generally got tepid reviews, particularly for portrayals and performances. Pauline Kael, for one, said Raoul Walsh had turned it into a “third-rate action movie.” She praised the battle sequences but she found the characterizations poor and the acting lacklustre. A. H. Weiler of the Times similarly concluded, “Director Walsh and his associates have carefully drawn an impressively stark face of war from ‘The Naked and the Dead’ but only seldom do they deeply dissect the people involved in it.”
That doesn’t make it a B-movie, of course. That term is applied to low budgets, not low artistic results. But it is to some degree a failed A-film.
Tonight for Sure was a nudie directed by Francis Ford Coppola!!!
Click here.
In this ad from 1963 posted elsewhere by Bill Huelbig, the Queen Anne appears to have been a very decent art house at one time.
From the Old Stone Bank History of R.I., Vol. 4, on the very first presentation of a film in Rhode Island:
“If Mr. [Abe] Spitz’s memory serves him right, and according to the recollections of Mr. Frank Page, life-long associate of Spitz, the first motion picture seen in Rhode Island was exhibited in his Olympic [later named Nickel] Theatre on Westminster Street, probably during the year 1896.
“The title of this first picture was ‘Fireman, Fireman, Save My Child,’ and both the projection machine and the film were procured from Lubin of Philadelphia, a pioneer in the industry. The machine was nearly nine feet long, and with considerable difficulty was placed in the balcony on a series of jacks. A generator was set up on the stage and connected by cable to the projector in the balcony and a small screen was erected on the stage. Strange as it may seem, our first local movie was a sound picture, in a sense, for as the sequence flickered away, from the peaceful family scene around the fireside to the sudden burst of flames, and from then to the fire-house and the wild scramble of hoses and ladders and finally to the daring rescue, none other than the famed song writer, Joe Howard, who with his partner wife, then billed under the name of Emerson, stood in the darkened wings and sang an appropriate ballad. What they sang is not known, except that, for certain, it was not Joe Howard’s immortal ‘I wonder Who’s Kissing Her Now,’ for at that time Joe had no good reason to say it in the song as he did later, ‘Good Bye, My Lady Love.’ Emerson was still in the act, and still Mrs. Howard, when the two accompanied with song ‘Fireman, Fireman, Save My Child,’ Rhode Island’s first movie in the now long-forgotten Olympic in Providence.
“For many years thereafter, a motion picture remained on the bill of local theatres as a novelty, a chaser, or trailer, and Edward M. Fay, leading showman in these parts, remembers well how the customers at the old Keith Theatre started putting on their coats when the variety program rang down the final curtain on the acrobats or the trained bears, and the house was darkened for one reel of ‘Old Madrid,’ ‘Plantation Capers’ or ‘How Susie Captured the Burglar.’”
Ten years later in 1906 the former Olympic, now called the Nickel, became the first full-time movie theatre in Providence and in Rhode Island.
At one time Saint John’s Church, almost next to the Majestic Building, used to run the Odeon Theatre, a kind of French-American dramatic society hall, created in 1909 by one Father Bourgeois of the parish. It had been the old Cadets' Hall. It was located about a block away from the church, on Legion Way. It was to be a showcase of French culture, a small performing arts center as well as a concert and lecture hall. It was modeled after the famous Odeon Theatre and opera house of Paris. I don’t know if the wooden structure was every used for movies. Later it became a furniture store and then years later burned down. I remember driving past it many times.
The church this theatre “aroused the ire of,” per my description, was St. John the Baptist, at 20 Washington Street. It is now called Saints John & James, having “merged” with Saint James down at the corner of Main and Washington after that one was closed.
At one time Saint John’s church used to run the Odeon Theatre, a kind of French-American dramatic society hall, created in 1909 by one Father Bourgeois of the parish. It had been the old Cadets' Hall. It was located about a block away from the church, on Legion Way. It was to be a showcase of French culture, a small performing arts center as well as a concert and lecture hall. It was modeled after the famous Odeon Theatre and opera house of Paris. I don’t know if the wooden structure was every used for movies. Later it became a furniture store and then years later burned down. I remember driving past it many times.
A 1927 city directory lists four town theatres: Majestic, Gem, Palace, Thornton’s. I have found newspaper ads for all except the Majestic and for this theatre, the Star, listed in 1928.
The building that housed the Star seems still to exist. It is a residence at what is now 614 Providence Street, right next to the Pawtuxet River and the bridge which crosses it. Looking at the residence, you can see that it has an odd shape, more like a former social hall of some kind than a place originally meant to be a home. It is here that the Star Theatre must have been located, though I consider that an educated guess.
I have no idea when it opened or how long it operated. The village of Natick actually straddles the border of two municipalities, Warwick and West Warwick, on opposite sides of Providence Street. The former theatre was on the West Warwick side.
A current photo shall follow in my next post.
A 1927 city directory lists four town theatres: Majestic, Gem, Palace, Thornton’s. I have found newspaper ads for all except the Majestic. Also, the Star, in the Natick section of West Warwick, remains a mysterious early-silent-era cinema.
A 1927 city directory lists four town theatres: Majestic, Gem, Palace, Thornton’s. I have found newspaper ads for all except the Majestic. Also, the Star, in the Natick section of West Warwick, remains a mysterious early-silent-era cinema.
A 1927 city directory lists four town theatres: Majestic, Gem, Palace, Thornton’s. I have found newspaper ads for all except the Majestic. Also, the Star, in the Natick section of West Warwick, remains a mysterious early-silent-era cinema.