Your thumbnail isn’t certain about the seating capacity of (what we called in my youth) the RKO Uptown. By comparison to another theatre in Highland Park, the Tuxedo, which you seem definite about having an 1800-seat auditorium, I will tell you that the Uptown was very significantly larger. If your figure for the Tux is valid, then I’ll bet the Uptown handily exceeded 2000 seats.
I believe the statement that Detroit’s United Artists Theatre was the first to get CinemaScope is incorrect. The first Detroit house to install ‘scope equipment was the Fox, for the opening of the first film to be (not produced, but) released in the anamorphic process, “The Robe.” I was an usher at this very glamorous event, and had the opportunity of exploring backstage, and in the booth. I remember the screen was particularly large, in that the early C'scope features had an aspect ratio of 2.67:1, rather than the current 2.34:1. Up until that night, the only wide-screen house in Detroit was the Music Hall, showing “This is Cinerama.”
Your thumbnail isn’t certain about the seating capacity of (what we called in my youth) the RKO Uptown. By comparison to another theatre in Highland Park, the Tuxedo, which you seem definite about having an 1800-seat auditorium, I will tell you that the Uptown was very significantly larger. If your figure for the Tux is valid, then I’ll bet the Uptown handily exceeded 2000 seats.
I believe the statement that Detroit’s United Artists Theatre was the first to get CinemaScope is incorrect. The first Detroit house to install ‘scope equipment was the Fox, for the opening of the first film to be (not produced, but) released in the anamorphic process, “The Robe.” I was an usher at this very glamorous event, and had the opportunity of exploring backstage, and in the booth. I remember the screen was particularly large, in that the early C'scope features had an aspect ratio of 2.67:1, rather than the current 2.34:1. Up until that night, the only wide-screen house in Detroit was the Music Hall, showing “This is Cinerama.”