Savoy Theatre
Broadwalk and Ocean Avenue,
Atlantic City,
NJ
08401
Broadwalk and Ocean Avenue,
Atlantic City,
NJ
08401
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Additional Info
Previous Names: Cort Theatre, Woods Theatre
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The Savoy Theatre was opened on October 22, 1903. On May 23, 1915 it was renamed Cort Theatre. The attached link shows an advertisement for this theatre from 1924. The theatre is not listed in the 1941 Film Daily Yearbook.
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Recent comments (view all 22 comments)
Hey Joe… I think you meant to say that the Hotel Poinsettia (which was evidently the Schlitz Hotel in 1911, and Green’s Hotel in 1905) was on South Ocean and the Boardwalk, across from the Dunlop. The building we’re talking about as being adjacent to the Dunlop was on the corner of South Carolina. In the 1915 image I linked to, it houses the Merry Go Round, Billiard Hall, a candy shop and The Post Card Store. There’s also an entrance that appears to advertise Venice Park.
In any event, it clearly isn’t the same building that now sits on South Carolina. As you suggested, the current structure appears to date from the 1920’s. Curious as to what the purpose of that building was. While there is no streetview available on google, if you zoom in as close as possible, you are able to view images taken and uploaded by google users. A few of these show the facade of the building as it faces the Boardwalk. It seems to house a shopping arcade plus a variety of touristy stores selling salt water taffy, funnel cake or souvenirs.
Speaking of Google, the street map for this theater is WAYYY off, placing the marker, for some bizarre reason, more than 75 miles to the north in Ocean Grove, NJ.
It was the upper floors of the merry-go-round building that were only half built in the ca.1905 view I linked to (I was thrown off by the caption that says Hotel Poinsettia.) In the ca.1905 photo, there’s a gap between them and the Dunlop, but in the ca.1915 photo the gap has been filled by new construction.
The merry-go-round building is a bit of a puzzle. If you go to Bing Maps and use the search terms Ripley Museum Atlantic City (the museum is three blocks south of Ocean Avenue, but the map includes the whole neighborhood), then select the bird’s eye option and zoom in you can get a very good view of the existing structure from all four angles. On looking at it again, what looks like a stage house might only be a surviving section of a second floor, the rest of which has been demolished. I now believe this building was always an ordinary commercial structure and never had a theater in it. It might actually be what’s left of the 1915 building, minus its upper floors, and with the facade remodeled at some point.
The Savoy had to have been on what is now the parking lot behind the building on the Hotel Dunlop site. There’s no telling how long the theater has been gone, but there no doubt that it is indeed gone.
This webpage features a plate from a 1908 atlas of Atlantic City that you can magnify in order to get an idea as to where the Savoy Theatre was situated. To get your bearings, the Central Pier is the large yellow structure jutting into the ocean on the right. The Hotel Dunlop and Savoy Theatre are slightly above the pier on the map. You can make out the dividing lines within the property that must define the storefronts within the Hotel structure. The rectangle that marks where the auditorium was situated is clearly labeled “Savoy Theatre,” with one of the narrow spaces obviously representing the lobby and foyer entrance out to the Boardwalk.
Our mystery building on South Carolina appears to have been owned at the time by Young’s Amusement Company, which, no doubt, operated the carousel within and, evidently, owned and operated the Central Pier amusements.
My great grand Uncle Robert Dunlop owned the hotel in 1904. The building became the Belmont Hotel (housed Woolworths) and has since been destroyed by fire in recent times. Only thing left is a pile of bricks in the lot behind the present building.
The Wurlitzer company records show a small pipe organ, opus 800, a stock, 5-rank residential model, was installed at the Savoy in May 1925, but moved to a Philadelphia residence just a month later. Maybe this was a demonstration for the theatre – in hopes that it would lead to a sale.(It didn’t.) One source says the organ was repossessed from the Savoy, but that seems unlikely in only a month’s time.
On a visit to Atlantic City in September 2015 I took some photos of the building that’s on the site of the Dunlop Hotel/Savoy. Although the structure facing the Boardwalk is a new build, the Savoy’s fly tower (and, possibly, rear auditorium) might well be intact – though this could be a new build as well!
Did the Savoy have any other names besides Wood’s Theatre?
Reopened as the Cort theatre on May 23rd, 1915. ad posted.
The Savoy theatre opened on October 22nd, 1903.