Rialto Theatre
17 Warren Street,
Glens Falls,
NY
12801
17 Warren Street,
Glens Falls,
NY
12801
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The Rialto Theatre was destroyed by a large fire on March 23, 1925, which also suffered damage from its hotel as well. It was rebuilt and reopened on November 21, 1925.
The address and its entertainment roots dated back to 1871 where the Glens Falls Opera House stood from construction to fire in 1884 that destroyed the building. The opera house was rebuilt and in 1909 housed its first movie theatre called The World of Motion on the second floor.
Rialto Theatre Corp. came in launching the much improved Rialto Theatre on November 18, 1921. As noted, Schine took on the theatre in January of 1937 and would revamp the theatre a year later.
In 1961, the Panther Theatre Corp. took over the theatre running it to its last day which was a showing of Pinocchio on March 30, 1969. After a salvage sale, the theatre was razed in October of 1969 as part of an urban renewal program.
According to a list in Our Movie Houses: A History of Film & Cinematic Innovation in Central New York, by Norman O. Keim, the Schine circuit operated the Rialto Theatre in Glens Falls from 1931 to 1966. The Rialto was mentioned in Variety on February 18, 1921, which said that the house was playing Keith vaudeville while the rival Empire Theatre was playing Shubert vaudeville.
The Empire appears to have won this particular battle of the vaudeville war, as by July 2 the Empire was still offering five acts of Shubert vaudeville along with a feature film, while the Rialto was showing only movies, according to their ads in that day’s edition of the Glens Falls Post-Star.
The Rialto was reseated in 1938. The middle photo on this page of the January 7, 1939, issue of Boxoffice shows a section of the new Heywood-Wakefield chairs on the orchestra floor.