Address | 2014 Genesee Street Utica, New York United States |
---|---|
Type | Movie palace |
Capacity | 1500 (c. 1927) [1] 400 (c. 2013) [2] |
Screens | 1 |
Opened | December 29, 1927 |
Closed | September 2013 |
Website | |
www | |
Uptown Theater | |
Coordinates | 43°5′12″N75°15′52″W / 43.08667°N 75.26444°W |
NRHP reference No. | SG100005466 [3] |
Added to NRHP | August 17, 2020 |
The Uptown Theatre is a historic movie theater in Utica, New York. It opened on December 29, 1927, during the silent film and Vaudeville eras, and is the city's oldest surviving theater, predating the Stanley Theater by eight months. It was part of the Kallet chain of movie theaters, like the Capitol Theatre in nearby Rome and other theaters no longer standing throughout Upstate New York. [4]
A boxing arena, the Utica Stadium, was razed to make way for the Uptown Theatre. A $25,000, three-manual organ was installed during construction, placed on an elevator lift beneath the orchestra pit. At opening the theater seated 1,500: it was the first theater in Utica to use stadium seating. [1] [5]
With the rise of the multiplex theater in the '70s and '80s, the Uptown shifted to showing second-run movies. The theater changed management and business strategy several times through the '90s and early 2000s. [5] In 2012 the owner combined the three divided theaters into a single theater, began running first-run films, and hosted live music and other events. Despite these efforts, it was closed and put up for sale in September 2013. [2] The owner mentioned being unable to afford the conversion to digital cinema and a perceived lack of interest from the community. [6] [7] The Uptown was scheduled for foreclosure auction in 2016 but the auction was postponed indefinitely. [8]
It remained vacant until 2018, when it was purchased by the non-profit group Uptown Theatre for Creative Arts (UTCA). Under the terms of the purchase agreement, M&T Bank forgave the $400,000 mortgage on the property and donated the building to UTCA, while UTCA took responsibility for $27,000 in back taxes owed to the city of Utica. [9] In early 2019 UTCA received a gift of $10,000 to repair the Uptown's marquee and replace its exterior lights with LED lighting. [10] Although UTCA has renovated the lobby and adjacent storefronts, the auditorium and stage are not yet fully usable. [1]
In August 2020, the Uptown was added to the National Register of Historic Places. [11] [12]
As of 2023 under the new ownership the Uptown Theatre has hosted Stand-up comedy and Improvisational theatre shows alongside classes and other events in spaces located outside the auditorium. The new owners have also expressed interest in using the auditorium for film screening and live performances once it becomes fully usable. [13]
Utica is a city in the Mohawk Valley and the county seat of Oneida County, New York, United States. The tenth-most-populous city in New York State, its population was 65,283 in the 2020 U.S. Census. Located on the Mohawk River at the foot of the Adirondack Mountains, it is approximately 95 mi (153 km) west-northwest of Albany, 55 mi (89 km) east of Syracuse and 240 mi (386 km) northwest of New York City. Utica and the nearby city of Rome anchor the Utica–Rome Metropolitan Statistical Area comprising all of Oneida and Herkimer Counties.
A movie palace is any of the large, elaborately decorated movie theaters built between the 1910s and the 1940s. The late 1920s saw the peak of the movie palace, with hundreds opening every year between 1925 and 1930. With the advent of television, movie attendance dropped, while the rising popularity of large multiplex chains in the 1980s and 1990s signaled the obsolescence of single-screen theaters. Many movie palaces were razed or converted into multiple-screen venues or performing arts centers, though some have undergone restoration and reopened to the public as historic buildings.
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An atmospheric theatre is a type of movie palace design which was popular in the late 1920s. Atmospheric theatres were designed and decorated to evoke the feeling of a particular time and place for patrons, through the use of projectors, architectural elements and ornamentation that evoked a sense of being outdoors. This was intended to make the patron a more active participant in the setting.
The Pickwick Theatre is an art deco movie palace located in Park Ridge, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago.
The Capitol Theatre is a theatre operating in Rome, New York. It opened December 10, 1928 as part of the Kallet chain of movie houses, presenting first run films until it closed in 1974. After extensive renovation, the theatre re-opened in 1985 as the non-profit Capitol Civic Center, offering classic films, live theatrical performances, and concerts.
The Orpheum Theatre is a historic theater in downtown Wichita, Kansas, United States. It was designed by renowned theatre architect John Eberson with funding from a group of local investors and opened on September 4, 1922.
The F. M. Kirby Center is a historic Art Deco-Moderne style movie theater located at Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.
The Capitol Theatre Building is a cinema and concert venue located at 140 E. 2nd St. in Flint, Michigan. Designed by John Eberson, it is an atmospheric theater designed to look like a Roman garden. The Capitol Theatre opened in 1928, and operated as a cinema and live performance venue until 1996. The theatre was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985.
Donk's Theatre was a historic movie theater located at Hudgins, Mathews County, Virginia.
Commodore Theatre is an historic movie theater located at Portsmouth, Virginia. It was built in 1945 in the Streamline Art Deco style, and originally sat 1,000 people. The theater closed in 1975 and sat empty until a change in ownership and extensive renovation beginning in 1987. It reopened two years later, and as of 2023 was in operation displaying first-run films accompanied by a full kitchen.
The Center Theatre is a performing arts venue and movie theater located at 20 East Main Street in Dover-Foxcroft, Maine. The theater was built in 1940 and was closed for several decades before being renovated and revived in the early 2000s. Its main auditorium contains 264 seats, while its second auditorium contains 40 seats. The Theatre hosts live stage performances, music concerts, community events, and movies. Its second screen was completed in February, 2021.