| 55th Street Playhouse | |
|---|---|
 55th Street Playhouse (vintage image) | |
 | |
| Former names | 55th Street Cinema;Europa Theatre |
| General information | |
| Architectural style | Late 19th and early 20th century American movements, other |
| Location | 154 West 55th Street New York, NY 10022 |
| Coordinates | 40°45′49″N73°58′50″W / 40.763743°N 73.980443°W /40.763743; -73.980443 |
| Completed | 1888[1][2] |
| Design and construction | |
| Architects | Bassett Jones andMaurice Fatio[1] |
The55th Street Playhouse—periodically referred to as the55th Street Cinema andEuropa Theatre—was a 253-seat movie house[3] at 154West 55th Street,[2]Midtown Manhattan,New York City, that opened on May 20, 1927. Many classic art and foreign-language films, including those byJean Cocteau,Sergei Eisenstein,Federico Fellini,Abel Gance,Fritz Lang,Josef Von Sternberg andOrson Welles, were featured at the theater.[1][4] Later,Andy Warhol presented many of his notable films (includingFlesh (1968) andLonesome Cowboys (1968) and others) in this building (as well as in other area theaters, including theNew Andy Warhol Garrick Theatre) in the late 1960s. Other notable films were also shown at the theater, includingBoys in the Sand (1971) andHim (1974).[3][5]
Originally, the theater was built to be ahorse stable[3] in 1888 byCharles T. Barney, a banker who later became president of theKnickerbocker Trust Company. The upper stories were rented out as The Holbein Studios,[1] and were occupied by artists, such asJohn Singer Sargent, impressionist painterChilde Hassam, and portrait artistCecilia Beaux.[2] Later, in the late 1920s, the stable building was converted into a movie theater.[2]
As anadvertisement illustrator in the 1950s, Warhol used assistants to increase his productivity. Collaboration would remain a defining (and controversial) aspect of his working methods throughout his career; this was particularly true in the 1960s. One of the most important collaborators during this period wasGerard Malanga. Malanga assisted the artist with the production of silkscreens, films, sculpture, and other works at "The Factory", Warhol'saluminum foil-and-silver-paint-lined studio on 47th Street (later moved to Broadway). Other members of Warhol's Factory crowd includedFreddie Herko,Ondine,Ronald Tavel,Mary Woronov,Billy Name, andBrigid Berlin (from whom he apparently got the idea to tape-record his phone conversations).[6]
During the 1960s, Andy Warhol groomed a retinue ofbohemian andcounterculture eccentrics upon whom he bestowed the designation "superstars", includingNico,Joe Dallesandro,Edie Sedgwick,Viva,Ultra Violet,Holly Woodlawn,Jackie Curtis, andCandy Darling. These people all participated inthe Factory films, and some—like Berlin—remained friends with Warhol until his death. Important figures in the New York underground art/cinema world, such as writerJohn Giorno and film-makerJack Smith, also appear in Warhol films (many presented at the 55th Street Playhouse and theNew Andy Warhol Garrick Theatre) of the 1960s, revealing Warhol's connections to a diverse range of artistic scenes during this time. Less well known was his support and collaboration with several teen-agers during this era, who would achieve prominence later in life including writer David Dalton,[7] photographer Stephen Shore[8] and artist Bibbe Hansen (mother of pop musicianBeck).[9]
In June 1970, the 55th Street Playhouse began showingCensorship in Denmark: A New Approach, afilm documentary study ofpornography, directed byAlex de Renzy.[10] According toVincent Canby, aNew York Times film reviewer, the narrator of the documentary noted that "pornography is more stimulating and cheaper than hormone injections" and "stresses the fact that since the legalization ofpornography in Denmark,sex crimes have decreased."[10] Nonetheless, on September 30, 1970, Assistant District Attorney,Richard Beckler, had the theater manager, Chung Louis, arrested on anobscenity charge, and the film seized as appealing to aprurient interest in sex. The presiding judge, Jack Rosenberg, stated, "[The film] is patently offensive to most Americans because it affronts contemporarycommunity standards relating to the description or representation of sexual matters."[1]
The 55th Street Playhouse building was partly rebuilt in the 1980s,[2] and the ground floor, at 154 West 55th Street, was altered to be a truck entrance.[1][a]
{{cite book}}:|work= ignored (help)| International | |
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| National | |
