Category: Toronto Cinemas

Toronto Cinemas2 Comments

Tura Satana twirls at the Victory Burlesque, 1963

Eric Veillette

Tura Satana, star of Russ Meyer’s Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! died on February 4 of apparent heart failure. Before she became the tough-girl phenom of cult film, however, she was a big star on the Burlesque circuit, often swinging her tassels on Toronto stages. One such occasion was on April 19, 1963, when she peeled off at the Victory Burlesque located on the north-east corner of Spadina and Dundas. On April 18, the day the above ad was published, the Toronto Star reported the “statuesque Eurasian” was set to retire in two weeks. The Star added: “Tura Sharon Satana earns … Continue reading Tura Satana twirls at the Victory Burlesque, 1963

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Buster Keaton 1895-1966

Eric Veillette

Buster Keaton died forty-five years ago today, and Silent Toronto would like to offer posthumous thanks for all the laughter that has filled (and continues to fill) Toronto cinemas. Seven Chances premiered at the former Shea’s Hippodrome in October, 1925. Last year I was fortunate to attend a screening at Casa Loma where the film was accompanied by Clark Wilson at the helm of the mighty, rumbling Wurlitzer organ. As I wrote in the Toronto Star in March, 2010, this organ was no stranger to Keaton’s farce — it was in use at Shea’s Hippodrome when the film premiered. It … Continue reading Buster Keaton 1895-1966

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Projectionists at the Loew’s Yonge St. Theatre

Eric Veillette

From left to right: Loew’s Yonge St. Theatre projectionists and operators Earl Winslow, Phil Ristow, Charles Sturgess and Charles Hallett pose for the January, 1946 issue of Lo!, the Loew’s Inc. employee magazine, which was in its second year of publication. Winslow was the veteran of the bunch, having manned the booth on the Yonge St. theatre’s opening  night in December, 1913; “select photoplays” by Selig, Pathe and Biograph were shown. Long-lasting tenures weren’t uncommon at the time. Jules Bernstein, a veteran of the Loew’s circuit in New York, was managing director of the Yonge St. Theatre from its first … Continue reading Projectionists at the Loew’s Yonge St. Theatre

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The Metro Theatre’s red hot opening night

Eric Veillette

At Bloor and Manning, a giant poster advertising Emmanuelle adorns the facade of the Metro, Toronto’s only surviving legitimate adult movie theatre. But long before it began showing porn in the 1970s, it served as a neighbourhood theatre for over three decades. Despite the PG-rated nature of the cinema’s opening night (April 7, 1939) double-bill, Delinquent Parents and Looking for Trouble, things got a little heated during the second showing of the programme when a fire broke out in a storage room on the ground floor near the building’s entrance. Smoke billowed into the auditorium and a minor panic ensued … Continue reading The Metro Theatre’s red hot opening night

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Toronto cinema memories

Eric Veillette

One of our readers reminisces on the movie theatres of his youth: “My childhood-adolescent theatres were all the downtown palaces, the Towne, University; nabes Victory on Spadina (pie eating contests Saturday matinees), Garden at College & Robert, Bellevue on College & Brunswick (Superman serials). When we moved north:  the Vaughan, Radio City, Nortown, Eglinton, Christie, St.Clair, Paramount (small house on St. Clair near Dufferin)… plus others. I was a very precocious kid and started taking streetcars every Saturday by myself or with my younger sister when I was about 6 or 7. Distinct memories of which pictures I saw at … Continue reading Toronto cinema memories

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Talking pictures in the silent era

Eric Veillette

Before the pictures learned to talk, they stuttered. Talking pictures settled permanently in Toronto in late 1928, but it was far from the first time Hogtown movie-goers were exposed to the concept that the flickers needn’t be silent. In November of 1924, four years before the Tivoli and Uptown Theatres were wired for all-talking pictures, those attending the premiere of Elinor Glyn’s His Hour at Shea’s Hippodrome were treated to short subjects from radio pioneer Lee de Forest‘s Phonofilm, a sound-on-film process. On the screen, an orchestra performed “Come on, Spark Plug,” the sound modestly filling the auditorium while the … Continue reading Talking pictures in the silent era

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Zardoz lobby card from Imperial Six

Eric Veillette

I’m not sure where a Zardoz lobby card from the former Imperial Six on Yonge st. figures in the annals of Sean Connery memorabilia, but it will make a welcome addition to the office wall. If you stare closely enough, you can see the tear-splash of a minor who was denied entry into Cinema 3 by a power-hungry usher when it premiered at the Imperial Six on March 15, 1974. Continue reading Zardoz lobby card from Imperial Six

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TIFF: Mary Pickford and the Invention of the Movie Star

Eric Veillette

In today’s Toronto Star, I preview TIFF’s latest exhibit, Mary Pickford and the Invention of the Movie Star, based on the collection of Rob Brooks. Over the course of three decades, Brooks, a Toronto native, amassed thousands of items including lobby cards, posters, correspondence and several personal items once owned by Toronto’s own Mary Pickford. In the article, I mention Pickford’s long-held ties to Toronto. In an early 1920s visit, Pickford was so enamoured by the patients and staff at the Christie St. Military Hospital that they received private screenings of all her forthcoming films. When Sparrows was released in … Continue reading TIFF: Mary Pickford and the Invention of the Movie Star

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Tales from the Downtown Theatre

Eric Veillette

With the awful blaze that decimated the former Empress Hotel at 335 Yonge St. over the weekend, I’ve been thinking about the evolution of the Yonge and Dundas area — the former Yonge Street Strip. One of the most noticeable changes over the past decades is the disappearance of store-front movie theatres and their sky-jutting, neon-lit pylons. In the above day-and-night photos taken by John Wallington in March of 1972, behold the long-forgotten Downtown Theatre, located on what is now the south end of Dundas Square (Streetview shot here). The Downtown opened in 1948, but is featured here on the … Continue reading Tales from the Downtown Theatre

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Merry Christmas from Shea’s Hippodrome

Eric Veillette

“He loved to fight and fought to love. His dames, like his flags, were many and soon forgotten.” Ladies and gentlemen — my future epitaph. The above ad is from the Toronto Star, December 22, 1930. Also playing in Toronto that week: Lon Chaney in The Unholy Three at the Royce (Edwin/Dupont); John Barrymore in Moby Dick at the Palace (Danforth/Pape); Amos & Andy in Check and Double Check at the Belsize (still around, as the Regent on Mt. Pleasant Rd.); Bebe Daniels in Dixiana at the Runnymede (Bloor/Runnymede). As the year comes to a close, I’d like to thank … Continue reading Merry Christmas from Shea’s Hippodrome