Academy 1-2-3 (cinema)

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Coordinates: 51°30′56″N 00°08′16″W / 51.51556°N 0.13778°W / 51.51556; -0.13778
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The Academy was a cinema located at 165 Oxford Street, Westminster, at the junction of Poland Street. Films (in the shape of Hale's Tours of the World) were shown at the address from at least 1906, and it opened in January 1913 as the Picture House to show The Miracle, with the intention of becoming "the home of the world's most realistic films".[1] The Picture House continued to show films throughout the 1920s.

It re-opened in 1931 as the Academy, becoming London's pre-eminent art house cinema, and for over 50 years introduced British audiences to major films, beginning with

auteurs such as Jean Renoir and Marcel Carné; in later years, the Academy largely established the reputations of Ingmar Bergman, Andrzej Wajda, Satyajit Ray, Jean-Luc Godard, Miklós Jancsó and others in Britain.[2] The Academy's high standards were maintained by a succession of three managers: Elsie Cohen, George Hoellering and Ivo Jarosy
. The cinema was damaged during a bombing raid in 1940 and re-opened in 1944.

The basement housed a ballroom from the early 1950s where the

Rolling Stones
played their first gig there in 1962. The New Academy cinema expanded to two and then three screens in the 1960s to become the Academy 1-2-3, and closed in 1986 after operating almost continuously for 80 years.

Cinema history

Previous occupiers

Mander Brothers, varnish and colour manufacturers of Wolverhampton until 1998, had a warehouse at 165 Oxford Street in 1884.[3] In December 1901 a partnership between Henry Clarke of 165 Oxford Street, and three Mander brothers (including Sir Charles Tertius Mander) was dissolved when Clarke retired.[4][5]

Hale's Tours

Entrance to a Hale's Tour

From at least 1906 the building housed a

J. Henry Iles,[9] and a company named Hales Tours of the World Ltd. was set up in December of that year to take over the running of 165 Oxford Street.[8]

J. Henry Iles and Joseph Menchen

Iles (who later owned Dreamland Margate) was a director of an Anglo-American syndicate, European Amusement Parks Ltd.,[10][11] which brought Luna Parks to Britain and Europe from around 1907. His business partners were Frank C. Bostock, a circus owner; H. C. McGarvie, an experienced showman "who probably had more experience in international expositions than any other living human being";[12] and McGarvie's business partner Joseph Menchen, who had been in the seaside and trolley park entertainment business since 1899.[13] He had constructed cycloramas based on the Johnstown Flood of 1889,[14] and furnished the complex electrical lighting effects for the 'Trip to the Moon'[15] and other cycloramas at Coney Island.

The Picture House

Trade press advertisement for The Miracle, March 1913
Engelbert Humperdinck, composer of the full-length orchestral and choral score of The Miracle

The premises were remodelled/rebuilt by the architects Gilbert & Constanduros[16][n 1]

The Picture House opened on Friday 24 January 1913 as a semi-permanent home for the world's first full-colour feature film,

Olympia. As most of our readers may be aware, the Picture House is in Oxford Street, at the junction of Poland Street, and exactly opposite to that long neglected playhouse, the Princess's Theatre. One steps from the street down a mosaic pavement straight into the stalls, which are fitted with tip-ups, upholstered in canary silk. Here and there the walls, in cream and gold, are relieved with exquisitely panelled paintings of seventeenth century figures, while the lower part of the walls are of solid mahogany. Lights branching from old-world vases are dotted about, and high overhead is a huge electrolier
, beyond the crystal beads of which gleam and glow 500 lamps, bathing the hall in a soft, warm light.

The circle — there is only one — is reached by a broad stairway of white and green marble, and there is never a pillar to obstruct the view. But even beyond an outward display science plays its part at the picture house, in that the heating and ventilating arrangements are on the most approved system, and fire is certainly considered to be next to impossible.

The aim is to make this theatre the home of the world's most realistic films, and the start made on Friday with those wonderful pictures of "The Miracle" straight from

Covent Garden Theatre has undoubtedly given the place a good send off. As at Covent Garden, "The Miracle" at the Picture House is portrayed to the accompaniment of Professor Humperdinck's beautiful music, which is rendered by an orchestra and a choir both under the guidance of Mr. Sydney Freedom, who was the leader of the orchestra when Professor Rheinhardt [sic] produced the play at Olympia
.

A special setting has been given to the picture by the erection of the convent and cathedral gates in uralite stone,[n 2] extending across the entire circle. With its doors, steps, towers, and windows, this grey entrance, 60 feet wide and 45 feet high, looks as though it had been taken bodily from some mediaeval German city. That the popularity of this picture is by no means on the wane has been proved by the vast audiences which have thronged the Picture House since its opening with "The Miracle".[1]

A company named 'The Picture House (Oxford-Street) Limited' was due to be wound up on 17 October 1915.[20] Menchen returned to the USA in 1917.

The Picture House continued to show films through the 1920s: the programme for October 1926 included Lady Windermere's Fan with Ronald Colman; The Sea Beast with John Barrymore; Ralph Ince and the alluring Olive Borden in Yellow Fingers; and The Sea Urchin with Betty Balfour.[21][22]

The Academy cinema

Eric Hakim

See also: Robert and Raymond Hakim and André Hakim

By 1929 the cinema at 165 Oxford Street had been bought or leased by Eric Hakim (1900–1967). His forebears were Armenian, and he came to England from France with 'a wealthy relative' (possibly his mother).[23] In 1913, Hakim (aged 13) played at a gathering in Nice at the home of Claire Virenque, founder of the fr:Prix de littérature spiritualiste: "The virtuoso Eric Hakim played a fugue by Bach, and other old tunes; admirably accompanied by his mother, Mme Hakim, this young artist obtained the stunning success to which he is accustomed."[n 3]

He came to England, and played as an orchestral violinist in cinemas run by the Davis brothers.[25] Hakim may have modernised the Academy,[26] which he owned by 1929, when he bemoaned the lot of the cinema owner (or exhibitor) during the transition from silent to sound films: "At the moment the renter is in the fortunate position of being able to hold the pistol at the head of the exhibitor because, not only is there a shortage of silent films, but also the exhibitor, having spent large sums of money in talking equipment, is forced to show talking films, which leaves the renter in the position of being able to dictate terms."[27]

In 1931, Hakim directed the dubbing in English of the original German version of M which had played in US theatres with subtitles with little success.[28] The dubbing was made in England, where Peter Lorre was one of the few original cast to be re-recorded in English.[28] He went on to produce several films, the first two with his Eric Hakim Productions. The Outsider[29] did well in the US, being shown by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in the US in its premier first-release circuit. Backed by the Rothschilds and with a 70% guarantee from MGM, he produced two more films both directed by Fred Niblo and starring Adolphe Menjou.[30] With the first, Two White Arms, Hakim brought Margaret Bannerman into the talking era,[31] and in 1932 he produced Diamond Cut Diamond (US:Blame the Woman).[32] In 1932 he also produced The Temperance Fête,[33] and The Crooked Lady, distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer with photography by Basil Emmott.[34]

Hakim had hoped to secure the services of Fritz Kreisler to star in Passion Hunger, a story of a famous violinist and his amorous intrigues; but the deal fell through.[35] He married Nina Vanna in September 1933,[36] but was bankrupt by 1934[37] with declared liabilities of $195,000 and assets of $230.[23] He remained legally bankrupt (although he had plenty of money) for at least 11 years with seven further petitions against him, and divorced Vanna after an affair with Norma Irene Zoe Plumby-Matthews ('Norma Dawn') in late 1945.[23][38][n 4]

'Unusual films'

The Davis brothers owned a chain of 'Pavilion' cinemas in London. In April 1927 they sold them to the

Gaumont British Theatres Ltd. circuit, with a contract which allowed them to show their own choice of films.[40] Stuart Davis dedicated the 750-seat Avenue Pavilion[26] at 101 Shaftesbury Avenue to 'continental' films[41] and started the 'Unusual Film' movement, showing first German and Russian classics, then French avant-garde works by such as Man Ray. A number of showings were organised by The Film Society, whose supporters included H. G. Wells and George Bernard Shaw.[42]

In 1929 Davies's contract with Gaumont expired and, at Davis' suggestion, Gaumont turned the remodelled Avenue Pavilion into London's first newsreel cinema.[43] This left the Film Society without a permanent venue.

The highbrow literary film journal Close Up, published by the Pool Group from 1927 to 1933, played a significant part in promoting European and art-house films.[44]

Elsie Cohen

The Netherlands-born Elsie Cohen,[45] who had worked on Dutch and German film productions, took over the Windmill Theatre for six months in 1929 and successfully put on a highbrow season of recent Russian and German films.[46][47] Stuart Davis had already approached Eric Hakim, the owner of the Picture House, but Hakim wanted too big a rent.[48] However, Elsie Cohen persuaded Hakim to let her manage the cinema, and it opened as The Academy in 1931 with Alexander Dovzhenko's Earth ('Zemlya'), one of the last silent films before the 'talkies' took over.[46]

In order to encourage students and other film aficionados, a number of seats in the stalls were available at reduced prices.[26]

Art-house cinema

A typical press advertisement in April 1932 announced G. W. Pabst’s "great epic of the mines" Kameradschaft; Mädchen in Uniform, Mutter Krausen, Road to Life, and Alone by Trauberg and Kozintsev.[49]

The BFI was founded in 1933,[50] and the moderne-style Curzon Cinema in Mayfair was built as a rival in 1934.[51]

George Hoellering

interned as an enemy alien. The Academy re-opened in 1944 with Hoellering as director, a position he held until his death in 1980.[55] His right-hand man was his stepson Ivo Jarosy, who started as the Academy's publicist in 1938 and wrote carefully researched press releases.[56][57] He worked closely with Peter Strausfeld (also interned with Hoellering on the Isle of Man) who created original linocut images for the Academy's distinctive posters since the cinema had a policy of not using any existing publicity material.[2]

Apart from European features and avant-garde or experimental films, the Academy programmed a range of documentary films such as The Way We Live

J. S. Bach (1949).[61] A film which showed at The Academy after the war could obtain up to 1,000 bookings across the country, although the British commercial film industry had been slow to embrace documentaries.[62]

Hoellering was approached in 1965 by the writer and filmmaker

Rolling Stones in 1966 and 1967 (see below
).

Academy 1-2-3

The cinema re-opened as Academy One in May 1964, the smaller Academy Two started in March 1965, and Academy Three in April 1967 after some considerable strengthening and rebuilding in the basement.[64] Hoellering died in 1980; the theatres closed permanently on 2 April 1986 and were demolished in 1989.[65]

Basement

Institute of Contemporary Arts

Bebende Kapelle ('Quaking Chapel') by Paul Klee, lent to the ICA's first exhibition in 1948 by Peter Watson[n 5]

In 1948, in order to remedy the lack of initiative shown by the

Vassily Kandinsky, as well as British contemporaries Francis Bacon, Eduardo Paolozzi, Victor Pasmore and Barbara Hepworth.[66][67][n 6]

The poet and literary critic Herbert Read, co-founder of the ICA, wrote about the exhibition:

"Such is our ideal – not another museum, another bleak exhibition gallery, another classical building in which insulated and classified specimens of a culture are displayed for instruction, but an adult play-centre, a workshop where work is a joy, a source of vitality and daring experiment. We may be mocked for our naive idealism, but at least it will not be possible to say that an expiring civilisation perished without a creative protest."[70]

Awning over the entrance to the Marquee Club

By 1954, the writer

Elizabeth Lutyens and Eduardo Paolozzi jazz became part of the ICA culture; and even Melody Maker began advertising in the ICA's monthly bulletin.[72]

Marquee Club

Main article: Marquee Club

The Marquee Club opened in the basement (previously the Marquee Ballroom) on 19 April 1958.[73] The Rollin' Stones played their first gig there on 12 July 1962.[74]

See also

20 Frith Street

References

Notes
  1. ^ Horace Gilbert & Stephanos Constanduros designed two cinemas operated by Montagu Pyke, the Piccadilly Cinematograph Theatre (later the Cannon Moulin) at 44 Great Windmill Street, and the Palace in Seven Sisters Road.[17] One of their 'bijou mews' conversions was featured in Country Life.[18] The partnership was dissolved in May 1924.[19]
  2. ISBN 9781849085809
    .
  3. morganatically married Prince Pasquale, Count of Bari, half-brother of the ex-King of Naples. "He was the black sheep of his family, was involved in no end of unsavoury scrapes, and in 1878 disgraced himself by his marriage to a woman of the French half-world, who had styled herself "Mlle. Blanche de Mareonnay."[24]
  4. ^ The judge in the case, Sir Ernest Bruce Charles,[39] made some disparaging remarks about the 24 year-old singer, to which she replied "I must go out, you're a wicked old man."
  5. ^ Watson, talking once about Klee to Stephen Spender, said "that there was something that painters like Klee did which had never been done before, and this was to paint interior light shining outwards." Clark, Adrian. "The art collection of Peter Watson (1908–1956)" (PDF). The British Art Journal. XVI (2): 104 [4]. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  6. ^ The full alphabetical list of around 100 exhibitors (too long to reproduce here)[68] essentially represents a Who's Who of Modernism since 1908, although André Derain's Pool of London dates from 1906.[69]
Citations
  1. ^ a b "The Miracle at the Oxford Street Picture House".CNPG 1913, p. 21 [413], 29 January 1913
  2. ^ a b Eyles 1996.
  3. ^ International Health Exhibition, 1884 : official catalogue. London: William Clowes and Son, p. 88
  4. ^ The London Gazette, 3 January 1902 Archived 26 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine, issue 27393, p. 29.
  5. ^ Mander, Nicholas. "A brief history of the Mander family". Archived 5 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine Owlpen Manor Estate. Retrieved 2 March 2016.
  6. ^ McKernan 2007, p. 129.
  7. ^ "Hale's Tours and Scenes of the World". Motion Picture World. 29 (3): 372 [435]. 15 July 1916.
  8. ^ a b "Hales Tours of the World Ltd". The London Project. AHRB Centre for British Film and Television Studies. Retrieved 27 February 2016.
  9. ^ Fell 1983, p. 125.
  10. ^ "Coney Island for London: American Open-air Amusements to be Exploited in Europe". London American Register: 1. 18 July 1908.
  11. ^ "The American "Pleasure Park" is to be introduced into England". Motion Picture World: 171. May 1907.
  12. ^ Billboard, 29 April 1922
  13. ^ New York Dramatic Mirror, 26 August 1899, p. 14[permanent dead link].
  14. ^ Ocean Grove Times, (New Jersey), 9 July 1904 p. 1e.[permanent dead link]
  15. ^ Hence Luna Park
  16. ^ "Horace Gilbert" Archived 5 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine. Dictionary of Scottish Architects (2014). Accessed 29 February 2016.
  17. ^ "Movie Theaters Designed by Gilbert & Constanduros" Archived 4 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine. Cinema Treasures. Accessed 29 February 2016.
  18. ^ 'No. 1, Mount Row, W. and its conversion by Messrs. Gilbert and Constanduros', by R.R.P., in Country Life, 28 July 1923, pp. 131–2.
  19. ^ "London Gazette, 5 December 1924, p. 8919" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 26 March 2016. Retrieved 29 February 2016.
  20. ^ The London Gazette 14 September 1915, p. 9125 Archived 27 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine This company's directors may have been Menchen and/or Iles, or perhaps other EAPL members.
  21. ^ "Cinema programmes 1922-26".[permanent dead link] Alamy.com. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  22. ^ "Cinema programmes, inside pages, 1922 and 1926". Archived 6 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine Alamy.com. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  23. ^ a b c "Mystery of bankrupt: Mr. Hakim's ready riches". The Milwaukee Sentinel (WI). 9 December 1945. p. 4 [39]. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  24. ^ "Selection of guests is cause of royal row" Archived 4 January 2023 at the Wayback Machine Times-Dispatch (Richmond, VA), 26 July 1913, p. 5e.
  25. ^ Rotha 1999, pp. 185–6.
  26. ^ a b c Mazdon & Wheatley 2010, p. 20.
  27. ^ Kine Weekly, 22 August 1929, cited in Wood, Linda (2009) [1986]. British Films 1927-1939 (PDF). BFI National Library. Retrieved 28 February 2016.
  28. ^ a b Jensen 1969, p. 93.
  29. ^ "The Outsider (1931)". BFI screenonline. Archived from the original on 11 March 2016. Retrieved 1 March 2016.
  30. ^ "MGM British production plans". Motion Picture Herald: 52b. 21 November 1931.
  31. ^ The Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser, 2 December 1931, p. 13c Archived 7 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine.
  32. ^ "Eric Hakim" Archived 11 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine. BFI. Accessed 27 February 2016.
  33. ^ The world film encyclopedia, 1933 Archived 11 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine, p. 18.
  34. ^ Motion Picture Herald, 2 April 1932, p. 10
  35. ^ "Hakim's Kreisler Deal Off". The Bioscope, 6 April 1932, p. 10.
  36. ^ "The Straits Times, 21 September 1933, p. 20". Archived from the original on 8 March 2016. Retrieved 2 March 2016.
  37. ^ Edinburgh Gazette, 11 September 1934, p. 774a Archived 26 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine.
  38. ^ "Brandy seller gets cash back". The Spokesman-Review. 10 May 1946. p. 1d. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  39. ^ "Sir Ernest Bruce Charles". National Portrait Gallery. Retrieved 3 March 2013.
  40. ^ Rotha 1999, pp. 184–5.
  41. ^ "Gaumont News Theatre". Cinema Treasures. Retrieved 1 March 2016.
  42. ^ "Film Society, The (1925-39)" Archived 3 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine. BFI Screenonline. Accessed 29 February 2016.
  43. ^ Rotha 1999, pp. 185.
  44. ^ "Along these lines, the collection reprints an admiring essay on Elsie Cohen's ambitious Academy Cinema, as well as polemics about worker's films, art films, and so forth." Donald et al. 1998, p. 324.
  45. ^ Fletcher, Tony (28 October 2007). "Elsie Cohen Homepage". WSBC: Women and Silent British Cinema. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  46. ^ a b Coxhead 1933, p. 109.
  47. ^ "Windmill International". Cinema Treasures. Retrieved 23 October 2020.
  48. ^ Rotha 1999, pp. 186.
  49. ^ "Contents" (PDF). The Adelphi. 4 (1): [1]. April 1932. Retrieved 27 February 2016.
  50. ^ Hanson 2007, p. 78.
  51. ^ Eyles, Allen. "Cinemas & Cinemagoing: Art House & Repertory" Archived 3 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine. BFI screenonline. Accessed 29 February 2016.
  52. ^ Szefkü 2013, pp. 51, 56.
  53. ^ a b Szefkü 2013, p. 56.
  54. ^ Ciné Magazine, Vol. 13 No. 1, January 1933, p. 55b Archived 11 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine (in French). In the same news item: Hakim had bought the rights to René Clair's 14 Juillet [fr], and L'Atlantide (1932 film) by Pabst was showing at the Academy.
  55. ^ Szefkü 2013, p. 57.
  56. ^ Eyles, Allen (6 May 1996). "Ivo Jarosy: Obituary". Independent. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  57. ^ "Ivo Jarosy". BFI. Archived from the original on 11 March 2016. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  58. ^ "The Way We Live". YouTube. Retrieved 20 June 2016.
  59. ^ "Children On Trial". YouTube. Retrieved 20 June 2016.
  60. ^ Enticknap 1999, p. 216.
  61. JSTOR 937811
    .
  62. ^ Enticknap 1999, pp. 204–6.
  63. ^ a b Darke 2005, pp. 83–4.
  64. ^ "40 Years Ago: The adaptability of steelwork". New Steel Construction. (From Building with Steel, 1966). February 2006. Retrieved 26 May 2016.
  65. ^ Photo album at "Academy Oxford Street" Archived 8 April 2016 at the Wayback Machine. Flickr. Accessed 29 February 2016.
  66. ^ a b c Phillips, Sinker & Hines 1997, p. 3.
  67. ^ Massey, Anne (2014) Cataloguing the ICA’s history: an ephemeral past. Archived 6 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine In: Association of Art Historians Annual Conference, 10–12 April 2014, Royal College of Art. Middlesex University. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  68. ^ "ICA Exhibitions List, 1948—Present" (PDF). Institute of Contemporary Arts. 2012. Archived from the original (PDF) on 24 September 2015. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  69. ^ "André Derain 'The Pool of London' 1906". Tate Gallery. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  70. ^ Phillips, Sinker & Hines 1997, p. 4.
  71. ^ Hibbert, Adam (26 February 1999). "The NS Profile - The Institute of Contemporary Arts". New Statesman. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
  72. ^ Phillips, Sinker & Hines 1997, p. 7.
  73. ^ "The Oxford St. days (1958-1964)". TheMarqueeClub.net. Archived from the original on 7 March 2016. Retrieved 27 February 2016.
  74. ^ Wyman 2002, pp. 36–37.
Sources

External links

51°30′56″N 00°08′16″W / 51.51556°N 0.13778°W / 51.51556; -0.13778

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