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39-484: It was founded in c.  1913  – c.  1914 , as The Regent, a nickelodeon -style small movie theater often showing Mary Pickford films. It later became The Avalon in 1931. In 1935, it opened as The Clay International under the leadership of Herbert Rosener, and was focused on showing foreign films. It was the first theater in the city dedicated to foreign film. The Song to Her (1934), and Goodbye, Beautiful Days (1935) were shown here in 1935. In

78-731: A 1907 article published in The Saturday Evening Post : Other 1907 films also distributed to nickelodeons by the Miles Brothers: Though strong throughout the years from 1905 to 1913, nickelodeons became victims of their own success as attendance grew rapidly, necessitating larger auditoriums. Nickelodeons further declined with the advent of the feature film , and as cities grew and industry consolidation led to larger, more comfortable, better-appointed movie theaters. Longer films caused ticket prices to double from five cents to ten cents. Although their heyday

117-723: A book Upton Sinclair Presents William Fox in which Fox recounted his life, and stating his views on what he considered to be a large Wall Street conspiracy against him. Fox died in 1952 at the age of 73. His death went largely unnoticed by the film industry; no one from Hollywood attended his funeral. He is interred at Salem Fields Cemetery, Brooklyn . Fox personally oversaw the construction of many Fox Theatres in American cities including Atlanta , St Louis , Detroit , Portland , Oakland , San Francisco and San Diego . His companies had an estimated value of $ 300,000,000 and he personally owned 53 percent of Fox Film and 93 percent of

156-484: A five-month and seventeen day prison sentence on charges of conspiring to obstruct justice and defraud the United States, in connection with his bankruptcy. Years after his prison release, U.S. President Harry Truman would grant Fox a Presidential pardon. For many years, Fox resented the way that Wall Street had forced him from control of his company. In 1933, he collaborated with the writer Upton Sinclair on

195-461: A large part in stimulating, also led to the development of intertitles , which appeared in 1903 and helped make actions and scenes clearer as storylines became more complicated. A side-effect of this change was that it minimized the role of exhibitors, since they no longer had the editorial control of organizing single-shot films into programs, and now their narrative responsibility (some exhibitors would talk and help explain narratives as they unfolded)

234-699: A movie theater. He also continued to focus his concentration in New York and New Jersey. Beginning in 1914, New Jersey–based Fox bought films outright from the Balboa Amusement Producing Company in Long Beach, California, for distribution to his own theaters and then for rental to other theaters across the country. He formed the Fox Film Corporation on February 1, 1915, with insurance and banking money provided by

273-697: A second one, The Family Theatre soon after. In 1907, Louis B. Mayer renovated the Gem Theater in Haverhill, Massachusetts , converting it into a nickelodeon, which he opened as the Orpheum Theater, announcing that it would be "the home of refined entertainment devoted to Miles Brothers moving pictures and illustrated songs ". Other well-known nickelodeon owners were the Skouras Brothers of St. Louis. Nickelodeons radically changed

312-478: A showman, he concentrated on acquiring and building theaters. Following the purchase of his first nickelodeon, Fox would then use it to create a chain of movie theaters and purchase film prints from major film companies at the time such as Biograph , Essanay , Kalem , Lubin , Pathé , Selig , and Vitagraph . In 1910, Fox managed to successfully lease the New York Academy of Music and convert it into

351-479: A small storefront theater with the name on Smithfield Street in Pittsburgh , Pennsylvania . Although it was not the first theater to show films, a 1919 news article claimed that it was the first theater in the world "devoted exclusively to exhibition of moving picture spectacles". Davis and Harris found such great success with their operation that their concept of a five-cent theater showing movies continuously

390-498: A trend that culminated in the lavish " movie palaces " of the 1920s. Film historian Charles Musser wrote: "It is not too much to say that modern cinema began with the nickelodeons." The name "Nickelodeon" was first used in 1888 by Colonel William Austin for his Austin's Nickelodeon , a dime museum located in Boston , Massachusetts . The term was popularized by Harry Davis and John P. Harris . On June 19, 1905, they opened

429-525: A variety of short films. Directors had a great desire to make longer films, because it meant greater artistic innovation as they tried to find new ways to engage audiences. The popularity of longer films also meant an increase in production of fictional films as actualities decreased. One of the possible reasons for this shift is that fiction films were often easier to plan and cheaper to film than actualities, which were subject to various location-related difficulties. Fiction films quickly became standardized, and

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468-417: The 1909 Broadway production A Fool There Was by Porter Emerson Browne , in turn based on Rudyard Kipling 's poem The Vampire , in turn inspired by Philip Burne-Jones 's painting, The Vampire (1897), modelled by Mrs Patrick Campbell , Burne-Jones' lover and George Bernard Shaw 's "second famed platonic love affair". In 1925–1926, Fox purchased the rights to the work of Freeman Harrison Owens ,

507-474: The 1950s, the building exterior was greatly modified, including moving of the ticketing booth and a change to the shape of the entrance (formerly an archway). In modern-day, the single screen theater held 325 seats. Filmmaker John Waters had remembered early showings of Pink Flamingos (1972) at the Clay Theatre. It was also known for midnight showings of The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975), after

546-545: The Fox studio in Hollywood she frequently worked in when she worked with Fox's company and that his movies were mainly managed by his movie makers. Following the 1927 death of Marcus Loew , head of Loews Incorporated , the parent company of rival studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer , control of MGM passed to his longtime associate, Nicholas Schenck . Fox saw an opportunity to expand his empire, and in 1929, with Schenck's assent, bought

585-519: The Loew family's MGM holdings, unbeknownst to MGM studio bosses Louis B. Mayer and Irving Thalberg . Mayer and Thalberg were outraged; despite their high posts at MGM, they were not shareholders. Mayer used his strong political connections to persuade the Justice Department to sue Fox for violating federal antitrust laws. In July 1929, Fox was severely injured in an automobile accident. By

624-688: The McCarter, Kuser and Usar families of Newark, New Jersey, and the small New Jersey investment house of Eisele and King. The company's first film studio was leased in Fort Lee, New Jersey, where many other early film studios were based at the beginning of the 20th century. He now had the capital to acquire facilities and expand his production capacity. Between 1915 and 1919, Fox would rake in millions of dollars through films which featured Fox Film's first breakout star Theda Bara , known as " The Vamp ", for her performance in A Fool There Was (1915), based on

663-527: The U.S. rights to the Tri-Ergon system invented by three German inventors (Josef Engl (1893–1942), Hans Vogt (1890–1979), and Joseph Massolle (1889–1957)), and the work of Theodore Case to create the Fox Movietone sound-on-film system, introduced in 1927 with the release of F. W. Murnau 's Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans . Sound-on-film systems such as Movietone and RCA Photophone soon became

702-506: The building re-opening as a movie theater, and in May 2022 it was designated a city landmark. In February 2024, it and the adjacent store were sold. Nickelodeon (movie theater) The nickelodeon was the first type of indoor exhibition space dedicated to showing projected motion pictures in the United States and Canada. Usually set up in converted storefronts, these small, simple theaters charged five cents for admission (a "nickel", hence

741-634: The central attraction. They did not have to worry about finding new audiences because the same audience would return again and again to watch different films. Exhibition practices greatly varied and programs lasted anywhere from ten minutes to an hour and a half or more in length. Often, programs ran continuously and patrons would join a program already in progress when they arrived and stay as long as they liked. While some nickelodeons only showed films, others offered shows that combined films with vaudeville acts or illustrated songs. The desirability of longer films, which enabled nickelodeons to grow as they would,

780-521: The film release and a decade after. The Clay was part of a chain of indie theaters across the United States owned by Landmark Theatres starting in 1991 (and sometimes called Landmark's Clay Theatre). In late January 2020, shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic , the Clay Theatre was closed by Landmark Theatres. In 2021, the owner removed the seating from the theater and filed an application to convert it to retail use. The local community rallied in hopes of

819-473: The larger movie theaters were set up there. Neighborhood nickelodeons, which were the majority of movie theaters in Manhattan, were almost always located in neighborhoods with high residential densities and spread over a substantial number of blocks. Nickelodeons usually showed films about ten to fifteen minutes in length, and in a variety of styles and subjects, such as short narratives, "scenics" (views of

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858-506: The middle-class stayed away until after World War I. This idea was reflected in Lewis Jacobs ' 1939 survey, where he wrote: "concentrated largely in poorer shopping districts and slum neighborhoods, nickelodeons were disdained by the well-to-do. But, the workmen and their families who patronized the movies did not mind the crowded, unsanitary, and hazardous accommodations most of the nickelodeons offered." More recent historians argue

897-447: The modes of distribution and the types of films being made. Around 1903, longer multi-shot films became more prevalent, and this shift brought about important innovations in the distribution of films with the establishment of film exchanges . Film exchanges would buy films from manufacturers and then rent them out to exhibitors. With a steady supply of different films, exhibitors finally had the possibility to open venues, where films were

936-672: The name) and flourished from about 1905 to 1915. American cable station Nickelodeon was named after the theater. "Nickelodeon" was concocted from nickel , the name of the U.S. five-cent coin, and the ancient Greek word odeion , a roofed-over theater, the latter indirectly by way of the Odéon in Paris, emblematic of a very large and luxurious theater, much as the Ritz was of a grand hotel. The earliest films had been shown in "peep show" machines or projected in vaudeville theaters as one of

975-589: The otherwise live acts. Nickelodeons drastically altered film exhibition practices and the leisure-time habits of a large segment of the American public. Although they were characterized by continuous performances of a selection of short films, added attractions such as illustrated songs were sometimes an important feature. Regarded as disreputable and dangerous by some civic groups and municipal agencies, crude, ill-ventilated nickelodeons with hard wooden seats were outmoded as longer films became common and larger, more comfortably furnished motion-picture theaters were built,

1014-411: The popularity of longer films meant they outperformed actualities, which were usually short. Early writers on American cinema history assumed that audiences at nickelodeons were primarily working-class people who could not afford a higher ticket price. At the heart of the image of nickelodeons in traditional histories is the belief that movies were a simple amusement for the working class, and that

1053-587: The rise of the middle class audiences throughout the nickelodeon era and into the later 1910s belief to expand the business. In 1985, Robert C. Allen debated whether movies attracted a middle-class audience as illustrated by the location of earlier movie theaters in traditional entertainment districts, where more nickelodeons were located in or near middle-class neighborhoods than in the Lower East Side ghetto. The nickelodeon boom in Manhattan between 1905 and 1907 often functioned as historical shorthand for

1092-567: The rise of the movies in general. In 2004, Ben Singer wrote in his analysis of Manhattan nickelodeons; "for most people ... the image of cramped, dingy nickelodeons in Manhattan's Lower East Side ghetto stands as a symbol for the cinema's emergence in America." Nickelodeons consistently appeared in the densest areas of the city in terms of residential concentration and the amount of pedestrian traffic. Areas such as Union Square , Herald Square , 23rd Street, and 125th Street were typical locations and

1131-543: The screen hung on the back wall. A piano (and maybe a drum set) would be placed to the side of, or below the screen. Larger nickelodeons sometimes had the capacity for well over 1,000 people. In 1905, William Fox started his first nickelodeon in Brooklyn . He owned numerous theaters in New York and New Jersey . In 1906, Carl Laemmle opened his first nickelodeon, The White Front on Milwaukee Avenue (Chicago) and

1170-682: The standard, and competing sound-on-disc technologies, such as Warner Bros. ' Vitaphone , became obsolete. From 1928 to 1964, Fox Movietone News was one of the major newsreel series in the U.S., along with The March of Time (1935–1951) and Universal Newsreel (1929–1967). Despite the fact that his film studio was based in Hollywood, Fox opted to instead remain in New York and was more familiar with his financiers than with either his movie makers or movie stars. Prominent Fox Film Corporation actress Janet Gaynor even acknowledged that she barely knew William Fox, stating "I only met him to say how do you do." Gaynor also stated that Fox would rarely visit

1209-581: The time he recovered, the stock market crash in October 1929 had wiped out virtually his entire fortune, ending any chance of the Loews-Fox merger going through even if the Justice Department had approved it. Fox lost control of his organization in 1930 during a hostile takeover . In 1935, Fox Film Corporation would merge with 20th Century Pictures , becoming 20th Century-Fox . William Fox

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1248-563: The world from moving trains), "actualities" (precursors of later documentary films ), illustrated songs, local or touring song and dance acts, comedies , melodramas , problem plays , stop-action sequences , sporting events and other features which allowed them to compete with vaudeville houses. The titles of a few of the films released in 1907 and distributed to nickelodeons by the Miles Brothers (Herbert, Harry and Earl C.) partially illustrate this diversity. These are taken from

1287-524: Was also minimized by this "internal narration" in the film. William Fox (producer) Wilhelm Fried Fuchs ( Hungarian : Fried Vilmos ; January 1, 1879 – May 8, 1952), commonly and better known as William Fox , was a Hungarian-American film industry executive who founded the Fox Film Corporation in 1915 and the Fox West Coast Theatres chain in the 1920s. Although he lost control of his film businesses in 1930, his name

1326-427: Was never connected with the ownership, production or management of the movie studio that famously bore his name. A combination of the stock market crash, Fox's car accident injuries, and government antitrust action, forced him into a protracted seven-year legal battle to stave off bankruptcy . At his bankruptcy hearing in 1936, he attempted to bribe judge John Warren Davis and committed perjury . In 1943, Fox served

1365-671: Was nine months old and settled in New York City, where they had twelve more children, of whom only six survived. With his family largely destitute, William found himself as a youth forced to sell candy in Central Park , work as a newsboy, and in the fur and garment industry. At the age of eight, he fell off the back of an ice truck, breaking his left arm; subsequent treatment left it permanently impaired. In 1900, Fox started his own company, which he sold in 1904 to purchase his first nickelodeon . Always more of an entrepreneur than

1404-454: Was relatively brief, nickelodeons played an important part in creating a specialized spectator, "the moviegoer", who could now integrate going to the movies into their life in a way that was impossible before. Miriam Hansen has noted that the term "spectator" had become common by 1910. The nickelodeon explosion also increased the demand for new films, as thousands of theaters needed new product. The growth of longer films, which nickelodeons played

1443-446: Was soon imitated by hundreds of ambitious entrepreneurs, as was the name of the theater itself. Statistics at the time show that the number of nickelodeons in the United States doubled between 1907 and 1908 to around 8,000, and it was estimated that by 1910 as many as 26 million Americans visited these theaters weekly. Nickelodeons in converted storefronts typically seated fewer than 200 – the patrons often sat on hard wooden chairs, with

1482-546: Was the result of many factors. Economic competition between film production companies put pressure on them to create more elaborate, and often longer, films, to differentiate one film from another. Longer films were also more attractive, as the price paid by exhibitors depended on a film's length and the longer a film, the more profit there was to be made. Some exhibitors found longer films more desirable since it made programming easier, faster, and possibly cheaper, as they no longer had to organize their own programs by editing together

1521-552: Was used by 20th Century Fox (now part of The Walt Disney Company ) and continues to be used in the trademarks of the present-day Fox Corporation , including the Fox Broadcasting Company , Fox News , Fox Sports and Foxtel . Fox was born Wilhelm Fried Fuchs in Tolcsva , Hungary. His parents, Michael Fuchs and Anna Fried, were both Hungarian Jews . The family immigrated to the United States when William

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