The Rialto Theatre was a movie palace in New York City located at 1481 Broadway, at the northwest corner of Seventh Avenue and 42nd Street, within the Theater District of

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

. The 1,960-seat theater opened on April 21, 1916, on the former site of Oscar Hammerstein's

Vaudeville Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 19th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition ...

venue the Victoria Theatre. Together with Strand Theatre, they were the most important movie theatres on Broadway at the time. It exclusively played Triangle Film Corporation films but beginning in 1919, the Rialto Theatre premiered many releases by

Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film and television production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the main namesake division of Paramount Global (formerly ViacomCBS). It is the fifth-oldes ...

(then known as the

Famous Players-Lasky Corporation Famous Players-Lasky Corporation was an American motion picture and distribution company formed on June 28, 1916, from the merger of Adolph Zukor's Famous Players Film Company—originally formed by Zukor as Famous Players in Famous Plays—and t ...

) until being supplanted by the newly built Paramount Theatre in 1926 as the movie studio's flagship theater in New York City. When Paramount sold the building in 1935, the Rialto Theatre was demolished and rebuilt on a smaller scale, with the rest of the building dedicated to shops and office space. Cat People advertisements at theater entrance

Cat People advertisements at theater entrance

By the 1970s, the theater had become an adult movie theater. In February 1980, it abandoned adult films in lieu of legitimate theater, becoming host to live theatrical productions. The building also contained a TV studio called Times Square Studios (not related to the studio owned by ABC). It was once home to

daytime Daytime as observed on Earth is the period of the day during which a given location experiences natural illumination from direct sunlight. Daytime occurs when the Sun appears above the local horizon, that is, anywhere on the globe's hemi ...

talk show A talk show (or chat show in British English) is a television programming or radio programming genre structured around the act of spontaneous conversation.Bernard M. Timberg, Robert J. Erler'' (2010Television Talk: A History of the TV Talk Sh ...

s hosted by

Geraldo Rivera Geraldo Rivera (born Gerald Riviera; July 4, 1943) is an American journalist, attorney, author, political commentator, and former television host. He hosted the tabloid talk show '' Geraldo'' from 1987 to 1998. He gained publicity with the liv ...

and Montel Williams. The building was torn down in 1998 and

3 Times Square 3 Times Square, also known as the Thomson Reuters Building, is a 30-story skyscraper at Times Square in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City. Located on Seventh Avenue between 42nd and 43rd Street, the building measures ...

, a high-rise office building, was erected in its place.

In popular culture

The Rialto's predecessor, the Hammerstein vaudeville venue, is featured in the 1948 film ''

Portrait of Jennie ''Portrait of Jennie'' is a 1948 American fantasy film based on the 1940 novella by Robert Nathan. The film was directed by William Dieterle and produced by David O. Selznick. It stars Jennifer Jones and Joseph Cotten. At the 21st Academy Awa ...

''. Jennie's parents are high-wire trapeze artists who perform at Hammerstein's until tragedy strikes. The Rialto itself also makes an appearance in the film, with a Mickey Mouse cartoon playing in the background.''Portrait of Jennie'' (David O. Selznick, 1948). Box office receipts from the premiere at the Rialto Theatre of

's 1926 movie Old Ironsides (film), directed by James Cruz went to the

USS Constitution USS ''Constitution'', also known as ''Old Ironsides'', is a three-masted wooden-hulled heavy frigate of the United States Navy. She is the world's oldest ship still afloat. She was launched in 1797, one of six original frigates authorized ...

restoration fund.

References

{{Times Square Former Broadway theatres Movie palaces Broadway (Manhattan) Demolished buildings and structures in Manhattan Former theatres in Manhattan Buildings and structures demolished in 2002 Theater District, Manhattan Seventh Avenue