Allen Theatre 1921-2021 - 100th Anniversary - update!
From The Plain Dealer, April 2, 1921.
From The Plain Dealer, June 27, 1922
From Exhibitors Herald - World, October 11, 1930.
From The Plain Dealer, June 12, 1931. The Allen becomes the only theatre in Ohio to exhibit Just A Gigolo.
From Motion Picture Daily, June 22, 1931.
From Motion Picture Herald, July 16, 1932.
From The Plain Dealer, November 25, 1932.
From The Plain Dealer, December 22, 1932. The members of this group, M.B. Horowitz, Max Lefkowich, P.E. Essick and Myer Fine were some of the earlier exhibitors in the city. Between them, they controlled dozens of subrunners around town. Interesting they would pool their resources to keep a big downtowner open. A few years later, Max Lefkowich opened the Embassy at 709 Euclid, running it until 1977.
From The Plain Dealer, December 23, 1932.
From The Plain Dealer, December 25, 1932.
From The Plain Dealer, July 21, 1933.
From Universal Weekly, February 10, 1934.
From Variety, February 20, 1934.
From The Plain Dealer, March 2, 1934.
From Variety March 5, 1934.
From The Plain Dealer, July 1, 1934.
Giant birthday cake for Margaret Sullavan during the run of Little Man, from Motion Picture Herald, September 15, 1934.
From Motion Picture Daily, August 20, 1934.
From Motion Picture Daily, August 28, 1934. Howard Higley will manage the Allen until the end of the picture era in May 1968. Higley also survived a shooting in December 1959.
From The Plain Dealer, August 30, 1934.
From The Plain Dealer, August 30, 1934.
From The Plain Dealer, September 23, 1943.
From The Plain Dealer, November 14, 1943.
From Motion Picture Herald, November 18, 1944.
From Motion Picture Herald, December 2, 1944.
From Motion Picture Herald, December 23, 1944.
From Boxoffice, December 28, 1957.
From The Plain Dealer, July 31, 1959.
Anatomy of A Murder tie-in, Allen manager Howard Higley flanked by two "Anatomy Logos" at Seaway Leader Drug, in the Ellington Apartments, SW corner Superior & 9th. from Independent Exhibitor's Film Bulletin, August 31, 1959.
New DP-70's in the booth, from Boxoffice, November 6, 1961. Note the image was reversed in the original publication, I reversed it to correct it, the Allen didn't really have a booth for left handed projectionists.
However the owners of the Bulkley Building which houses the Allen began to lease the theatre for one-nighters.
From The Plain Dealer, October 18, 1968. This was not the first Cleveland appearance of the Airplane, who previously appeared a few doors up the street at Loew's State in WHK's Big Show of '67 on January 7, 1967.
From The Plain Dealer, February 21, 1969. In pre-cable TV, pay-per-view days, special events were broadcast in theatre. The Allen's permanent television system was long gone by this time. A portable system was brought in and set up on a sheet of plywood on top of seats a dozen or so rows back from the stage. The picture was shot onto a small picture screen, pulled back and tied a little to prevent keystoning.
From The Plain Dealer, October 9, 1969. With all the Stax acts on the bill this was sort of like the famous film and concert WattStax of three years later.
Snip from Belkin ad, The Scene, November 5 - 11, 1970.
Meanwhile.....
Ray Shepardson, a man with a plan to save the Allen and the three adjoining theatres slowly begins to gain support. From The Plain Dealer, July 23, 1970.
From The Plain Dealer, November 7, 1971.
From The Cleveland Press, November 9, 1971. I don't know how many times I was on that ladder.
Marquee, November 1971, Larry Nighswander photo.
Rotunda, 1971, William Gesten/Foto Arts Inc.
Elliptical dome, William Gesten/Foto Arts Inc.
Auditorium, William Gesten/Foto Arts Inc. The 1961 renovation cut the capacity to 2,860.
The Budapest Symphony, the first Playhouse Square Association production, from The Plain Dealer Action Tab, November 19, 1971.
From Scene, November 4 - 10, 1971.
The Budapest Symphony Orchestra on the stage, November 21, 1971. William Gesten/Foto Arts Inc. A few weeks before this event, Smitty extended the stage over the orchestra pit, much to the chagrin of IATSE 27.
From The Plain Dealer, November 22, 1971. This proved that people will come downtown if there's something worthwhile on the boards. This point will be hammered home consistently over the next few years, first with these Allen shows, then with Brel in the State, and the shows that followed in the State and the Palace. It's a movement that is sometimes painfully slow to gain momentum against a mountain of naysayers. "No one is going to go down there anymore" is a common theme back then.
From The Plain Dealer, December 5, 1971. Interspersed with PSA attractions over the next year or so were numerous one-nighters by various promotors. The rental of the 2,860 seat Allen back then was $1,000 Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays, other nights were $800, with all rental fees going to Millcapp. The Playhouse Square Association made money off concession sales, percentages of tix sold from the Allen BO, and various fees for providing ushers, use of marquee, sometimes handling ticket distribution, etc. Fees were sometimes flexible, IATSE 27 and Teamsters were not.
From Scene, December 16 - 22, 1971. Sam Knight was a popular local disc jockey,
National Dance Troupe of Sierra Leone flyer, December 27, 1971 - January 2, 1972. This was the second Playhouse Square Association attraction.
From the Plain Dealer Action Tab, January 21, 1972.
From the Plain Dealer Action Tab, February 4, 1972. Not exactly boffo. For this film about $10,000 worth of projection equipment was installed in the Allen, just basic stuff, forget what was there now, maybe a pair Brenkerts, one channel sound on an RCA amp, with one Voice Of The Theatre speaker on the stage. This was the equipment we removed in the summer of 1975.
From the Plain Dealer, February 7, 1972. Zoltan Gombos helped underwrite some of the early Playhouse Square Association attractions, Budapest Symphony, Sierra Leone Dancers, and funded the pre-owned projection equipment for the Adrift film.
Blurb from Jane Scott's Happening column, Plain Dealer, February 25, 1972.
From Scene, February 24 - March 1, 1972. This was the famous show where Crimson's truck broke down and they didn't show up until almost midnight, and they played til 2 AM. A Friend Productions were run by Roger Abramson.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, March 17, 1972. This was my first day at Playhouse Square, I dusted all the seats in the balcony, and sold soda and popcorn at the mezzanine concession stand. The others there at the time were Ray Shepardson, Ceil Hartman, Smitty - Ralph Smith, Veralynne Bosko, Bert LeGrande, Victor Villimas, Bugs - Solomon Alexander, and a girl named Cinnamon. Ray's friend Gordon Bell would often stop in to give a hand when he could. Some of the semi-regulars, volunteers more or less, were: Poe - Ken Plocica, Kevin McAndrew, Chuck Fleming. and Pete Webber. There was also a group of Garfield Heights High School seniors who were volunteer ushers at the shows, unfortunately I can't remember any of their names.
From Scene, March 9 - 15, 1972.
From The Plain Dealer, March 31, 1972.
From The Call & Post, March 23, 1972. I seem to remember this turning into one long show where the acts did a couple turns each. I also learned to count deadwood at this show. There was plenty of it.
From The Plain Dealer, March 26, 1972. This was a fun show, Miss Rand was a pretty cool lady.
From the Cleveland Press, April 1, 1972. I'm pretty sure Victor Villimas is in the Yogi Bear suit.
Victor Villimas and I went into every store on Euclid Avenue, from Playhouse Square to Public Square and back, asking to put up posters. He was dressed like Yogi Bear, I was just a 15 year old kid handing out these flyers. These did not go over well, doubt if there was more than 100 at any of the shows, and a lot fewer than that at most.
From Plain Dealer Action Tab, April 7, 1972. There were maybe a couple hundred people here at most.
From Plain Dealer Action Tab, April 14, 1972. There weren't many at this one either. After the show Peter sat in the rotunda and played for 20 - 30 minutes to a dozen or so fans. A Joe Tex show schedded for the next night was cancelled.
The Save the Allen benefit, from The Scene, April 13 - 19, 1972. Damnation failed to appear. This show was put together by Veralynne Bosko and Smitty (Ralph Smith), Veralynne did the artwork and a lot of the legwork. This was quite a show! It was pretty well attended, maybe 2,000 tix sold. This event was catered by Paul Hom, who was a friend of Smitty's. Paul later catered the tennis party that summer, and parties at the Palace that fall. The next spring saw Paul in charge of the kitchen for the run of Brel in the State.
From The Plain Dealer, May 7, 1972.
Stickers from Polydor Records.
There were also posters for Lily Tomlin, from Polydor Records, my job was to cut the bottom half off these flyers, and paste them onto the blank space at the bottom of the Polydor posters.
Flyer from gospel music show produced by James Bullard.
From Scene, July 13 - 19, 1972. This was an absolutely wild night. White Trash cancelled after drummer Bobby Ramirez was killed in a barroom brawl in Chicago the previous weekend. This was also the first event in Cleveland to ban bottles and cans. I had read in Variety a few weeks earlier where the Kansas City Midland had banned cans and bottles at their rock and roll shows. I pointed this out to Ray and noted how it would keep people from getting hurt by thrown bottles, and how it would also save on trash removal fees. So we tried it out on a new promotor, and the rest is history. Some of the other events that summer can be found here.
Flyer from the second gospel music show produced by James Bullard. These were great shows, James was a really nice guy who would go on to win numerous Grammys.
From the Cleveland Press, August 14, 1972. Woodsmoke was one of two bands that played the tennis benefit, Trevor Guy's & Doll the other.
From The Scene, August 3- 9, 1972. This was a WABQ/Sam Knight production, we handled ticket sales and distribution, traveling around town dropping off blocks of tix at Bibb's and Dean's record stores, and later picked them up. This was somewhat of an infamous show when we found the ticket seller, in the box office, and the ticket taker, both union people, were palming tickets and reselling them. I learned how to do a house count that night, and found there were over 2,000 people there, but only about 600 tickets were actually sold. They burned Sam big time.
From The Scene, August 24- 30, 1972. This was quite the event, a multi-media extravaganza. A few weeks before this a man named Howard Ragland came into the Allen, asking about rental availability. We were sort of skeptical of this guy in a cowboy hat with the southwestern accent as he boasted of sellouts across the country. But when showtime rolled around, mobs swarmed the box office. There were three shows a day, all nine were sold out. The show itself consisted of a 360 degree sound system, with the sound set at the maximum level. 26 film projectors and a wall of slide projectors bombarded the film screen with 6,000 slides. The show opened with a brief montage of rock and roll before the Beatles, then a quick Beatlemania segment, before heading into the much longer later Beatle era. Dick Wooten in the Cleveland Press didn’t care much for it, but the crowd ate it up with a spoon. This was supposed to be the next wave in entertainment, never saw anything else like it. This was a pretty intense experience, and it was LOUD! A couple days before the show, when it was time to put the show up on the marquee, Ray was insistent that the Beatles, should be spelled Beatels, and it stayed that way all weekend, Jane Scott poked fun at us in her column. Ragland and his associate, whose name I can’t recall, were sort of shady individuals. On Saturday night they got a few counterfeit $20 dollar bills, which they passed at a local restaurant. That Sunday night after the last show I went with Ray and Ceil to the Roost and Ranch at 9th and Carnegie for a late night feast after a hectic weekend. By Monday morning, the promoters had left town and the phone was ringing off the hook as hotels and other suppliers tried to collect on their bills. We took cash up front, so we were OK. Ragland brought a slightly different version of this to the Hanna in December 1975.
An amusing blurb from Jane Scott's Happening column in the Plain Dealer Action Tab, August 25, 1972.
Review from the Cleveland Press, August 26, 1972.
From Scene, August 31 - September 6, 1972.
From Scene, August 31 - September 6, 1972. WNCR was located next door in the Stouffer Building, their on-air personalities could sometimes be found in the Allen's west fire court, smoking marihuana.
From the Plain Dealer Action Tab, August 25, 1972. Fleetwood Mac failed to appear, patrons were offered a full refund, or $1 refund and the rest of the show. After Rory Gallagher's set, I doubt anyone remembered the Macs.
From the Plain Dealer, September 20, 1972.
Snip from Belkin ad, from the Plain Dealer Action Tab, September 8, 1972. House was about half filled, box office window was broken out front at some point. TRextasy never really hit this country. I remember Mickey Finn throwing out handfuls of T Rex - The Slider buttons during Get It On, there must have been hundreds of them, wish I still had a few.
From the Plain Dealer, November 9, 1972. This was part of a Town Hall lecture series that fall. Then later that same day....
From the Plain Dealer, November 9, 1972. This was moved to the Allen from CSU.
From Scene, November 2 - 8, 1972. KDJ was a Sam Knight company. I remember War rocked the SRO house.
From the Plain Dealer, December 1, 1972. A few hours before showtime, a leg of power blew out in the vault in the basement of the Bulkley Building. The Cleveland Electric Illuminating Company (CEI) said they'd be out Monday to fix it. So the show went on, with half the electrical circuits dead, the emergency lights lit on the main auditorium ceiling, the crowd chanting "turn out the lights,' but there was nothing we could do, aside from selling warm sodas. I think the CEI would have a very different response today. It should also be noted, this was around the time CEI cut the main steam line off into the State prior to the anticipated demolition. The raw steam causing considerable additional damage to the house right rear corner of the State auditorium.
A long forgotten benefit, blurb from Jane Scott's Happening column, Plain Dealer Action Tab, January 12, 1973.
Another blurb from Jane Scott's Happening column, Plain Dealer Action Tab, January 12, 1973. The Playhouse Square Association's day-to-day operation of the Allen was coming to an end at this point, Millcapp, the Bulkley Building owners would operate the theatre themselves over the next few years, essentially bleeding the the place dry, little maintenance over the next few years. PSA workers would run the next few shows through JC Superstar in April 1973. No doubt Miller and Cappadora were getting an earful from their ground floor tenants about rock and R&B shows, especially the Playhouse Restaurant & Lounge next to the Allen. I know they didn't like the thousands of "hippies" or Black kids that would flock to some of these shows.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, February 9, 1973.
From The Plain Dealer, February 17, 1973. There was also a private party at the Palace that night. I had to run back and forth a few times.
From The Plain Dealer, March 9, 1973.
From The Plain Dealer, March 23, 1973. This was a choral presentation, not a roadshow. This was also the last show PSA personnel worked, after this Millcapp and/or the production company handled the front-of-the-house tasks in the Allen. The day this show closed, was the day the new chandeliers arrived for the lobby of the State, ten days before the opening of Brel. Officially the Playhouse Square Association no longer had anything to do with the Allen, however some of us could walk over and see anything we wanted, didn't need tix. We knew all the stagehands, and Chester the doorman. There were even some parties in the projection room for some shows a little later on.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, April 6, 1973.
From Scene, April 12 - 18, 1973.
Snip from Belkin ad, in Scene, March 29 - April 4, 1973.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, October 12, 1973.
From The Plain Dealer, December 30, 1973. This was a wild night.
From The Plain Dealer, Action Tab, February 22, 1974. There was high hopes for this short lived company, they had offices in the Bulkley Building. Bocky, from Bocky & the Visions, and John Sinclair from Ann Arbor, of MC5 and White Panther Party infamy, their one and only production, that played to a less than half filled house, Burning River Productions quickly folded afterwards.
Snip from Belkin ad, from Scene, March 7 - 13, 1974. A bunch of us went to this.
Snip from Belkin ad, from Scene, March 7 - 13, 1974. The Marshall Tucker Band opened.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, April 5, 1974.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, April 5, 1974.
From Scene, April 5 - 11, 1974.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, April 12, 1974.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, April 26, 1974.
From the Plain Dealer, April 26, 1974. Queen was replaced on the Mott bill by Kansas. Genesis had played to a half empty house the previous November, this time around they sold out back-to-back dates. A bunch of us went to both shows.
Blurb from Jane Scott Happenings column, Plain Dealer Action Tab, May 24, 1974.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, May 17, 1974.
From Scene, May 16 - 22, 1974. Michael Stanley opened for the Eagles, review below.
Reviews of three Allen shows, Scene, May 30 - June 5, 1974. click to open.
From Scene, May 23 - 29, 1974. Maggie Bell was the added opener to the June 11 Slade concert.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, July 12, 1974. This concert was one of legend, the band from Den Haag blew Brownsville off the stage. This was also the first of three times the Earrings would play the Allen.
The Allen on the cover of a Dutch language Golden Earring book, misspelling and all. This was where the Earrings really took off in the U.S. From Dutch 60's Beat and more on Facebook. Little did we know their manager, Peter Rudge was robbing them blind.
From Scene, July 18 - 24, 1974.
From Scene, September 5 - 11, 1974. A few anecdotes from that fall are here.
From The Plain Dealer, November 7, 1971.
From the Plain Dealer, February 7, 1972. Zoltan Gombos helped underwrite some of the early Playhouse Square Association attractions, Budapest Symphony, Sierra Leone Dancers, and funded the pre-owned projection equipment for the Adrift film.
Victor Villimas and I went into every store on Euclid Avenue, from Playhouse Square to Public Square and back, asking to put up posters. He was dressed like Yogi Bear, I was just a 15 year old kid handing out these flyers. These did not go over well, doubt if there was more than 100 at any of the shows, and a lot fewer than that at most.
The Save the Allen benefit, from The Scene, April 13 - 19, 1972. Damnation failed to appear. This show was put together by Veralynne Bosko and Smitty (Ralph Smith), Veralynne did the artwork and a lot of the legwork. This was quite a show! It was pretty well attended, maybe 2,000 tix sold. This event was catered by Paul Hom, who was a friend of Smitty's. Paul later catered the tennis party that summer, and parties at the Palace that fall. The next spring saw Paul in charge of the kitchen for the run of Brel in the State.
From The Plain Dealer, April 24, 1972. This sold out in advance with little notice. Back then most shows were booked a month or so ahead of time, this was maybe a week.
From The Plain Dealer, April 30, 1972. This was the beginning of a wild weekend.
From the Cleveland Press, August 11, 1972. This was a major event that helped create interest in renovation of Playhouse Square. I can remember doing that marquee change.
An amusing blurb from Jane Scott's Happening column in the Plain Dealer Action Tab, August 25, 1972.
From Scene February 15 - 21, 1973.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, May 4, 1973.
Snip from Belkin ad in Scene, April 26 - May 2, 1973.
Snip from Belkin ad, from The Plain Dealer Action Tab, January 4, 1974.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, October 18, 1974. Note the misspelling of Graham Central Station.
Snip from Belkin ad, Plain Dealer, October 25, 1974. Two sold out shows on back-to-back nights, Lou not in top form, like death warmed over, Hall & Oates heckled offstage the first night. Lou returns the following spring in peak form.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, October 25, 1974. Roger Bohn of the Smiling Dog produced a number of shows at the Allen. These were both great shows, I'll always remember Miles up in the balcony, house right side, blowing crazy notes on his trumpet a few hours before showtime.
From Scene, December 5 - 11, 1974. This was a show where a leg of power blew out, similar to the December 1, 1972 Cheech & Chong Show. I was in a mezzanine office with Tom Kalish while ZZ Top is doing their sound check, and we noticed flashes outside the window. Kalish runs down to the alley, then runs back yelling "Fire in the Hole." He grabs an ancient carbon tetrachloride fire extinguisher and raced back down to the alley. The big electrical box on the wall is smoking, as Kalish pumps carbon tech onto the fire, putting it out, but half the power doesn't work.
From The Plain Dealer, January 19, 1975. This was an absolutely dreadful show.
From The Plain Dealer, January 19, 1975. At the last performance a harness snapped and Judas was almost hung.
From Scene, February 6 - 12, 1975. They really rocked the house!
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, February 21, 1975. These shows were all sell outs. Cockney Rebel was quite pathetic, with Steve Harley standing center stage, upset his sing-a-long didn't go over, chastising the audience, as they hit the exits in droves. "You don't need me, you don't need Cockney Rebel..." The Alex Harvey show was postponed twice, once for illness, once because they were trapped in a Chicago snowstorm. They finally appeared in one of the best shows of the era on March 25th, absolute dynamite!
Alex Harvey review from Scene, April 3 - 9, 1975. I'll always remember, they played Gangbang for an encore, it was quite the performance. There was also a great show by Robin Trower the following night, Wednesday, March 26, 1975. There was a two day party in the Allen projection room for my birthday at these two shows.
From Scene, March 13 - 19, 1975.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, March 14, 1975. The Earrings sold out two shows that Saturday night, the second one starting at 11 PM, it was quite the night.
From Scene, April 17 - 23, 1975. Seven months earlier Lou looked like death warmed over, here he was in peak form.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, May 25, 1975. The Bee Gees played to a few hundred people that night, a couple years later they filled the 20,000 seat Coliseum, apparently Cleveland wasn't quite ready for Jive Talkin'.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, July 6, 1975.
From The Scene, July 17 - 23, 1975. This was the second of three Springsteen appearances at the Allen.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, September 5, 1975.
From The Plain Dealer, September 7, 1975.
Snip from Belkin ad, Scene, October 2 - 8, 1975. This was the show when Fee Waybill ran up and down the aisles with a chainsaw.
From Scene, October 16 - 22, 1975. This show was produced by a guy named Mike, can't remember his last name. He was the guy Millcapp hired to do maintenance of the Allen after Playhouse Square. He was around for awhile.
From The Plain Dealer, November 21, 1975.
From The Plain Dealer, November 9, 1975.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, December 5, 1975.
From Scene, February 26 - March 3, 1976.
From The Plain Dealer April 2, 1976.
Anastasia Pantsios review of April 7, Bruce Springsteen concert, from the Plain Dealer, April 9, 1976, part 1.
Anastasia Pantsios review of April 7, Bruce Springsteen concert, from the Plain Dealer, April 9, 1976, part 2. I was at this show with my friend Elsa who was a fan, I was not. I think I was the only one in Cleveland who couldn't stand Springsteen, whose Allen shows all went over big.
From The Plain Dealer Action Tab, April 2, 1976.
Snip from Belkin ad, Scene, May 13 - 19, 1976.
Snip from Belkin ad, Scene, April 29 - May 5, 1976.
In the Fall of 1976 Millcap leased the lobby of the Allen to a group of restaurateurs which transformed the lobby into a restaurant known as The Old Allen.
The auditorium was transformed into the Laserium, the main floor seats were removed and a huge laser dome was built. A hallway was cut through the former managers office into the lobby of the Bulkley building for Laserium access.
Neither of the restaurants, nor the Laserium lasted very long, the Laserium closed in November 1978, the Old Allen closed in late January 1979. By July a new restaurant was opened in the lobby, Yesterdays, which suffered the same fate as it's predecessor, closing in early 1983.
The Allen then began to seriously deteriorate. Millcap sold the Bulkley Building a few years later to a group headed by William West. West had plans to raze the Allen and replace it with a small shopping center. This was met with some opposition.
Flyer from the Save the Allen rally held on December 23, 1987.
From The Plain Dealer, December 23, 1987.
Ray Shepardson returned to Cleveland for the rally, from The Plain Dealer, December 24, 1987.
Original stage house, October 1991.
Location of Bulkley Building Garage, Allen Auditorium on right, October 1991.
October 1991.
Ladder on side of original stage house, October 1991.
Auditorium 1994, from the Playhouse Square Archives.
The end result was the Allen was saved, and today is used by Cleveland State University and the Cleveland Playhouse. It is part of the Playhouse Square Entertainment complex.
Below a few views from recent trips.
2 comments:
Hi Frank,
Love the retrospective!
Thank you,
Bill
What an amazing collection of history. Took me back to the days of seeing many rock concerts and days of being a redcoat. They you for all of this.
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