The Brattle

The Brattle is the other theater in Harvard Square - tucked away in the basement at 40 Brattle Street. The Brattle is a pretty unique theater, and I'll grab a quote from their own site to give you an idea of what you can see there...

The Brattle shows the best in classic, cutting-edge, foreign, and art-house films. We also show first-run films and new releases of classic films, but our specialty is a repertory programming format consisting of films from a particular director, genre, or subject shown over the course of a week, or on the same weekday throughout the month.

Beantown Today mentioned that they had seen a Felix The Cat marathon there, and events like that are always what comes to mind when I think of The Brattle - in fact, they are extending the Bugs Bunny Film Festival (an annual event since 1995) to run tomorrow night!

In the past few years The Brattle had been in danger of losing their lease, and with the creation of the Brattle Film Foundation and the massive support of the community, The Brattle was saved and we can continue stopping in to check out their awesome repertory film series'. Personally, I'm psyched for The 80s Rock! series coming up in March. Who's up for Desperately Seeking Susan??

Harvard Square Theater

Hey! It's a theater! The Harvard Square theater is located on Church St and has 5 screens. I love the mural outside the theater, which extends above the marquee, but the best parts are down the bottom here (click to enlarge!). The theater shows first run movies, but more importantly, they show Rocky Horror Picture Show every Saturday at midnight, with live accompaniment. Go in costume, have a blast.

There's more detail about the theater's history here .

Wang Theater: Part Dos

Here's another one from the Wang Theater - this is the ceiling in the foyer (lobby?).

Wang Theater

We went to see Irving Berlin's White Christmas at the Wang Center tonight. This is the ceiling in the theater.

The Wang Center was built in 1925 as The Metropolitan Theater by the same architect that designed the Colonial and Wilbur Theaters in Boston, and the Copley Plaza hotel. The Met was renamed in 1962, becoming The Music Hall and became the home of the Boston Ballet. As time went by, the theater became outdated, and in 1980 it was converted to a non-profit organization. Two years later, thanks to a donation from Dr. An Wang, the Music Hall became The Wang Center and restoration began. You can see from the photo above that the restoration was successful - the theater is beautiful!

Talking Pictures

The Paramount Theater was opened in 1932 and was the only move theater in Boston (at the time, obviously) devoted exclusively to talking pictures. It was closed in 1976 and still sits abandoned today. But not for long! In 2002 the facade was fancied up and the sign cleaned and repaired by Millennium Partners, in exchange for permission to complete their Ritz-Carlton Towers project next door. Now the Paramount is being renovated by Emerson College! They'll be tearing up the interior of the theater (with the exception of the lobby which they have promised to restore to its original glory) to create some live performance space, so no more movies but at least it'll be put to good use.

This is an area of the city that has come a long way in recent years and this type of project (which includes renovations to an adjoining building and the parking lot across the street) is exactly the type of thing that will continue to push it in a good direction.