Mercatudo: A Second Act for Brooklyn’s Extravagant Kings Theatre

quarta-feira, 28 de janeiro de 2015

A Second Act for Brooklyn’s Extravagant Kings Theatre

by Benjamin Sutton on January 27, 2015

The exterior of the Kings Theatre (all photos by the author for Hyperallergic)

“Brooklyn, the county of kings, has cleaned off its crown, and it’s the Kings Theatre,” Borough President Eric Adams proclaimed during a ribbon-cutting ceremony at the long-shuttered and lovingly restored movie palace on Flatbush Avenue on Friday. Between the boisterous presence of former borough president Marty Markowitz and a man who arrived on his unicycle, the event reflected the mix of Old and New Brooklyn audiences to which the Kings Theatre will be catering.
Designed by architecture firm Rapp and Rapp and opened in 1929 as one of Loew’s five “Wonder Theatres” in New York and northern New Jersey, the Kings Theatre operated as a cinema for nearly 50 years. It was shuttered in 1977, seized by the city in 1979, and left to deteriorate for the next three decades — save for an emergency repair to its leaking roof in 2007.

The lobby of the Kings Theatre

A $95 million makeover, launched almost exactly five years ago, has not only seen all its ostentatious detailing and architectural features restored, but also involved converting it from a movie theater to a performance space. Martinez+Johnson Architecture oversaw the renovation, the bulk of which (over $50 million) was funded by the city. Its opening programming lineup reads like a strange musical census of the borough’s tastes by neighborhood and demographic: Diana Ross, Sarah McLachlan, Frankie Valli, Disney Live!, dancehall singer Mavado, and Crosby, Stills & Nash will all perform at the Kings in the next four months.

The staircase from the lobby to the balcony of the Kings Theatre (click to enlarge)

In spite of the theater’s pointedly curated concert lineup, it’s hard to imagine more than 3,000 people trekking to 1027 Flatbush Avenue every other night. The Houston-based ACE Theatrical Group, which renovates and runs historic venues around the country, is aiming to have 200 events at the Kings Theatre every year. But it certainly merits at least one pilgrimage to marvel at this gilded time capsule of a bygone era.
Its ornate façade, soaring lobby, and sweeping theater feel nothing like what we think of as cinemas today. Its size and swankiness make it part opera house, part sports arena. (Or, to put it in Brooklyn metrics, bigger than BAM, smaller than Barclays.) Stepping into the lobby, with its vaulted ceilings literally plastered with bas-relief motifs, is like stepping back in time. Massive steel and glass chandeliers dangle overhead, columns of dark wood shoot up two stories, golden capitals and friezes sparkle. Could it be that the Kings Theatre is just an extreme manifestation of last decade’s speakeasy trend taken to multiplex proportions?
Whether or not it makes sense from a business standpoint, as an architectural rescue mission it is undoubtedly successful. In a city that relentlessly decimates its own heritage by leveling old relics and replacing them with brutally mediocre new buildings, the Kings Theatre is a welcome preservation project. It may be an anachronistic Xanadu of a performance venue, but at least it has character.