1939 Newark, New Jersey

Lucille Helen Adonis Niketakis
Born in 1934
First movie memories from Newark, NJ
Interviewed on January 11, 2018
by Britt Bistis

The first movie I remember seeing was either Pinocchio or Snow White. I think I saw Snow White first. I couldn’t have been more than five years old, maybe even four.  I don’t remember what year I saw the movies, I just remember that I was very young.

I remember my mother and father took me to the theater.  It was just the three of us as my brothers had not been born yet. My parents would take me to the evening performances on Thursday nights. At this time we lived in Newark, NJ and my father would take us to the theater.  He would generally drive us there, he always drove us everywhere.

We would go to the Loewe’s theater in Newark.  It was beautiful, absolutely gorgeous.  It was like a palace. It looked like one of the Broadway theaters to which my mother and father would take me. The theater was enormous. Its outside entrance was a spectacle of lights. The screen was incredibly large and looked like it took up the entire wall.  On either side of the screen were giant, tall, thick red curtains with gold trim that looked like they were made of velvet.

There was gold filigree on the walls framing the screen and the curtains.  There was gold and red everywhere.  I remember the ceiling was tall; there was a giant balcony, too. I remember the seats as being plush and red, too, and they were incredibly comfortable.  And the seats, they would continue on for rows; I thought there must have been thousands of them. The floor was on an incline, and I vaguely remember ushers leading us down the slope and gesturing us to our seats.  Mainly I remember trying to not stumble.

The man who owned the theater was Mr. Adams, who was a friend of my father’s, and I remember he gave us a pass to the theater.  Mr. Adams, my father, and Dr. Antonious, a cardiologist, were long-time friends and would often gather at my house for dinner and to play cards.

About the movie itself, well, it was animated and colorful.  It was absolutely delightful. I was impressed with the music and the color spectacle.  It was a total sensory experience. Oh, and about the movie Pinocchio I had mentioned earlier, I remember the message clearly from Pinocchio: never tell a lie.  I’m only adding that because I don’t remember learning anything from Snow White.

If there was a candy stand at the movie theater, I don’t remember it.  I’m sure my father would have bought me candy, but, I suppose, in comparison to the movie it wasn’t memorable. Later, I developed a strong affinity for Milk Duds, which I would have at the Saturday matinees. I remember, those very well, let me tell you about those.

By this time we lived in Roseland, NJ – this was a few years later – and we would walk to the neighborhood theater every Saturday. We would spend the entire day at the theater; it was quite an event. My grandmother would make us lunches.  My favorite lunch she made was fried ham and cheese.  She put them on slices of bread she had fried with olive oil. It was absolutely delicious.

I would take my brothers, and sometimes my cousin Myrna and her siblings, and we would take our lunches and walk to the theater.  I was the oldest, so I had to be the one to keep them in line.

The theater was a small neighborhood theater and was by my grandmother’s house, where all of us cousins would often go on weekends, although once we walked in and saw Myrna’s father, my uncle Andy, taking a nap in the theater on a break from work.  It was cool in the theaters, so you would sometimes see someone in the theater on a hot day sleeping in one of the seats during a work break.

The theater itself was unimpressive compared to the palace-like Lowe’s theater, and afterwards it would always be messy because all the kids went to the theater on Saturdays for matinees and would all bring lunches with them. In addition to eating lunch, I would also always get Milk Duds at the concession stand.

Saturday matinees were an event!

The event would start at 1:00 pm and go until about 5:30.  First, there would be a newsreel, followed by a cartoon, then the serial- there was a new chapter every week, then a double feature.  We would see two full-length movies!

And this all only cost 13 cents!  11 cents for the movie, and two cents for tax.

I don’t remember many of the specific movies I saw on these Saturdays, but I remember that they would give out plates every week, and if you went every week sooner or later you’d wind up with a free set of dishes.