Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1914-05-02
Theatrical Season Just
Ending Improbable to Many

There has been a wonderful dearth Of
good attractions this year and the
two houses have been forced at
times to play attractions not up to
the standaIu OF lOI.4.er years
Out of approximately thirty-five
weeks each at the Newark and Shu-
bert theatres, not twenty of them
have been winning" weeks, or weeks
in which the theatres were able to
make any money. Many of the weeks
were bad losses, while on some of
the others the theatres managed to
break even.
Lee Ottoengui, manager of the
Shubert Theatre, and Georse w. Rob-
bins, of the Newark, are both very
optimistic over the outlook for next
season and believe 1t will be one of
the best for several years past. AS
reasons for this belief they point to
the fact that many new productions
were brought out in New York late
this season that proved so success
full that no other city got a chance
to see them.
These shows will be available for
Newark early next season, and will
/ then be followed by the usual run of
new shows that are pre- duced in New
York at the commencement of each
! season. Another manager who thinks
the theatrical business is in for a
| boom next season is l.. J. Fosse, of
! the Orpheum Theatre.
Theatre business runs in cycles"
said Mr.. Fosse yesterday. the cycles
being ten years in average duration.
| For ten years theatrical business has
] not been at it's best, but from the
| indications floating around / look for
| a big year next season. 1t is O fact
| that New York managers who have
! been laying low in the line of large
| productions for several years past are
now laying plans to go ahead on an
! extensive scale next season."
| The Orpheum, Miners Empire and
Keeney's since it's opening as a
! vaudeville house early last December,
are big moneymakers of the season.
| Proctor's Park Place is also believed
to have had a big season up to the
time Frank A. Keeney invaded the
Newark field with a combination of
high-class vaudeville and moving
pictures at popular prices. From r.
time the Keeney Theatre opened
the Proctor business fen on, anu Lllat
house was finally forced to adopt the
Keeney policy of continuous show
| at popular prices.
| The increase in the number of the
aires in Newark in the last five years
has been rather startling. Five years
ago there were seven regular theatres
in Newark They were the Newark
then as now devoted to high-class at
fractions, and the only one of the
seven that has not in some way
changed its policy or location since;
] Waldman's, then a burlesque house,
| is now known as Fox's Carlton, de-
| voted exclusively to moving pictures;
| Miners Empire, then located on
| Washington street where the Bam-
berger department store now is, and
| devoted to burlesque; The Bijou Pal
ace, run by the Proctor interests as a
picture house, and which later became
F'oxs' Washington Theatre, and is
now being torn down; the Columbia
| Theatre, now the Family Theatre, a
moving-picture house; the Lyric, five
years ago vaudeville house, in oppo-
stion to Proctor's, is now run as a
picture house by the Proctor inter
ests. The last theatre on the list is
! Proctor's Park Place, which is now
closed for the season.
At the present time there are just
an even dozen theatres in the down.
town section of Newark that are fully
equipped for full-fledged dramatic
performances. this distinguishing
them from the many others that are
used exclusively as moving picture
houses. True some of the houses thai
are mentioned below are now devoted
solely to moving pictures, but the,
are fully equipped theatres and coult
be used for dramatic productions OF
days notice.