The Curtain Comes Down on the Concord Theatre

“The Valley of the Dolls” was one of those books that no one in Concord seemed to want to admit reading. It was a similar response to the one that “Peyton Place” elicited in the 1950s. When the movie version of “Dolls” bowed at the Concord Theatre during the early months of 1968, it created a box-office sensation.

The lines waiting to get in snaked down Main Street to Pleasant Street, heading all the way up to South State Street. It seemed to matter little that it was often bitterly cold outside or that the movie itself wasn’t very good.

For the Concord Theatre it was the beginning of a lengthy stretch of really good films – either critically acclaimed or a box-office success and sometimes both.

The titles included quite a few Oscar winners and films that have gained cult followings throughout the years. They included “Planet of the Apes,” Kubrick’s “2001,” “The Towering Inferno,” “Young Frankenstein,” “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” “Rocky,” “Carrie,” an odd choice for a Christmas, 1976 attraction but one that sold-out night after night, “The Spy Who Loved Me,” “Annie Hall,” “Superman,” National Lampoon’s Animal House,” “10,” “Star Trek,” “Breaking Away,” “Reds,” “Splash,” “The Karate Kid,” “Pretty in Pink,” “Broadcast News,” “Moonstruck,” and “Big.”

Theresa was present at the box-office, nightly, and didn’t allow chronic health issues, that caused her constant and excruciating pain and even a bout with cancer to prevent her from greeting her patrons and waiting around to hear their comments as they exited after the show.

She never took a vacation and one of the theatre’s regular customers, Lillian Garafoli, often asked Theresa to join her on one of her trips. Theresa would always decline, graciously.

“I see the whole world from right here at the theatre. It’s up there on the screen.”

She had her particular likes and dislikes in movies and never looked at the theatre being solely about making money. She was also interested in playing films that might only appeal to a small, select audience – and sometimes simply because she wanted to see the film.

Theresa was especially fond of the English actress Glenda Jackson and played one week engagements of many of her films in the 1970s. She also liked Katharine Hepburn and played “The Trojan Women” to less than twenty people during a one week run, but enjoyed it herself tremendously.

The Concord Theatre created a huge controversy in the summer of 1968 when it played a lesbian-themed film, “The Fox.” The theatre was inundated with threats and several members of the local clergy called Theresa to tell her she would burn in hell. The film, which starred Sandy Dennis, had been critically acclaimed and drew huge crowds. The follow-up film, “Thoroughly Modern Millie,” was about, in part, white slavery and opium dens. No one said a word, however, perhaps because it starred Julie Andrews?

Theresa was deeply devout in her religion and attended Mass daily at Sacred Heart. She was never without her Rosary Beads, which she kept in her pocket.

In late 1968, Cinerama Releasing was anxious for Theresa to play “Candy,” the decidedly adult film based on the racy book. Before committing, Theresa decided to journey to Manchester to see the film at the Rex Cinema. I accompanied her.

Fifteen minutes into the film she pulled out her Rosary Beads and I knew that the abomination we were watching on the screen would never play the Concord Theatre.

The next morning she called the salesman and told him that she wouldn’t even allow the film to occupy the dumpster she had outside the theatre.

A staple at the Concord Theatre was the musical film. Theresa loved musicals of all kind and between 1968, when we played the English musical, “Half a Sixpence” and early 1984 when we played “Yentl,” the theatre played more musicals than any other theatre in Concord.

They ran the gamut from Francis Ford Coppola’s “Finian’s Rainbow” to “Victor Victoria” and everything in between. The most successful musicals were “Woodstock,” “Saturday Night Fever,” and “Grease.”

All around her, things began to change in the movie industry. Concord’s first multi-plex cinema opened as the 70s became the 80s. The drive-ins shuttered and the Capitol Theatre became exclusively a stage and concert venue. Still, Theresa continued tirelessly working to get the best film product she could for “her people.”

It became more difficult, especially as her eyesight began to fade. She had already overcome many obstacles including being one of the few female first-run theatre owners in what was sometimes referred to as a “men’s club.” Losing her ability to clearly see the images on the theatre’s giant screen was heartbreaking.

By the 1990s, the theatre complex that is now Regal had opened and was quickly taking all available films. The Concord Theatre and Cinema 93 were fighting to stay alive in a business that was about making money not “loving films and wanting to bring good entertainment to Concord,” a philosophy Theresa shared with Cinema 93’s owner, Barry Steelman.

While she could still pack the house with an occasional film like the Oscar winning “The Piano” and “The Crying Game,” more often than not the celluloid images were sophomoric, at best and played to sparse patronage.

On a summer day in 1994 it all ended. The picture, “Andre,” played to an audience of less than 50 and when the film concluded, Theresa found she no longer had the “fire in her belly” to do battle with the theatre chains and a new generation of booking agents who considered her insistence on quality to be bothersome.

We still talked every Friday about pictures as I tried to get her enthused about playing another film.

In late 1997, I got Jeff Larabee, a realtor, interested in buying the theatre and he began talking with Theresa.

Monies were also available from a variety of grant sources that could help refurbish and restore the theatre. Jeff would propose leasing it to Barry Steelman, whose Cinema 93 was closing. The thought of Barry possibly running the theatre gave Theresa a renewed interest and hope.

Although she and Barry had been competitors in finding good films for their respective theatres, Theresa had enormous respect for Barry and his very obvious passion for movies.

“If anyone can make this place tick again, it’s Barry,” she said during one of our last conversations.

Unfortunately, the curtain had come down on the Concord Theatre. Theresa passed away at the age of 84 in the early months of 1998 without seeing her beloved theatre come alive once more with the sounds of an audience magically drawn into the images that danced on the silver screen, just like those images that had entranced and delighted so many for 60 years.

Next week: The Endicott – Was it more than just a hotel?