Stephen Johnson
Proscenium: The Quarterly Newsletter of Theatres' Trust, vol 1, no 2, Winter 1990. Published by Theatres Trust/Société des Salles Anciennes, P.O. Box 5154, Station C, Montréal, Québec H2X 3N2.
Double Take: The Story of the Elgin and Winter Garden Theatres by Hilary Russell. Published by Dundern Press, Toronto, 1989. 158 pp ill $24.95 softcover, $59.50 hard.
Pantages Theatre: Rebirth of a Landmark by Constance Olsheski. Historical Research by Mike Filey and John Lindsay. Published by Key Porter Books, Toronto, 1989. 112 pp ill $25.00 hardcover.
Toronto's Theatre Block: An Architectural History by Paul Dilse. Published by The Toronto Region Architectural Conservancy, 1989. P.O. Box 7162, Station A, Toronto, Ontario M5W 1X8.
The completion, during the autumn of 1989, of two major construction projects in downtown Toronto resulted in the re-opening of three historic theatres within six weeks. This event is certainly unprecedented in Canada; perhaps it is unprecedented, period. The total of as much as $50 Million spent on these two projects is certainly not indicative of the political and economic attitude toward heritage theatres across the country. The most recent issue of Proscenium: The Quarterly Newsletter of Theatres' Trust, while it reports some success stories (The Pantages in Winnipeg, the Capitol in Nelson, B.C.) is more eloquent when it reports the battles - both for investment and against city councils. At a time when the Famous Players Canadian Corporation is selling off its downtown locations almost entirely for new theatres in malls, there are perhaps more good performance venues for sale now in Canada than there ever have been or will be. However, in Proscenium we read that the Regina city council would not designate that city's Capitol Theatre a municipal heritage property, nor aid in its preservation - effectively ensuring its eventual demolition. We read that an application was made to revoke the historic designation of the Capitol Theatre in Cornwall, one of Canada's last remaining intact 'atmospheric' theatres (that is, with an auditorium designed as an exterior setting). Lobbying by local, national and international preservation groups blocked the application, but the building still has a limited life if left in its present neglected condition. This reviewer does not want to sound a death knell; hard-working lobby groups and enlightened governments have saved theatres and put them to work for the community. The victories, however, have been few and hard-fought, and the arguments against spending money on such projects have been persuasive to budget-conscious political and business communities.
Downtown Toronto, then, appears to have had extraordinary good fortune. It remains to be seen whether the public praise for these beautiful theatres provides good argument and lobbying power for other restoration projects, or whether the expense involved will argue against such projects, making the re-opening of the Pantages, Elgin and Winter Garden simply another manifestation of the relative power of the central Canadian economy.
The re-opening of these theatres has generated three publications, which may be considered spin-offs of the construction projects. They are, one way or another, financed by or because of them, and the information they present has been accumulated for use by the construction team, and by the organizations and governments that fund them. The best of them may be read as vehicles for political advocacy or public education, and as good economic, architectural and social histories. In the most unfortunate case, one of the works can really only be viewed as a commercial byproduct - a pictorial souvenir of Toronto. Perhaps not surprisingly, none of them quite explains why these two projects succeeded in such chronological proximity; although, implicit in the general praise of theatre restoration, there may be a clue.
It is not the place of this review to give a history of the theatre buildings under discussion, nor to criticize or praise the re-opened theatres; but a word of context is necessary in order to judge the books that claim to perform these functions. The Elgin Theatre was opened late in 1913 as a 'small-time' vaudeville house for entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew; it was his inaugural Canadian theatre and, partly for this reason and partly to improve the image of his entertainments, the theatre's decoration was opulent compared with most of his theatre chain to that point. Early in 1914, directly above this theatre, Loew opened the Winter Garden theatre, meant to present the same entertainment to an upscale clientele in an extraordinary garden setting, complete with false tree-trunk columns and real beech branches, silk blossoms and an illuminated moon. The Winter Garden was a culmination of a 'roof garden' design tradition, and generally seen as one kind of prototype for the movie palace. One block north, in 1920, vaudeville entrepreneur Alexander Pantages built his Pantages theatre; it represented the movement east of a western circuit, and as such had, like the theatres to the south of it, an opulent design. The architect for all three of these theatres was Thomas Lamb, the most successful and arguably the most influential designer of movie palaces during the 1920s. The Pantages and Loew's downstairs theatre (it was only named the Elgin late in its history), in the manner of most other theatres in most other cities in North America, followed the policy of its centralized management, moving from vaudeville-with-film, to film-with-vaudeville, to film. Like most North American theatres, too, they followed the fortunes of their neighbourhood, downward. Their revitalization during the 1980s and their re-opening as live theatre venues in 1989 - the Elgin/Winter Garden by the Ontario Government, the Pantages by Cineplex-Odeon - represent a break from the typical theatre history on this continent in this century. Most such theatres are gone, and most of the rest endangered-even in the centre of the industry, New York.
It is also important, in judging these publications, to emphasize the different degree of reconstruction necessary in the three theatres because of their relative condition in the early 1980s. The Winter Garden was closed in the late 1920s when sound was installed in the theatre below it. It had barely been touched, before or after this event, and as such, when the Ontario Government-financed work began on it, the great questions were: how to clean what was a 1913 time capsule without damaging original paints and plasters; how to replace what could not be merely cleaned using original techniques; and how little the space could be altered to bring it up to contemporary building and fire codes.
The Elgin was in somewhat worse shape, since it had remained in use as a movie theatre. Its design had been updated in small ways to accommodate changing tastes; and more important, the boxes had been destroyed and proscenium mutilated to accommodate a wider screen. The problems and questions were different in re-vitalizing the Elgin. Part of the theatre had to be recreated from photographs, fragments and historical research. The rest of the theatre had to be carefully stripped and restored - as in the Winter Garden using the techniques and skills of the original construction, some of those now rare. Finally, decisions had to be made regarding the extent to which to recreate the original venue, or to accommodate the demands of the modern theatre - each accommodation, of course, necessarily compromising the integrity of the restoration.
The Pantages was in the worst shape of all. As admitted in Constance Olshesky's book, a 1972 renovation to divide the building into six theatres had 'significantly altered the structure of the building' (p 74), meaning among other things that 'virtually all of the original plaster ornamentation [was] either destroyed or badly darnaged.' (p 96) Columns, dome, proscenium, murals were either gone or mutilated, and the whole building had been redecorated. The demands of revitalization were similar but far more severe than those of the Elgin. Far less remained upon which to base a re-creation; far more of that re-creation must have been based on an analysis of scanty remains and some historical research. In effect, the Pantages as re-opened is a 're-creation' of a theatre that looks very much like a theatre built on that site in 1920, using the shell of the building and incorporating some remnants of the original interior. This statement is not meant to diminish this formidable enterprise, but to place it in context. The results are impressive in all three cases.
Hilary Russell's book on the Elgin and Winter Garden Theatres is carefully structured to appeal to every kind of reader; and it should not be misconstrued by academics, because of its gloss, as simply a general appeal to love the Elgin/Winter Garden. It is that, and on one level can be enjoyed as a souvenir of a visit to the building. It would be difficult for this reviewer to judge the book objectively on such a superficial level. As a student of both the vaudeville and roof garden traditions I have seen my own research, along with the research of other theatre historians, come to life in this building. Because of this (and a clandestine visit up the back stairs of the Winter Garden in 1981) I admit to a personal and professional sympathy for the Elgin/Winter Garden project. This book fulfils its function as a tribute to the restoration, and feeds that sympathetic response-as it should.
Double Take, however, goes beyond this superficial treatment, and in its text demands an objective critique of its value to the academic as a scholarly work. Treated on this level, Russell's work is, I believe, one of the best-researched histories of a theatrical venue I have seen. She has had an advantage that she has used well. As a professional researcher for the National Historic Sites branch of the Federal Government's Parks Service, and as author of a valuable text on the history of Canada's picture palaces (All That Glitters, in Canadian Historic Sites: Occasional Papers in Archaeology and History), she has been researching the history of the Elgin/Winter Garden building for at least ten years. For several years she was assigned by the Federal Government to the Elgin/Winter Garden project as its historian, where her work was instrumental in locating the original architectural plans of the building and providing information on the original means of production. Her official status as project historian and her previous credits raise expectations for her work on this subject; as a work on theatre business and architecture, this book entirely fulfils these expectations.
Her research has been conducted in archives as general and obvious as the Metropolitan Toronto Library and the New York Public Library, and as arcane and inaccessible as the minutes of the Toronto City Council and the City of Toronto Architect's Department. She has apparently followed every lead, however small, in reconstructing the life and look of the theatre. She has traced minor backstage personnel through their descendants, producing in one instance a passport photograph of an early stage manager. She has considered the importance of the most easily dismissed reference, and come up with charges of corruption in the City Architect's office, and the possibility of influence-peddling in Toronto politics by New York interests. The exhaustive nature of this research can be seen in the wealth of extraneous information, simply not pertinent to the main text, but too intrinsically interesting to eliminate entirely. It is there in the sidebars: a social history of the concession stand; a biography of the building's local architect, tainted by unethical practice; and a listing of some of the performers appearing in the theatres whose names are recognizable today. This last sidebar represents a refreshing avoidance of the error common in most such books, to assume contemporary fame and importance before the performer achieves them, simply because we recognize the names. Finally, the extent of Russell's research can be found in the existence of both bibliography and endnotes (which are a good read on their own).
What might have emerged from this exhaustive accumulation of data was an exhausting accumulation of data, with no explanation of terminology, no biographical detail, no context and no analysis. This did not happen. It is a credit to the author that, given the restrictions of length and format, she has masterfully balanced the setting-down of information with the attempt to communicate its significance - along with a taste of the thrill of research.
Chapters 1-5 guide us through the history of the construction of the building, including the competition it would have in Toronto, and the effect of this new venue on that competition. Most important, we are guided through the complicated relationships that defined the mass-produced-entertainment monopolies of 1913-4, and the architectural history of the roof gardens and proto-picture palaces that culminated in the unusual stacked theatre design. What results from these chapters are two clear, if implicit, statements: that the history of theatre at this time is informed by (and perhaps overwhelmed by) a merging of the histories of business and design; and, that the history of theatre in Toronto in 1913 is, almost entirely, the history of the American presence. These are not new statements, although they may be new to many who will read this book. They are, however, given new emphasis, and life, by the archival documents discussed.
One example will have to suffice. It was common in New York City and elsewhere to build theatres on inexpensive land one block away from the main thoroughfare; the entrance would be a single narrow access from that main street. Despite the fact that Toronto's newly-rewritten bylaws regarding theatres 'mirrored, sometimes word for word, sections of New York City's bylaws,' there were complications that prevented access to the building from Yonge Street, threatening the entire project. Russell tells the story of this complication through documentation that makes a minor example of city politics focused and illuminating. Quotations from the proceedings of a 1914 judicial inquiry, a sample page from Thomas Lamb's personal job book, and an analysis of the proposed decor for the Victoria Street facade of the theatre all provide evidence that the builders attempted to circumvent the bylaw by saying that the Yonge Street access they were building was simply an emergency exit. This was an obvious and audacious lie; nevertheless, some accommodation was reached, and patrons ultimately entered the theatre from Yonge Street.
Chapters 5 through 8 describe the theatre building as it would have appeared when it opened; this section is organized very much as a tour might be, from entrance to backstage. Once again, what might have been an unevaluated accumulation of data is made both more accessible and more useful through the use of contextual information, some of it from contemporary architectural and business publications. Once again, one example will have to suffice. There is a reason for an exterior vestibule and outside box office in this theatre building, explained in a 1927 work on theatre architecture as the psychology of the passerby, who must never be made 'to pass through doors or . . . any other obstructions to purchase a ticket.' Straightforward, perhaps, but in 1913 this configuration was more often associated with the nickelodeon, dime museum, and other less opulent venues. Its place in these more opulent surroundings represents a physical manifestation of the business policy - it was built by a 'small time' vaudeville enterprise trying to improve its status to 'big time.' As such, the design is a hybrid, combining features of the working class entertainment venue with those of the middle and upper middle classes.
This hybrid nature, as it becomes clear in these chapters, not only combines features of different class venues, but also combines features of the 19th century theatre with those of the latest architectural fashion. The two are related. Boxes were traditional, and still standard, in a legitimate theatre, but useless to the modern vaudeville house; yet they were included in both of Loew's Toronto theatres. Relatively large lobbies and elegant rest rooms were common in a legitimate theatre, but useless in a theatre running continuous vaudeville; they were not included here. The stage of the Elgin was flat, and its proscenium low and wide, in the style of the day; but it had a paint bridge and grooves for the tormentor wings, both 19th-century anachronisms. These, on their own, are all minor if interesting facts. However, Russell makes it clear that these design features are manifestations of the rapidly changing and confused state of popular entertainments - a confusion recognized and discussed in the texts she cites, and culminating in the 1920s in that most influential meeting of business and design, the motion picture palace.
Chapters 9 and 11 cover the history of the entertainments offered in the complex, both vaudeville and film, and Chapter 10 describes the staff necessary to run such a building. While the research provided here is just as exhaustive and interesting, I note a substantial difference in the contextual information provided. Perhaps it was the nature of the research for which Russell was commissioned, which dictated that the wealth of material should relate to the way in which the building was constructed. Certainly in a book of this length and format it would be more difficult to do justice to the history of performance and service in the building than to the history of the building itself. For whatever reason, these chapters offer less of what had come to be expected in the rest of the book.
Finally, the Prologue and Chapter 12 describe the restoration. They do so quickly, providing a necessary frame to serve the book's function as a pictorial souvenir. She matter-of-factly states the reason for restoration as 'a severe shortage of purpose-built and economically viable performance space,' with restoration 'a far less expensive proposition' than the '$50-75 million' for a single new theatre. This does not explain much. It does not explain the approximately 5,000 beech branches harvested and preserved in glycerin according to original methods, and now hanging in the Winter Garden. It does not explain the 300 kilos of flour used to clean the water-based murals in the Winter Garden so as not to damage their authenticity - nor the regilding of the lower theatre, again according to original techniques. None of this was necessary to re-open a performance space; indeed, it will be difficult for productions to compete with the opulence (and eccentricity) of the auditoria. Just as Russell, to her credit, went so much farther than her job required in writing this well-researched theatre history, so, somehow, the Ontario government supported the restoration of a piece of our theatrical heritage with an uncommon care and dedication. How did this happen, and how do we repeat it?
Russell mentions, in passing, that in 1981 'a development agreement with a private operator was signed . . .' regarding the Elgin and Winter Garden theatres. That agreement 'failed in 1983, for a variety of reasons.' She does not mention that the agreement was with Cineplex-Odeon Theatre Corporation. In the six years following the failure of that agreement, Cineplex-Odeon purchased the old Imperial Six (that is, the Pantages) one block north, reconstructed its interior as a single venue for live performance, and opened it with the spectacle Phantom of the Opera in September 1989, a few weeks before the Elgin and Winter Garden theatres reopened. It would be difficult not to see a causal connection in these events. One must assume that Cineplex-Odeon saw an important commercial prospect in the restoration of an old theatre in downtown Toronto and, prevented from participating in a Government project, it purchased its own. Perhaps this truly was the least expensive means to provide a downtown venue for Phantom. But, as with the Elgin/Winter Garden, this does not explain much. It does not explain the willingness of a commercial enterprise to compete directly with a government-subsidized facility in a difficult market. It certainly does not explain around $18 Million lavished on the re-creation of a venue for live entertainment, by a company devoted to multi-screen cinematic ventures. If we are to believe the book accompanying the theatre's re-opening, altruism is the only reason; certainly no other clues are given.
To appreciate Hilary Russell's work, one only has to look at Constance Olsheski's. If the author, a vice president of Cineplex-Odeon, and previously the writer of a book on hockey, had created this book solely as a souvenir of the re-opening, it would have been unfair to make any comparison with Russell's, or to judge it at all as a work of interest to the academic community. As a souvenir, in fact, it is quite agreeable. The photographs of the original and re-created theatres are impressive. Most interesting are the photographs of the work in progress, which are more extensive than in Russell's book.
Unfortunately, it tries to be more, by giving a history of theatre in Toronto, and a history of the building and its entertainments. Mike Filey and John Lindsay are credited with the research upon which the text is based. As presented, this text includes no references, despite the use of quotation. There is no bibliography, and sources cited in the text are either anecdotal by nature, or do not reflect recent scholarship, or both. In addition, there is little analysis or social context. None of this might have mattered, if the alternative were a reasonably confident, straightforward accumulation of reliable information for the general reader.
There are, however, difficulties with the text which undermine our confidence in the writer. Two examples illustrate the problem. It is one thing to find that information in this book concerning Toronto's Grand Opera House - on seating capacity and year of demolition - do not agree with information in another source (The Oxford Companion to Canadian Theatre). This can be rationalized in a number of ways. But to say that the Grand Opera House was demolished 'because of the declining interest in opera' is to completely misunderstand the history of this theatre, the concept of the 'opera house' in Ontario, and the nature of popular theatre in general. To say that the Pantages' Victoria Street entrance was used for patrons arriving by automobile is certainly interesting. To say that this was 'surely a unique and innovative idea at the time,' when it represents a venerable tradition of separate entrances for patrons in carriages, questions the breadth of the writer's knowledge of theatre history. In similar ways, and often enough to be disconcerting, this author makes sweeping, misleading generalizations based on unacknowledged sources (on the history of variety, for example). She assumes the undeniable truth of her apparently out-of-date and anecdotal secondary sources (her etymology of 'vaudeville,' for example), and provides no trustworthy context to the information she records.
The lack of context is especially frustrating in the otherwise interesting oral histories recorded. One woman reminisces that she saw Mary Pickford in a play at the Pantages, and got her autograph. Did the Pantages produce plays, or was Pickford in a vaudeville playlet? Did Pickford, who from the time the Pantages was built was one of the most powerful individuals in the film business, still tour in vaudeville? Tour at all? If by 'play' the woman means 'film,' then was Pickford touring in a personal appearance promotion? I do not necessarily doubt this or any other reminiscence; but without some attempt at dating, verifying, and giving a social context for them, they lose their impact.
As a source of pictorial documentation, this book is potentially of value. In any other sense, however, this reviewer cannot recommend it. One can only hope that the historical research that went into the re-creation of the Pantages was more thorough than that which found its way into this book.
Finally, last year this 72-page soft-cover publication appeared, produced for the Toronto Region Architectural Conservancy, a branch of the Architectural Conservancy of Ontario - an organization incorporated to lobby for the preservation of 'the best examples of architecture in the province.' The publication provides a complete history of the square block in Toronto that includes the Elgin and Winter Garden theatres and Massey Hall. This is a fairly straightforward document meant to advocate a respect for architecture beyond the flashy and commercially viable performance venues on the block. By beginning at the very beginning (a creek ran through the block, for example), and noting in each historical section which elements of that period's development influenced the modern look, the author argues for the serious consideration of every building on the block.
As a general reader, my opinion of this work is high. Its documentation is formidable, its organization clear and significant, its illustrations useful. While its material on the Elgin and Winter Garden owes much to Russell, it contains some information on the block's earlier performance venues. This is of interest to the theatre historian, suggesting as it does that there were historical, traditional reasons for the building of the surviving theatres. Perhaps most important, this work reminds the theatre historian that the performance venue is a small part of the social and architectural fabric of the city, just as much when it re-opened in 1989 as when it first opened. In each case, its signiflcance as a structure, for better or for worse, depends upon its effect on that fabric.
In conclusion, the quality and reliability of each of these books is, not surprisingly, a direct result of the needs of the projects that produced them. The Architectural Conservancy had to combine exhaustive research with a strong organization in order to argue persuasively for its cause. The Cineplex-Odeon Corporation, on the other hand, had nothing to advocate and no one to persuade - the theatre is finished, Phantom has opened with a remarkable advance sale, and the general public is very impressed with the venue. The corporation had no need for a work of research; the only question is why the book tried to be more than a pictorial giveaway.
Hilary Russell's book may be as thorough as it is precisely because there was something to advocate. A sizable sum of public money was used to rehabilitate an aging structure for aesthetic and cultural, and not strictly functional, reasons. Double Take can be seen as a defence of the money spent, through an explanation of the importance of the structure - or rather, how important the structure can become with the appropriate historical context. Perhaps, too, the book advocates something more personal - a more complete integration of historical research and practical restoration.
Quite aside from their relative value, it would be wilfully optimistic to believe that the mere existence of these publications, and the theatres they describe, represent a new attitude toward our theatrical heritage by both government and business. Indeed, the situation in many Canadian communities, outlined in Proscenium, may have more in common with the situation that now exists in the city that dictated so much of Canada's theatrical culture, New York. The loss of two of its finest small dramatic venues (the Helen Hayes and Morosco) to the wrecker's ball shocked the city into a redevelopment and revitalization plan for its old, illustrious theatres along 42nd Street (now derelict, or showing pornographic films). And yet, even in a city that owes as much to the commerce of theatre as New York, the plan has been fought aggressively in councils and courts, while the theatres are allowed (encouraged?) to deteriorate. On the one hand, it is encouraging that Toronto avoided this scenario. On the other hand, it would be unwise to ignore the politics at the centre of the empire.