#traymore hotel

[fredandginger64]

I hate the watermark but this photo is scrumptious. I thought this may have been in London but it's at the Traymore Hotel in Atlantic City. I watched a video on YouTube of Atlantic City in the 1950s and this hotel was shown.

Thanks to @luzzarm for the help💓

[outoftowninac]

FOREVER AFTER

1918 / 1919

Forever After is a three-act play by Owen Davis. It was originally produced by William A. Brady starring his daughter, Alice Brady and Conrad Nagel. 

From the day they first met in the schoolhouse in a small New England town, Theodore Wayne, son of a respected lawyer, and Jennie Clapton, daughter of wealthy parents, have been sweethearts. Their romance has progressed into their college years, where Ted has become a big football star on the gridiron. But Jack Randall, the wealthiest boy in town, has also courted Jennie, with the approval of her mother, impressed and blinded by Jack's money. Ted's father dies, and Ted has to leave college to return home to a menial job in order to support his mother. Jennie's love for him never waivers, but her mother convinces Ted that Jennie's happiness hinges on having money and social position. He leaves town, with his mother, and Jennie is heartbroken. Then World War I breaks out.

Alice Brady was doing double duty during the run, making films during the day, and performing in theatre at night. She was nominated for an Oscar in 1937, and won the Award in 1938. She appeared in the play courtesy of Select Films Corp., to which she was under contract. This was her first stage appearance in more than three years.  

During the run of the play, Miss Brady co-starred in a film with her stage co-star Conrad Nagel in Redhead (1919). The film is now considered lost. 

Instead of Atlantic City, the play premiered in Long Branch NJ on August 12, 1918 and then Asbury Park NJ before moving south to Washington DC.  But that doesn’t mean Miss Brady didn’t ‘visit’ Atlantic City - at least in film.  

During the run of Forever After, Brady was also filming The World To Live In (1919) which was partly set in Atlantic City. 

Instead of going on location to the seaside resort, Select Films brought Atlantic City to Brady, by painstakingly recreating the lobby of Atlantic City’s iconic Traymore Hotel (above) at a New York studio. Extras who had vacationed at the Traymore were recruited to verify the accuracy of the recreation. In 2010 HBO’s “Boardwalk Empire” also chose to recreate 1920′s Atlantic City in Brooklyn. 

The reason for starting tryouts in Monmouth County was that Brady had a home in Allenhurst NJ on Deal Lake, which is on the northern border of Asbury Park and the Atlantic Ocean. During the run of the play, Brady leased the home to his daughter, although she had very little leisure time to enjoy it. 

Forever After opened on Broadway at the Central Theatre (1567 Broadway at 47th Street) on September 9, 1918. 

About the Venue: From 1921 through 1957, the Central alternated movies and live theatre (including a fair amount of striptease and burlesque). Movies kept it afloat until 1988, when the Shuberts sold it. The theatre lobby became the Roxy Deli and the auditorium became what is now the W Hotel. Forever After was the premiere production of the new 1,100 seat venue. 

“The new theatre is attractively decorated in French gray and old rose, with just a bit of dull gold. The audience last night gave every indication of liking the new play immensely, which should be encouraging to the management, as there are a fearfully large number of seats which people could stay away from in the Centra!.” ~ HEYWOOD BRAUN

It was reported that producer Brady spent $40,000 on the scenery, and another $40,000 on sound effects to imitate the sounds of war. 

Miss Brady’s salary was revealed to be $750 for her stage week, and a further $1,500/week for her screen work. 

"I work in pictures all day. The only rest I ever get is on rainy days, and often I don't get that, because I have to be fitted for new costumes. Ordinarily I get to the studio a little after 9 in the morning and I'm there until 6 in the afternoon. I'm here at the theater about 7:30 and I usually manage to get away about 11:30.“ ~ ALICE BRADY

Miss Brady’s comment about having rainy days off reflects that early filmmaking was done outdoors to capitalize on the sun as a lighting source, instead of lighting interiors in a studio.  

On December 23, 1918 it moved to the Playhouse Theatre (137 West 48th Street).

About the Venue: The Playhouse was a theatre built by William Brady in 1911. When he died and it was sold to the Shuberts. From 1949 to 1952, it was an ABC Radio station. Both the interior and exterior were used in Mel Brooks' movie, "The Producers." In 1969, the theatre was razed to build onto Rockefeller Center.

Between the two venues, the play ran 312 performances, closing on June 7, 1919.  Miss Brady and the play took the summer off, before touring the play in the fall of 1919.  

Forever After opened in Atlantic City at the Globe Theatre on September 25, 1919. Alice Brady was billed as appearing “personally” and “returned to the speaking stage” so readers would not think that Forever After was a film. 

A film version of the play was made in 1926 starring Mary Astor and Lloyd Hughes. Alice Brady, meanwhile, took a decade-long break from film from 1923 to 1933, concentrating on Broadway instead. 

The film opened in Atlantic City at the Stanley Theatre (Boardwalk & Kentucky) on November 3, 1926. 

[cannedpoo]

Atlantic City Traymore Hotel New Jersey Postcard 1916

[the1920sinpictures]

1916 Memorial Day menu from Hotel Traymore, Atlantic City, New Jersey. From Kenneth McIntyre, FB.

[irish-chap]

Atlantic City, New Jersey, circa 1908. Hotel Traymore, bathers on the shore.

[uneasylisteningradio]

Labor Day 2023 September 2, 2023

stream on mixcloud

Soul Flower Mononoke Summit - The Internationale FREAK GENES - Let's Get to Work

DJ speaks over The Stumbling Band - The Internationale

The Ex - You Shall Not Pass Almanac Singers - Plow Under Skitsystem - Profithysteri Deathreat - Victim of the Middle Class Myth Red Red Krovvy - Company Job

Gang of Four - Cheeseburger The Dukes - I'm an Unskilled Worker John Handcox - There Is Mean Things Happening In This Land Boots for Dancing - Money (Is Thin on the Ground) The Young Canadians - Well Well Well Zalmen Mlotek,The New Yiddish Chorale, The Workmens Circle Chorale - In Ale Gasn (in every Street) Daloy Politsey (Down with the Police) Neo Boys - Cheap Labor

The Kids - I Wanna Get a Job in the City Qlowski - Lentil Soup Alex Bartha's Hotel Traymore Orchestra - It Must be Swell To Be Laying Out Dead Subhumans - Work Experience

Chuck Brown & The Soul Searchers - We Need Some Money Progressive Labor Party - Mary Got a New Job Ernst Busch & Grigori Schneerson - Das Einheitsfrontlied (Live) Omega Tribe - Young John Billy Bragg - It Says Here

Rose Marie Jun - Chain Store Daisy Dirt - Unemployment Dick Gaughan - Workers' Song The Dils - Class War The Beat - Work-a-Day World Aunt Molly Jackson - Ragged Hungry Blues part 2

Manhattan Chorus, Elie Siegmeister, Mordecai Bauman & Maudy Bauman - On the Picket Line Passion Day - Weapon of Work MDC - I Hate Work Cherry Cheeks - Not My Job

Chumbawamba - One By One

[retromodernisme]

Traymore Hotel, Miami Plage, Floride, 1945.

[memolands]

Traymore Hotel - The Art Deco skyscraper by the Sea in Atlantic City

Traymore Hotel – The Art Deco skyscraper by the Sea in Atlantic City

The resort begun as a small boarding house in 1879, the hotel expanded and became one of the city’s premier resorts. As Atlantic City began to decline in its popularity as a resort town, during the 1950s and 1960s, the Traymore diminished in popularity. By the early 1970s the hotel was abandoned and severely run down. It was imploded and demolished in 1972. Most of the Traymore site remains a…

[menubot]

Welcome to Hotel Traymore, would you care for the menu? http://menus.nypl.org/menus/32028

[jerrylewis-thekid]

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Jeanne (@moonchildbooks)

Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Traymore Hotel's Traymore Cabana Club in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in the early 1950s.

[aiiaiiiyo]

1915, Atlantic City. Bathing in front of the Marlborough-Blenheim and the Traymore Hotels. (984x750) Check this blog!

[route22ny]

Atlantic City beach scene, with the noted Traymore Hotel in the background.  Image is a scan of an anonymous amateur photo taken circa 1930 that was purchased on ebay, then scanned and submitted to wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traymore_Hotel

[outoftowninac]

FUNNY FACE

1927

Funny Face is a 1927 musical composed by George Gershwin, with lyrics by Ira Gershwin, and book by Fred Thompson and Paul Gerard Smith. It starred Fred Astaire and his sister Adele. 

It was in this show that Astaire first danced in evening clothes and a top hat.

The show has the distinction of not only being partly set in Atlantic City, but also trying out there as well. 

THE STORY: Jimmy Reeve is the legal guardian of three pretty sisters, Dora, June and Frankie, whose prize belongings he keeps in his safe. June's pearl necklace is locked in there, and so is Frankie's diary, after having been confiscated by Jimmy. However, the diary contains very incriminating things, so Frankie convinces the aviator Peter Thurston to steal it from the safe. But somehow he manages to steal the pearls instead, setting off a merry chase that takes the cast to Atlantic City. 

The score includes such Gershwin classics as “’S Wonderful”, “He Loves and She Loves” and “What Am I Gonna Do?” 

Originally called Smarty, it first premiered in Philadelphia on October 11, 1927, to poor reviews. This led to major rewrites and caused critic-humorist Robert Benchley, who had contributed to the script, to walk out. The rewrites and changes continued as the musical moved to Washington D.C. on October 31st.

It then arrived in Atlantic City on November 7th, playing at Nixon’s Apollo Theatre for one week. 

There were still script problems and daily changes. Fred Astaire said to his sister and co-star, 

“I hate flops, and this is one. We might as well face it. This damn turkey hasn’t got a prayer.”

The show had one more stop before heading to Broadway, in Wilmington, Delaware on November 14th. By now the show had been renamed Funny Face. 

It opened on Broadway on November 22, 1927, as the first show performed in the newly-built Alvin Theatre, named for owners Alex Aarons and Vinton Freedley, who were also producers of Funny Face. It is now known as the Neil Simon Theatre. 

It became a major Broadway hit, and after 244 performances, the whole company transferred it to London, where Fred and Adele Astaire had had a successful run of Lady, Be Good! just before starting the rehearsals of Smarty in Philadelphia.

The 1957 film musical Funny Face also features Astaire, but only four songs from the 1927 show survived, now in a totally different plot. 

ATLANTIC CITY & NEW JERSEY

George Gershwin and Atlantic City were not strangers. When not there for professional reasons, he was also found there for personal ones.

“Atlantic City suits me to a ‘T’ right now and I am loathe to leave.” ~ 1919

His Pulitzer Prize-winning musical Of Thee I Sing (1931) is partly set in Atlantic City. 

Funny Face played a week of out-of-town tryouts in Atlantic City at Nixon’s Apollo Theatre. 

The plot of the musical takes us to an inn located in fictional Lake Wapatog, New Jersey, before visiting the very real seaside resort of Atlantic City. 

Book writers Thompson and Smith give the locations names that are similar to, or pun on, actual places. Lake Wapatog, for example, may be a reference to the very real Lake Hopatcong, or any number of communities with names inspired by native American tribes. 

Fred Astaire’s character, Jimmy, is said to be from Silver Brook, New Jersey. Except for a small body of water in Morris County, there is no town of Silver Brook in the Garden State. Late in Act Two of Funny Face, the Silver Brook Police Department follow Jimmy to Atlantic City. Silver Brook may be a reference to Green Brook, a real town in Somerset County NJ. 

The Paymore Hotel in Atlantic City is likely a satirical name for the Traymore Hotel. The Traymore (located at Illinois Avenue and Boardwalk) catered to an upscale clientele, and was described in 1924 as "the Taj Mahal of Atlantic City" so the pun “pay more” was apt. The hotel was demolished in 1972. 

The show is also set on the Two-Million Dollar Pier in Atlantic City, obviously a verbal swipe at the famous Million Dollar Pier (1906 to 1981).  The pier was also known as Playground Pier, and later Ocean One, a shopping complex. 

The 1983 Broadway musical My One and Only claimed to be a revival of the original musical, but contained only some of the songs and had a very different plot. It did, however, succeed in bringing Gershwin back to Atlantic City when the show was produced at the Claridge Hotel in 1985. 

‘S wonderful when things come full circle! 

[cannedpoo]

Hotel Traymore, Atlantic City )

[the1920sinpictures]

1928 Menu at the Hotel Traymore. From America in the 1920′s, FB.

[dandyads]

Traymore Hotel, 1917

The Traymore was located at the intersection of Park Place and Boardwalk, aka the swankiest property in the game Monopoly. This fine product of American creative genius was demolished in 1972.