The Bleecker Street Cinema

03/01/2026

In chronically descending order:

1. Across the street from The Bleecker Street Cinema since 1987, The Peculier Pub was a good place for meeting before movies, or for hashing out their meaning afterwards. It’s still there as of this tapping, though, of course, the Cinema ain’t.

2. Before The Peculiar, the same location hosted The Dugout - seen here in a 1978 photo by Jack Falat - before it moved around the corner to 3rd Avenue north of 13th. The Dugout was a longtime Village stalwart that likely played host to the same pre- and post-cinema-related activities as the storefront’s subsequent occupant.

3. This circa 1940 photo of the same location, with the identifiable Bleecker Street Cinema pillars on the left in the foreground, shows a different use than its future incarnations: The Vatican City Religious Book Company. The Bleecker Street Cinema was still years away from being established, the Raymond Hood-designed building then being occupied by a restaurant named Mori’s.

4. Between 1833-1835, that same building was home to James Fenimore Cooper, the author perhaps best known for “The Last of the Mohicans,” seen in this photo by Matthew Brady. His father founded Cooperstown, NY, the home of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.®️ Neither Cooper had anything to do with The Bleecker Street Cinema. In fact, cinema itself would only be invented long after their deaths. I just thought it was a cool factoid.

•Some of this history and its annotations are due to the diligent toil of Al Heitzer. Thanks, Al.

14/12/2024

Sketch by architect Raymond Hood for Mori’s Restaurant (1928). The building would become the home of The Bleecker Street Cinema.

31/05/2024

WHO STARTED THE BLEECKER STREET CINEMA?

Lionel Rogosin was born January 22, 1924 in New York City. He studied chemical engineering at Yale, served in the Navy, and worked in his father’s textile firm until he turned his attention to making films about global social justice issues.

One of his earliest films was about South African apartheid. In order to shoot this film - about a Johannesburg migrant worker - under the disapproving noses of the authorities there, he pretended that his project was about African music. Finished in 1958, the resulting film, “Come Back, Africa,” was well-received and won the Grand Prize for Documentary at the Venice Film Festival.

However, he was unable to arrange for American distribution for the film and so, in 1960, he founded The Bleecker Street Cinema to showcase independent films. It soon became, in the words of film critic and historian James Hoberman, one of "three key revival houses: The New Yorker, the Bleecker Street, and the Thalia.”

Rogosin continued running the theater until 1974, when he sold it to Sid Geffen. He died of a heart attack in Los Angeles in December 2000.

For more about Lionel Rogosin, please see: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lionel_Rogosin

05/04/2024

A June 1972 shot of across the street from The Bleecker Street Cinema, showing The Dugout, which was a bar well-used by cineasts before and after screenings. The Dugout would move around the corner to Third Avenue, to be replaced by The Peculier Pub, which remains at this location as of this writing. Photographer unknown. Courtesy of Susan Fensten.

EDIT: An April 2024 shot from a similar vantage point. Photographer Jason Kessler

06/12/2023

Two 1940’s photographs of the Mori’s/Bleecker Street Cinema building with a forlorn “For Sale” sign hanging in a second floor window.

23/10/2023

In 1883, restauranteur Placido Mori hired then-unknown architect Raymond Hood to create a facade for the two row houses at 144 and 146 Bleecker Street so that they could be combined into an upscale eating establishment. Hood was paid for the job with an apartment in the building as well as an open tab in the restaurant.

The architect would go on to design the Daily News building and Rockefeller Center as well as many other important works.

The Bleecker Street Cinema was established in the building in 1960.

For more information about Raymond Hood, see:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Hood

10/10/2023

144 Bleecker Street, October, 2023

25/09/2023

An uncredited photo from the 60’s, looking west on Bleecker Street from LaGuardia Place. The theater is on the left. The venerable Dugout, The Bitter End, and Circle in the Square Theater can be seen on the right.

03/08/2023

Life in the ol’ gal yet.

The reopening of Smacked Village will be the first of 20 new pot shops featuring the new state-wide store template.