... in Bałuty ...
In Bałuty
As the least expensive form of available cultural entertainment, film found immediate success with the impoverished residents of the Jewish quarter.The earliest permanent cinema-theaters in Bałuty opened in 1909. These were Kasandra and Flora, the latter of which was owned by the aptly named Jan Kino (John Cinema). In a manner typical of early cinema-theaters, the venues in the Jewish quarter at first presented films within the context of variété theater, alongside acrobatic spectacles and magic shows. Information about specific performances demonstrates that the connection of cinematic screenings to vaudeville persisted into the next decade. A good example of this practice includes performances in 1914 at the Flora of a troupe under the direction of Stanisław Szosland. By the 1920s, however, the vaudevillian extras were shed in favor of double-feature cinematic shows. Still, when not used to present films, the cinema-theaters in Bałuty (and elsewhere) hosted cabaret and revue performances.
In 1927, Łódzki Przegląd Teatralny published an interview with the owner of the cinema-theater Syrena (the new name of the Kasandra theater) under the title “First-rate cinema in the Bałuty quarter.” The article was, in fact, a thinly veiled advertisement for this venue. Syrena, vying with Flora and Macierz (later Venus) for audiences, was in actuality a second-rate theater. Like other cinemas in Bałuty, it presented films that premiered earlier at the more expensive locations in Łódź. There might have been truth to the article’s claim that spectators at Syrena waited for hours to see movies because of the high demand for its shows. The establishment during 1928–29 of several new cinema-theaters in Bałuty—Zacheta, Oaza, Uciecha, and Bajka—suggests that indeed there was pressing need for more cinema-theaters in the Jewish quarter.
With the introduction of the talkies, the cinema-theaters that could not afford the equipment for sound projection were compelled to provide their audiences with better live music. During that period, nearly all of Bałuty’s cinema owners put additional resources into hiring larger instrumental ensembles to offer fitting musical illustration. By 1932, two venues in Bałuty—Bajka and Raj—were equipped to broadcast sound. A year later, five more cinemas in the quarter could play the talkies. This development coincided with the same transition to sound elsewhere in in the city and Poland. The reign of silent film had ended.
Over the years, there were repeated efforts to create a public film venue in Bałuty. In 1922, Berek Baumgart, the owner of the cinema-theater Flora, asked for a license to screen the same movies as the Municipal Educational Cinematograph (MEC) so that the schoolchildren and youth of Bałuty could have access to “appealing and educational” films. This request was not granted because the city authorities did not agree to the tax break proposed by Flora’s owner. In 1927, when the low-cost, high-quality films offered at the MEC were attended by hundreds of thousands, Łódź’s government outlined a plan to establish a sister institution in Bałuty. Among the proposed ideas, the most impressive was the project for a new building at the corner of Brzeska and Sporna Streets. The structure was to accommodate a 1200-seat auditorium, a lecture hall for 300, a library, and a reading room. The project was thwarted by the city’s inability to meet the high price for the land at this location.
