American Theater (later Chopin Theater)
910 Manhattan Avenue | Greenpoint | built 1931
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The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.
Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.
- 1914
Farber & Markwitz design the American Picture Theater on the site of Isaac Kaim's shop
After Isaac Kaim, who ran a cigar and newspaper shop at this spot on Manhattan Avenue, died in 1914, the site was sold to local developers who got approval for a movie theater. Farber & Markwitz, a Brooklyn firm better known for tenements, designed the American Picture Theater with 565 seats. It showed second-run films downstairs and had a pool hall on the floor above.
Source: brownstoner.com
- 1922
The city tries to close the American Picture Theater over bulging walls
In 1922 the city sought a permit to shut the American Picture Theater for good, claiming it was badly built and that its walls were bulging outward. The theater was evidently repaired, since it was not torn down.
Source: brownstoner.com
- 1932
A falling billiards sign nearly kills a woman with a baby carriage outside the theater
In 1932 the billiards sign that hung from the second floor of the theater building came down in a strong wind. It crushed the wheels of a pram and cut the baby's forehead, though the frame of the carriage shielded the child, and the mother narrowly escaped being hit. Brownstoner calls it a miracle that no one was hurt.
Source: brownstoner.com
- 1968
The theater is renamed the Chopin to appeal to Greenpoint's Polish community
In 1968 the American Picture Theater became the Chopin Theater, a name chosen to draw patrons from Greenpoint's by then strongly Polish neighborhood. At the same time, the upstairs pool hall and bowling alley were turned into a meeting room, catering space and dance hall.
Source: brownstoner.com
- 1987
The Chopin Theater and its catering hall close, and the building turns to retail
The Chopin Theater and its upstairs catering hall closed in 1987. The building then became a Burger King and a Quest Diagnostics, and most recently a Starbucks, according to Brownstoner's 2013 account. A bingo hall also occupied the upper floor for a while. The facade has been stuccoed and painted over the years and has lost its original roofline.
Source: brownstoner.com
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