Last night, Sandy and I headed out to the Landmark Theater for the 2006 Ghost Hunt. Its basically just a spook themed fund raiser. The CNY Ghost Hunters crew was out in full force.
Not quite what I expected. I figured that there’d be a lot of sit down about Landmark history and its known ghost (Claire) and not much actual touring of the premises. But surprisingly, after a short intro, they turn you loose in the entire theater alone. The only rule was that you were welcome to explore any area with an open door. Any doors closed/locked were off limits.
Surprisingly, there’s really not a whole lot to see outside of the generally public areas. We wandered through the stage and back stage areas, which are quite cramped as the traveling shows always say. I enjoyed the massive antique electrical cabinet stage left that looked to be pretty original to the theater. From there we went up to the dressing rooms (where I noticed people always forget to turn off the lights as they’re visible from Clinton St). Hardly luxury accommodations by any means.
From there, we snaked our way behind the stage and back down under the stage area. The basement is pretty average for a building of its age. Dark, dank, and smelly. The green room was especially austere; just a few random tables and chairs under the stage. Don’t see performers spending much time down there.
Outside of that, the rest of the basement is pretty much storage (as you’d probably expect.) A lot of small dark rooms packed with assorted junk. A real flash light, might have been a good addition to the ghost hunting kit. While the some of the areas were kind of spooky I was more worried about tripping over some random junk in the dark. The LED light on my key chain, wasn’t quite up to the task.
Completing the underground circuit that goes from the stage up to the men’s lounge under the lobby, we came up to the theater level again and headed up to the balcony. No worries about seeing over the head of the person in front of you up here. The seats are on a really steep incline. Almost scary steep.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t a whole lot of stuff to see up there, other than some a gigantic flow spot and some peeling pant. I would have liked to have seen the projection room, but that was one of the few off limits areas, doh.
One of the perks of the ghost hunt was that you bring in what ever ghost hunting devices you wanted, including camera (both still and video). I figured this was pretty much a once in a life time chance to get some pictures. You can check ’em out as a slide show on flickr. I’ll pre-apologize for the camera (too slow for low light) and the operator (who can’t seem to take a straight shot or hold the camera steady to save his life) resulting in some pretty unexciting shots. There are a couple that came out pretty OK…
Purplewire crew: I made a half hearted attempt to find the room off our deck that we’re always wondering about. I suspected it might be accessible off the emergency exit corridor from the north side of the balcony, but didn’t see any doors that looked likely. I’m guessing now that its actually accessible from the projection room itself.
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