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Marriage Story director Noah Baumbach with Adam Driver, Laura Dern, Ray Liotta, Alan Alda, producer David Heyman and Scarlett Johansson
Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
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Netflix has chosen to have theatrical releases of two of its most anticipated films at two very impressive venues in New York. Martin Scorsese's The Irishman, starring Robert De Niro, Al Pacino and Joe Pesci, which opened the 57th New York Film Festival will screen at the 1,015-seat Belasco Theater on West 44th Street. The showings will be limited to eight a week, with the theatre dark on Monday, as if it were a Broadway play run. Pacino won a Best Supporting Actor Tony Award in 1969 for Don Petersen's Does A Tiger Wear A Necktie? at the Belasco. This is the first time a film will be presented there.
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Ron Howard’s Pavarotti was the last film screened at The Paris Theatre before it closed in August and now Netflix will reopen the venue to show Marriage Story
Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
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The Irishman, based on Charles Brandt’s nonfiction book, I Heard You Paint Houses, screenplay by Steven Zaillian, is that of hit man Frank Sheeran (De Niro), his mentor, Pennsylvania mob boss Russell Bufalino (Pesci) and their intricate connections to the notorious union leader and Teamster President Jimmy Hoffa (Pacino). Much more than a history of post-war organised crime, the film spans decades, with the focus on the Fifties, Sixties and Seventies, plus a jump further back to the Second World War and a frame narrative closer to the present.
The other surprise announcement is that Netflix has made a deal to reopen The Paris Theatre in New York which has been closed since August of this year to show Noah Baumbach’s Marriage Story. Ron Howard’s documentary Pavarotti was the last film to be screened at the iconic 581-seat palace located on West 58th Street off Fifth Avenue near The Plaza Hotel and Central Park South.
The Irishman starts its run at the Belasco Theater on Friday, November 1 and on Netflix later in the year.
Marriage Story screenings start at The Paris Theatre on Wednesday, November 6 and will be available on Netflix on December 6.
