Fox Figueroa Theatre
4011 S. Figueroa Street,
Los Angeles,
CA
90037
4011 S. Figueroa Street,
Los Angeles,
CA
90037
3 people favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 33 comments
Well, time marches on and the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena that was formerly across the street from the Figueroa Theater is no longer and has been replaced by Banc of California Stadium, home of Major League Soccer’s Los Angeles FC which opened in 2018.
Correction: Opened on November 13th, 1925. Figueroa theatre opening Fri, Nov 13, 1925 – 28 · The Los Angeles Times (Los Angeles, California) · Newspapers.com
I am unable to find the page for the Regent. I would definitely comment.
Yes I did. That was my second favorite neighborhood theater. Down the street from Manual Arts High.
docchapel: Did you ever attend the Regent Theatre on Vermont near 40th Place? We have a page for it, but nobody familiar with the theater has ever shown up to comment on it, so we know next to nothing about it. It might have closed sometime in the 1950s. I don’t remember ever having seen it myself.
Yeah, the bank has been there awhile and is the cornerstone for the housing complexes around it. The Figueroa was such a great theater, and I have so many found memories of those Sunday Afternoons only a 15 minute walk from home after church. It made life really easy for a kid when the only other alternative for a theater of this quality was downtown L.A. Although the “Academy Theater” in Inglewood was a pretty nice house as well, for a kid that was just as far away as downtown.
In Google’s satellite and street views it is the Broadway Federal Bank that is on the site of the Figueroa Theatre, with a large housing complex just west of it along MLK Jr. Blvd and another housing complex to the south across 40th Place.
A couple of times in the 1950s when we were on our way to visit my grandparents, who lived on 99th Street west of Normandie, we drove past the Figueroa Theatre about the time the house was opening for a Saturday or Sunday matinée, and there would be a huge crowd waiting in the line for the box office. It must have been a very popular theater in those days.
Growing up this was one of the local theaters within walking distance of my house, and the nicest theater in the area. Awesome architecture and it had a balcony which was unusual for a neighborhood theater. I saw “Visit To A Small Planet” with Jerry Lewis there when it opened, along with the “Curse Of Frankenstein” and many others..
The gas station is across the street from where the theater was, the location now is occupied by housing. The picture is before they built the Sports Arena. My buddy and I used to play in the construction site, riding our bikes through doing hook slides and jumps.
The theater address was 4011 S. Figueroa, and Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd was called Santa Barbara Ave back then.
Another example of the occasional sloppiness of old newspaper reports: The caption of the sketch Tinseltoes just uploaded mangles architect William Sterling Hebbard’s name into W. S. Shephard.
Here are some interior photos from the LAPL, circa 1945:
http://jpg2.lapl.org/theater2/00015290.jpg
http://jpg2.lapl.org/theater2/00015289.jpg
http://jpg2.lapl.org/theater2/00015288.jpg
Here is a February 1927 item in the LA Times:
Lois Moran, the heroine of the Fox Films production of David Warfield’s greatest triumph, “The Music Masterâ€, arrived back in Los Angeles last week in time to be here for the western premiere of this picture, now at the Figueroa Theater.
Alec B. Francis has the name role in the production and other prominent members of the cast include Norman Trevor and Neil Hamilton. Other features of the Figueroa program include Salvatore Santaella’s twenty-piece orchestra on the stage in a trio of numbers and a breand new Earle Fox Van Bibber comedy called “The Speedboat Demonâ€.
Here are the USC photos, circa 1936:
http://tinyurl.com/y8hqkgk
http://tinyurl.com/yardbnn
http://tinyurl.com/ye8xuh6
Got gas today on the bones of the Fox Figueroa:
http://tinyurl.com/nvze9a
Don Meyers is correct about the address of the Figueroa Theatre. I’ve checked several old street directories and the address for the theater itself is always given as 4011 S. Figueroa Street. The Santa Barbara Avenue address must have been for the office section of the building above the shops.
Here is a May 1958 ad from the LA Times:
http://tinyurl.com/n2vaem
Here is a new addition from the LAPL:
http://jpg1.lapl.org/00079/00079559.jpg
I worked at the Figueroa Theater from 1949 -1954. My older sister worked there also 1946- about 1955 as a cashier and book keeper. The official address, at least during that period was 4011 S. Figueroa Blvd., Los Angeles 37, Calif.. The main lobby entrance was on the Figueroa west side of the street. The complete building structure included a drug store on the corner of Figueroa and Santa Barbara and on the opposite corner Figueroa and 40th Place was a Bank of America. Above the theater there were some offices with their main entrance on the Santa Barbara side. Also there was a nice Card and gift shop at the far west side of the theater on Santa Barbara. During the forties the theater’s manager was George Miller and his assistant manager was a young lady named Boobie. Later around 1950 J. D. Richardson became manager. His assistant manager was Bob Emory. They were wonderful to work with/for. I could go on forever talking about my experiences and friends that I met working during my youth at this wonderful theater. Don Meyers
Here is a 1925 photo:
http://tinyurl.com/49ths9
Here is a September 1928 ad from the LA Times:
http://tinyurl.com/238qao
I think that location is where the Chevron and McDonalds is now. It’s where you make a left from Figueroa onto MLK to get over to the 110 South.
Those aerial photos clear up my puzzling childhood memory of the Fox Figueroa. I knew there was something unusual about the building’s configuration, and now I see that it was that the auditorium was set at an angle to the street. I have no idea how my memory transformed that angularity into an open corner plaza, though.
Here is another view from the same date:
http://tinyurl.com/277uh7
Here is an aerial photo from 1936, from the USC archive:
http://tinyurl.com/2s6q8x
Here is an excerpt from an LA Times story dated ¾/68:
For years a huge sign overlooking Exposition Park stood out as a familiar Los Angeles landmark. It towered above the Figueroa Theater at Santa Barbara Avenue. “Figueroa Theater” was emblazoned on a massive steel frame, luring moviegoers to such films as “Stanley and Livingston” and “Boom Town” in the years just before World War II.
Now the theater, built in the mid 1920s but dark for many years, is being torn down and a gas station will go up on the site.