Denis Theatre
685 Washington Road,
Mount Lebanon,
PA
15228
685 Washington Road,
Mount Lebanon,
PA
15228
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I truly hope that the renovating efforts for this theatre returns it to the orignal single screen concept. Present and past photos of the theatre and its art deco interior can be found at the site below:
http://www.denistheatre.org/History/Pictures
In conjunction with efforts to raise money to renovate and resurrect the Denis, three movies are being shown this summer outdoors at the nearby Parse Way (covered) Pavilion on Washington Road.
“Bringing Up Baby” will run at 9 p.m. June 27, the locally made “The Bread, My Sweet” at 9 p.m. July 25 and “Mad Hot Ballroom” at 9 p.m. Aug. 29.
Ah, yes! The famous “green box” marquee of the Denis. If you look where the square hole is down from the “S” in “DENIS”, a smaller neon sign reading either “Denis Encore” or “Encore Theater” was monunted there.
I suggested to the organization that is restoring this classic theater that they should try to get a replica of the original marquee from its earlier days. It’s probably a one-in-a-trillion shot, but you may never know.
Photo from March 1982:
View link
Renewing link.
The lower pic, the one looking into the auditorium from the stage, appears to have way more than the 500 seats that the caption states. It looks more like 1500-2000 seats, 500 in the balcony alone. The upper pic, looking twds the stage, with the center aisle, is more likely to be the Denis.
Something odd. The historic photos of the Denis from opening day 1938, posted at the official site, show two distinctly different auditoriums.
The view toward the stage shows a center aisle. The view from the stage has no center aisle, but two side aisles.
Which is the real Denis?
MT. LEBANON, PA — Fundraising to renovate the Denis Theatre is going slower than expected. $238,000 has been raised, but its non-profit board had hoped to raise $1 million by the end of the year.
The Denis Theatre Foundation received its first six-figure gift of $100,000 last Oct. 29th, but it seems unlikely to make this year’s goal.
An estimated $3 million will be needed for an extensive renovation to reopen the 1938 theater closed in 2004. The theater went non-profit earlier this year.
Read more in The Almanac.
Susan,
I was in the Denis only once and that was to see “Home Alone”. Seriously, it was about THE most cramped theatre I was ever in! A horrible chop-job if you ask me.
Considering that the nearby Hollywood was re-opened for only about a year, I sincerely wish the Denis all the luck in the world.
Please visit www.denistheater.org It appears that the Denis may continue to operate as a movie theater
For the record, this theater was never identified as the Denis Quad.
Postscript to TomB’s note above:
The Denis opened as a Harris theater in 1937 in Mt. Lebanon Township, a suburb southwest of Pittsburgh.
It played third run (second neighborhood run) commercial films after they had played Downtown and after, in a 50-50 ratio, one of nearby Dormont’s two theaters, the Hollywood and the South Hills. (The latter appears in Cinema Treasures as Cinema 4 in Dormont.)
The initial Denis capacity reportedly was, as Dave-Bronx notes, 1,152, part of which was in a balcony I never knew to be used.
Occasionally, thanks to the vagaries of booking, the Denis played a major second-run film before the Dormont theaters. Examples included “Porgy and Bess,” “Sons and Lovers” and “Experiment in Terror.”
Associated Theatres, which had taken over the Denis and many other Pittsburgh area theaters, had been having great success as the district’s leading purveyor of art films.
In order to have a South Hills area outlet for art films that could “daydate” (play concurrently) with their popular 374-seat Forvm Theatre in Squirrel Hill, Associated Theatres reconstructed part of the Denis property to put its new Encore (or Denis Encore) auditorium on what had been an upstairs lobby – long unusued – that had led to the main theater’s balcony.
The Denis charged regular neighborhood prices for the third-run commercial films in its larger main-floor theater and higher first-run prices for the art films shown upstairs in the 274-seat Encore.
The Encore opened in the summer of 1965 and joined the Forum in presenting a spy spoof called “Agent 8 ¾,” which had been known in England as “Hot Enough for June.”
The film did not do well, but “Casanova ‘70” quickly became the first joint Forvm/Encore hit, followed soon by “A Patch of Blue,” which lasted 16 weeks, and “To Sir, With Love,” which hung in for 19 rounds.
All records then were broken during the 25-week run of “The Graduate.”
When the two theaters played the same film, the Forum consistently did better than the Encore by taking in 60-70 percent of the earnings.
But because the Denis had a second, larger auditorium on site, it could trump the Forvm’s numbers occasionally by moving “The Graduate” down to the main Denis at art house prices and letting the other audience, for a third-run movie such as “Wait Until Dark,” pay the lower price to watch it in the tonier Encore auditorium.
Eventually the original Denis Theatre was subdivided two ways. The main-floor auditorium was divided down the middle into a pair of 280-seat spaces.
The former balcony was piggybacked in a sense. The front of the balcony was sealed off and converted into a projection booth for the two main-floor auditoriums. The back half became an oddly wide, shallow space with few rows. No. 4 was difficult to access by a back stairwell that immediately made it an unpopular climb.
Denis 4, as the odd new 120-seater was called, drew complaints. Many folks, upon reaching the box office and learning their movie of choice was in No. 4, left the premises.
Dissatisfaction with the space was so pronounced that when Cinema World took over, it shut down auditorium No. 4 and used only the main three.
Under different managements, the main three auditoriums were numbered differently. Sometimes the former Encore was called Denis 1, and sometimes it was Denis 3 because it was third in size (by then listed as having 240 seats).
CineMagic took over, reopened the fourth auditorium and concentrated more and more on art films (generally moveovers from the Squirrel Hill and Manor in Squirrel Hill).
But the overall Denis continued to deteriorate, with some films shown out of frame and out of focus by employees who complained of poor equipment.
The upscale audience that supports art films became increasingly discontented with the condition of the Denis.
A few movies did do well, including the first run of “Fahrenheit 9/11” and the locally made sleeper “The Bread, My Sweet.”
But attendance worsened steadily until the Denis closed Sept. 12, 2004, with “We Don’t Live Here Any More,” “The Door in the Floor,” “I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead” and “Maria Full of Grace.”
We can be heartened by the purchase of the theater (see the link above to Barbara Vancheri’s Post-Gazette story) and hope that the proposed $3 million renovation, including significant reconstruction, will turn the Denis into the art house jewel of the South Hills.
Denis Quad was good in Great Balls Of Fire and The Rookie.
According to the post above of 11/22/04 by TomB, the Encore was built over the lobby. The last time I saw the Denis in person was in the mid-70s, and at that time from the street the building looked to be 2-stories tall. The wall above the marquee was that decorative grill-looking type of concrete block, and the theatre name was on there in big neon letters. The marquee only had the titles on it, no theatre name. In these recent photos that wall above the marquee is no longer there, the name is on the marquee, and the facade appears to be only 1-story. Has the Encore, previously stated as above the lobby, been removed?
Excellent news!!!
Hopefully the trend continues! (Parkway, South Hills, New Granada, Roxian, The Garden and The Warner hopefully follow suit and reopen as well!!!!)
congrats for all those involved in the remodeling and reopening!
it’s nice to know that there are still investors who see value in keeping some of these great old movie houses going.
Photos of the current state of the Denis Theatre are here
Plans unveiled to reopen Denis Theatre
View link
Hey Susan! Your hopes have been answered. A local Mt. Lebanon man purchased the Denis in November. Remodeling efforts will begin this month. He’s a great guy and has I’m confident that he’ll restore the theater properly. Once I find out the opening date, I’ll post it here.
Kelly
Kelly,
Let’s hope that someone buys it who has the resources in which to properly renovate it. I’d like to see it go back to being the way it was originally, although I’m much too young to remember that!
I remember riding the T out to this theatre.
The Denis Theater in Mt. Lebanon just went up for sale. Pittsburghers – here’s your chance to revive a landmark!
I lived in this area for a couple of years and I remember seeing HOME ALONE here. As I recall, this was one of the worst chop-jobs I’d ever seen on a sub-divided movie house.
The Denis opened in 1940.
That’s funny. Everytime I tried to Google “Dennis Quad” I would get Mr. Quaid, lol.