Bijou Theatre

They did briefly shut down in August, but reopened shortly thereafter with new management. The website is now http://www.bijoutheatre.org/.

For over seven years these skeptics have been monopolizing these pages. Now that the Bijou Theatre has reopened, (July 7, 2011), there hasn’t been a peep from this bunch! Wonder what theater restoration project they’ll target next. Maybe there’s still some room left here for the rest of us to share some photos or other information about the original Bijou Theatre cir. 1909.

I just went to the Bijou today to see some old Chaplin films. The theatre was gutted and rebuilt, but some old features such as the proscenium remain. This could be a great addition to downtown Bridgeport. My only problem was the parking is pricey. It cost me $7 to park in the garage across the street. BTW, the permanent seats are not in yet, but hopefully will arrive soon!

I live in L.A. but have fond memories of patronizing the Rivoli in the 1950s and 1960s. One of the last movies I saw was “Mr Moses” in 1965. If I’m not mistaken we could hear bowling during the movie as there was an alley either adjacent or above the theater.

My mother remembered the upstairs ballroom as “Quilty’s”, in the 30s and 40s. It was a great location with Howlands, Sears, Barnum Hotel, Koenig’s Art Shop and a fresh food and meat market very close.

Okay. New update, Summer 2009. View link

As for the Bijou movie house, which dates to 1909, Mr. Kuchma says he has at last found a tenant for it. He was not prepared to give further details but said he was hopeful of a summer opening. (The theater already has one nonthespian tenant: its second-floor ballroom and viewing balcony house the architecture offices of Antinozzi Associates.)

Nope.

I have decided that this theatre will never reopen. Originally it was supposed to be like three years ago, but from what I’ve heard there has been NO renovation work at all done in the inside yet.

Rode by there last week. Still under construction.

From the Fairfield Weekly last week.

Westport resident and documentary filmmaker Larry Locke announces plans to relocate his TV production and editing company from NYC to downtown Bridgeport’s Bijou Theatre this fall. Locke is producing a documentary about Beepo as seen through the eyes of the mayor’s office, which can only get more bizarrely Babylonic by the time it’s released in 2008.

Dear All,

Sorry it’s taken me so long to visit this site and read the comments about the Bijou…it’s been a long haul getting this project going and I appreciate your patience…renovating any old theater is hard, especially in an urban context riddled with decades of neglect; added to that is the fact that we’re also building a restaurant and a performance space, that it’s in two different buildings and that I, the owner, have been trying to complete a couple of other projects in the interim, and you can see why it’s taken so long. But it is finally happening! Two Boots of Bridgeport will open in the next few weeks, and the Bijou Theater a couple of months after that. The Bijou will have restoration of its original pressed tin cavorting nudes, a gorgeous event-space of a lobby, a full liquor license and two sky boxes up above with casual seating for large groups. We’ll program a combination of mainstream independents and off-beat cult films, and work with as many local organizations as possible — arts groups, ethnic organizations, gay/lesbian filmmakers, etc.
Please stay in touch, through Two Boots.com, or call us at 212-777-2668. We look forward to seeing you all up in Bridgeport soon!

Best,

Phil Hartman, Two Boots/Pioneer Theater/Bijou Theater, etc.

I’ll believe it when I see it. They’ve been saying for over 2 years that this theatre will open soon, and the date keeps getting pushed back.

I can’t find it in this week’s Weekly, but I read it. It’s still under renovation. Two Boots will be opening by this month’s end, though.

Throughout the fifties and into the seventies, Iknew this as THE RIVOLI. They had a program venue similar to that of the STRAND, with the shows changing three times weekly, and plenty of movie posters to dream about on the outside. The inside was unpretentious, but you always got your money’s worth. In the Sevenites, they changed to the STUDIO CINEMA, and added the Chaplin silhouette on the marquis. Then, it changed to the DOWNTOWN FAMILY CINEMA and quietly passed away. Hardly anyone wanted to go to that part of town anymore, let alone park your car nearby. One thing I remember is attending a showing in the seventies, and in the coming previews, there was a trailer of “Godzilla Vs The Thing”. The narrator began the trailer with, “It started out innocently, as a giant egg…” My friend turned to me and said, “How can a giant egg be innocent?”