Co-owner Shad Branen was determined that the Geneva Theatre would survive the coronavirus shutdown and re-emerge as a cultural center. He and his staff used this downtime to complete cleaning and interior renovation work. Damaged seats were repaired, computer software upgraded, and walls that needed touchup were painted.
“We will be opening up better and cleaner,” he said. “It’s a good opportunity to do cleaning and improvements throughout the buildings.”
At the Plaza Theater, Branen said they have stripped and epoxy sealed the floors, a process that typically requires 24 hours to dry, something near impossible when the theater is operational. They have also taken the opportunity to work on cleaning projects and update computer software.
The Plaza Theater originally opened in 1928, the same year as five other theaters opened in the Racine area. “All these theaters have a history dating back to the vaudeville era,” Branen said.
The Geneva Theatre was closed and dormant for years before Branen acquired the property and reopened it in March 2017 following an estimated $2 million restoration. The city extended a $900,000 loan for the effort, to be forgiven if Branen owns the theater for at least five years. It’s home to the Geneva Theatre Actors Guild, a group that presents live stage productions and contributes the proceeds to area charitable organizations. The Geneva Theatre Actors Guild planned to resume operations in the fall.
Branen said he had to throw away concession items such as pizza ingredients, and he is no longer ordering soft drinks or beer. He had planned to order a new movie screen, but the manufacturer is temporarily closed.
Branen said that he has approximately 20 employees total between two theaters, with a dozen who work at the Plaza in Burlington and some at work at both facilities.
While the theatre offers curbside concessions during limited hours on Friday and Saturday, Branen said the COVID-19 has forced him to furlough “virtually the entire staff.” Branen was recently approved for a paycheck protection program which allowed him to bring back some of his staff, but he looks forward to resuming normal operations as soon as possible. Movie studios currently are not releasing any new movies to theaters. “The biggest challenge theaters will face when reopening is what products will be available from the studios,” said Branen. Some studios have released films instead to online streaming services, but Branen said “I think there will always be a place for movie theaters, because people like to go out.”
Co-owner Shad Branen is determined that the Plaza Theater and Geneva Theater in Lake Geneva will survive the current coronavirus shutdown and will re-emerge as cultural centers. Branen and his staff are using this downtime to complete some cleaning and interior renovation work on the theatres, repairing damaged seats and more. The lobby floor has been seal-coated. Computer software has been upgraded. Walls that needed touching up were painted.
“We will be opening up better and cleaner,” he said. “It’s a good opportunity to do cleaning and improvements throughout the buildings.”
The Plaza Theatre floors have been stripped and epoxy-sealed, a process that typically requires 24 hours to dry, something near impossible when the theater is operational. The Plaza was fourplexed, closed briefly due to bankruptcy, and reopened approximately 20 years ago to its previous owner. Branen has owned the theater for 11 years.
Branen also owns Mercantile Hall, a wedding venue located at 425 N. Pine St., in Burlington. He said that he has approximately 20 employees total between the two theatres, with a dozen who work at the Plaza, and some employees at work at both facilities.
While the Plaza offers curbside concessions during limited hours on Friday and Saturday, Branen said the COVID-19 has forced him to furlough “virtually the entire staff.” Luckily, Branen was recently approved for a paycheck protection program which will allow him to bring back some of his staff. But he looks forward to resuming normal operations as soon as possible. “It’s all a waiting game,” Branen said. “Everyone is anxious to get back to work.”
Movie studios currently are not releasing any new movies to theaters. “The biggest challenge theaters will face when reopening is what products will be available from the studios,” Branen.
Some studios have released films instead to online streaming services, but Branen said he is not worried about it. “I think there will always be a place for movie theaters,” he said, “because people like to go out.”
Federal inspectors found multiple safety violations by a Kenosha-based subcontractor at the Fox Theater demolition site in February, according to citations issued to the company.
The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration issued citations to Recyclean, a demolition company, in March totaling $5,205 after observing electrical hazards and a lack of proper demolition plans on Feb. 5, which the company said in a statement it immediately fixed.
Recyclean worked as a subcontractor on the Fox Theater demolition and specializes in sustainable deconstruction and recycling of building materials, particularly those from historic properties. Urban Evolutions of Appleton served as the primary contractor on the project as contracted by Stevens Point.
The 126-year-old theater in downtown Stevens Point closed permanently in April 1986 and remained unused for decades despite efforts to reopen the building as a theater, performance space or a business incubator. The city took control of the building in late 2019 and tore down the back two-thirds with the goal of using the land and the remaining facade to attract a developer to build on the property.
Recyclean failed to use a ground fault circuit interrupter, a type of circuit breaker meant to protect against ground faults, when workers used extensions cords to power equipment, according to the citation. OSHA inspectors said they saw extension cords missing ground pins that workers used on lifting equipment and that other cords were not protected against sharp objects.
OSHA observed that the Kenosha company started demolition work before it had developed a demolition plan, which should include an engineering survey of the building’s condition and the possibility of unplanned collapses, according to the citation. The company said in a statement that it had not properly posted its plans at the site.
“These issues were immediately corrected and our employees will continue to practice industry leading safety standards in the growing deconstruction field,” according to a statement from Recyclean.
The final outcome of the case is pending corrective action on the violations, according to OSHA’s inspection database.
OSHA inspectors visited the Fox Theater demolition site in February as part of a planned inspection that observed the hazards affecting five workers, according to the citations. The visit from federal inspectors was not complaint-based and Recyclean was not given advanced notice, according to OSHA’s inspection database.
OSHA last fined the Kenosha company in 2014 for issues related to aerial lifts and asbestos abatement, which resulted in Recyclean paying $2,800 and $4,400 respectively in informal settlements with the regulatory agency.
The end of Chicago’s majestic rat-ridden movie palace (Mitch O'Connell)
Short story first- I heart movie palaces.
Now for the long story – I moved to Chicago in 1979 right after high school to attend the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. For a film lover, it was perfect time and place. I got to relish the last days of the cavernous decaying grindhouses where you could just lose the day watching action and horror schlock, and catch the evening screenings of the classic and cult at the revival theaters such as The Parkway, Varsity and Sandburg (among others). I’d have my first time exposure to so many great films as they should be seen, on the big screen with an appreciative audience. Double features of Hitchcock to Marx Brothers, to John Waters and David Lynch.
This is a story about one of the former, the majestic rat-ridden wonderful centers of entertainment that weren’t long for this earth. In its heyday, downtown Chicago was the place to catch a flick with dozens and dozens of downtown movie palaces projecting away day and night, but by 1989 only the Woods was left standing as the last surviving operating Loop movie theatre. Opened in 1940 with a yearlong showing of Gone With the Wind, for it went out with “I’m Gonna Get You Sucka” and “Hellraiser Hellbound 2” (not a pithy judgement call, I like ‘em all!). I went there for the first time when visiting my dad and happily stood in a line around the block to watch the James Bond flick “Diamonds Are Forever.”
Back then I was doing weekly drawings for a Chicago Tribune column titled “Around Town” where I’d illustrate whatever reporter Rick Kogan wanted to write about. I was also researching the history of Chicago theaters for a never-realized graphic novel (which, 34 years later, will finally turn into blog postings). This time I thought I’d slightly fudge the facts and let the tail wag the dog using the press phrase “I’m from the Chicago Tribune” to get an all-access pass to the Woods’ last day. The manager, who was around my age, lets me, my camera and note-taking yellow legal pad right in.
Today’s crowd for the 9am first showing consisted of three teens already caught up in talking back to a 40-foot-tall Isaac Hayes on the screen. The sleepy candy counter girl just seemed to be there out of habit. The popcorn machine is unplugged, there are no cups for soda and only 3 packs of candy are available under the glass display. I snapped away and worked my way up the 2 flights of stairs, stepped around the “Balcony Closed” sign, to the projectionist’s room door and knocked. Morton Krugman, projectionist for the Woods Theatre since 1953, lets me in. As soon as I get off my “I’m from the Tribune” greetings, a buzzer goes off warning that it’s one minute before the cue appears in the upper right hand corner of the screen to signal the reel change. When that shows, he has another 2 minutes before the next reel starts. Morton starts to rewind the wheel on the table which quickly spins until the last bit of celluloid feeds through, turning off the machine. Today’s films have been duly written on the pages he keeps secured to a clipboard chronicling the last 10 years of movies shown there.
I pester and photograph away for the next half hour asking every unprepared question that pops in my head.
I find out that normally his door is locked and chained to keep out the curious and intoxicated, but I just lucked out. Today was a late start since the manager didn’t get in until 8:50am but he still had to spend a half hour getting the machines ready. He’ll be able to get everything back to showtime schedule by just dropping out the coming attractions.
He can watch the movie through the glass panel in the room, but since he doesn’t like much of what’s being screened, prefers to watch the TV (channel 5 comes in great but he can’t get in channel 2). Right next to the TV is a tape player where he puts cassettes management supplies of “urban” music to pipe in during intermission, which he also doesn’t like and doesn’t listen to.
I ask to take a picture of him in his red chair that’s perched front of the viewing window. He objects.
“A projectionist sitting down! Are you crazy?!”
His long career has had him working at most of the Loop theaters. It’s in the blood as his father owned a chain of theaters all down Milwaukee Avenue. He remembers as a tot spending the day riding in a limo with dad to check on all the movie houses. It’s still a family affair since to get in the union you’ve got to already be related to a member. It’s also a strong union (the highest paid in the nation in fact). He started out at $60 a week and now he earns enough to easily retire. If fact, enough to have traveled to 30 countries over the years and, next week, has tickets to fly to Bora Bora with the wife. He started out like his father, acquiring second-run theaters that changed double features every three days, but ending up with an almost 40 years projectionist’s career. Along with two side businesses running a collection agency (including all Marshall Fields' accounts) and owning an “active seniors” complex, Mr. Krugman seems to be doing well.
Hobbies? Bridge every week.
He starts to tell me a story about projectionists who would have loud conversations in the booth and disturb the patrons. I keep on talking for another 10 minutes before it dawns on me that that was my cue to leave.
I chit-chat with some other staff, and former employees who are hanging out and reminiscing.
Within a month, the East West corner of Chicago and Randolph is an empty lot.
A GESTURE TO THROW NEW LIGHT ON THE GRANADA (Paul Gapp, Architecture critic, Chicago Tribune, 1987)
When this city saved the Chicago Theatre, it earned no right to turn its back on the three other major movie palaces of the 1920s surviving here. Those are the Uptown, the Avalon and the Granada—and among them, the Granada is perhaps the grandest of all.
You have probably seen the elaborately ornamented and arched terra cotta facade of the now-threatened Granada, which stands on a prominent site at 6433 N. Sheridan Rd.
But if youve never been inside the theater (which has been dark for several years except for a few rock concerts), you may wish to visit one of two photo exhibitions that will continue through July 31. One is on the fourth floor at the south end of the Chicago Public Library Cultural Center, 78 E. Washington St.; the other at the Rogers Park Branch Library, 6907 N. Clark St.
The recently shot black and white photos of the Granada by Mike Williams are part of a suddenly escalating, last-ditch public effort to find a new use for the theater to prevent its demolition by developers who have talked about building an apartment tower in its place.
Architect Daniel D. Watts curated the photo exhibits. He also organized the Save the Granada Theater Committee, which is working in league with the Rogers Park Community Council and the Theater Historical Society.
Williams photographs show the exterior of the Granada, some of the more sweeping expanses of its interior and a number of its decorative details. The pictures also convey impressions of desolation and incipient decay in the 3,447-seat house, which opened in 1926.
The Granada is nominally Spanish baroque in style, although it manifests many of the other eclectic, whimsical and deliberately overblown twists and turns of form and ornamentation found in big urban stage-and-screen venues of the time. Its grand staircase, crystal chandeliers, stained glass, use of marble and bronze, coffered ceilings and acres of ornamented plaster give it a marvelously gaudy quality.
Cleveland-born Edward E. Eichenbaum designed the Granada while working for the architectural firm of Levy & Klein in Chicago. He had begun his career in Detroit with the distinguished Albert Kahn and at another point was associated with the Chicago-based design firm of A. Epstein & Sons.
Other Chicago theaters credited to Eichenbaum include the Regal and Diversey. He also designed the Palace in South Bend, Ind., and the Regent in Grand Rapids, Mich.
Eichenbaums love of legitimate theater originated during his student days at the University of Pennsylvania, and he even understudied the great George Arliss in ''Disraeli'' for a year when the play was running in Philadelphia.
Eichenbaum once called the Granada ''the greatest design I have ever been privileged to make,'' according to a 1983 article by Sharon Lindy published in Marquee magazine. Film palaces were being built so rapidly in the 1920s that Eichenbaum sometimes used the same terra cotta molds on different theaters, ingeniously assembling them into fresh configurations to save time and money. When the Granada was still on the drafting boards, Eichenbaum told an interviewer: ''I want this building to be paradise, so that the common man can leave his meager existence at the door and for a few hours feel that he, too, is among the very rich class that he reads about in the paper.''
Fifty years after he designed it, Eichenbaum returned to the Granada for a visit to receive a 1976 Marquee magazine award from Joseph DuciBella of the Theater Historical Society. Eichenbaum detested the plainness of modern theaters. ''Theyre nothing but barns,‘’ he said. Eichenbaum died in 1982.
The present effort to save the Granada is supported by DuciBella, a theater historian, and by preservationists. Early this month, a representative of the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency said the Granada was a ‘'very good candidate’‘ for listing on the National Register of Historic Places.
Architect Watts, spearheading the Granada campaign, points out that most of the theater is unaltered and in good condition: Its original marble floor is sound, its organ intact, and even its original stage lighting is in working order.
The Granada does not have Chicago municipal landmark status as does the Chicago Theatre on downtown State Street, now a busy venue for live entertainment. Yet it doesnt necessarily make sense to compare the strategy or business rationale for saving the Granada with the scenario that led to the Chicagos salvation after a slide to the brink of demolition. The location, economics and re-use factors are disparate, after all.
Still, neither can such differences be used as alibis for shrugging off the Granada. The old North Side movie palace is part of the citys sociocultural fabric and its brilliant architectural heritage.
There is no doubt, then, about the Granadas credentials. And so we are left with the basic question about any major preservation effort: How many people care, and how hard are they willing to work?
In 1983, after the last devastating flood, the municipality bought the Electric Theatre building and contents, minus two projectors, from the Larson family for $12,600.
The Warner Grand Theatre will bear the name of late Allen-Bradley co-founder Harry Bradley and Peg Bradley. The Bradley family gave a combined $52 million to the MSO’s $139 million project. Donations came from the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, David and Julia Uihlein, and Lynde Uihlein (the grandchildren of Harry and Peg Bradley and the children of philanthropist Jane Bradley Pettit). The Jane Bradley Pettit Foundation also made a significant gift to the project. The 1,650-seat auditorium will be named Allen-Bradley Hall to honor of the builders of the Allen-Bradley Company, founded in 1903 by Lynde and Harry Bradley. David and Julia Uihlein led the campaign which has raised over $128 million to date. The theatre is scheduled to open in the fall.
The last remaining funds needed for the Uptown Theatre should be available soon, we’re hearing. Ald. James Cappleman (46th) said so in an email to residents. Work on the building could begin shortly after that, and today Cappleman said funding will likely be in place by late spring.
The Uptown Theatre since 1981 has largely been maintained by a dedicated group of volunteers who spent their own money to make sure the theatre didn’t deteriorate.
As of today, the petition to save the theatre had more than 13,000 signatures. Recent news that the addition of a second Costco in Naperville would shutter the Ogden 6 Theatres has brought out an influx of protest from fans of the theatre. To further the efforts, a former employee has started a petition to help save the theatre.
The former employee, who has worked at Ogden 6 since 2016 wrote, on the Change.org petition,
“This place is very different than any other movie theater. The experience is personal and you start to remember the faces that come in. I have bonded immensely with the regular guests that come in and I’m forever grateful for them and the kindness they have shown me. To see this place go would be devastating, as it would be destroying 44 years of history.”
The petition, which was started Monday, had more than 13,000 signatures as of Thursday afternoon.
Owners of the Ogden 6 Theatres announced Monday on Facebook that the theatre would likely have to close or relocate to make way for a Costco that is preparing to build at the Ogden Mall in the space that was formerly home to KMart. The news brought a flood of comments from longtime fans of Ogden 6 who shared their memories and lamented the impeding closure.
The petition, which aims to “bring attention to Costco, the Ogden mall management, and Classic Cinemas,” also encouraged signers to share their own personal memories about the theatre and “how the demolition impacts you.”
One signer wrote, “We all (me, friends&neighbors) reacted viscerally to the news of Ogden 6’s closure. It’s a landmark to us…”
Another added, “This theater is such an important part of Naperville culture. Such memories of this place.”
Kenosha’s short-lived and forgotten first Crystal Theater was established by the Crystal Theater Company by Jones and Miller. The Kenosha Evening News reported on January 23, 1907 that the fireproof Bullamore Building at 260 Park Street (today’s 710 57th Streetand still there at this writing) had been leased for a new electric 5-cent theatre, and that it was to be ready over the next two weeks. On Saturday, February 23 of that year, the Kenosha Evening News published an announcement that the Crystal Theatre would have a complete change of program the next day with Baby Gladys to sing and dance and illustrated songs by Miss Lillie Jones and Mr. Jones. And on May 31, 1907, the newspaper published an advertisement for the Crystal Theatre inviting the public to its evening performances, adding “we are and intend to continue giving a clean up-to-date show, one that women and children may attend without fear.” But weeks later, in June, property owner H. L. Bullamore listed the building for rent. (Thanks to Al Westerman for his research on the 57th Street Crystal Theatre.)
LouRugani
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Vixenon
Jan 13, 2020 at 6:44 pm
Downtown McHenry movie house gets a gut rehab
By Dan Moran
Not every old movie theater is worth saving. Those of us who pinched pennies by watching the finest G-rated films of the 1990s on postage-stamp screens at The Dunes in Zion or the Belvidere Mall Cinema in Waukegan were a little sad to see them go, if not in a way that would require chaining oneself to the door to stop progress.
But in an economic marketplace dominated by multiplexes that charge whatever it takes to cover the salary of a Mark Wahlberg — your highest-paid actor in 2017 at $68 million, according to Forbes, and that was for “Transformers: The Last Night” and “Daddy’s Home 2,” if you want to be really angry about it — it’s easy to root for a grassroots effort to restore a 20th century neighborhood movie house for use in the 21st century.
That is the case just a short hop across the border of Lake and McHenry counties, where Scott Dehn of Golden Age Cinemas opened the doors last month on a renovated McHenry Downtown Theater.
As area movie-going fans might already know, the Golden Age stable already included the Liberty 1 and 2 Theaters in Libertyville and the McHenry Outdoor Theatre (which is set to re-open on May 4 with “Avengers: Infinity War,” for those of you already sick of February).
The indoor version when it comes to the McHenry nameplate sits on the west side of the Fox River on Green Street, and it has witnessed an on-again, off-again existence in the last generation or so. According to the invaluable website CinemaTreasures.org, the storefront location’s history as a movie theater dates back to 1919, and it operated as The Empire and The Colony before becoming the McHenry Theatre during the Boomer years.
After joining and departing the umbrella of the Rhyan Management Co. — which ran everything from the Grayslake Outdoor to the aforementioned Dunes once upon a time — the McHenry gave it a go in the early 2000s as discount first-run venue. I remember taking the kids to see one of the many “X-Men” movies there in 2006 or so, and then trying to take them back to McHenry to see one of the many “Toy Story” movies, only to find it closed.
Cinema Treasures reports that the last iteration of the McHenry Downtown closed shop in 2014, and a lot of smaller theaters simply don’t make it back from a slow death like that. But published reports last year revealed that Golden Age was tackling a $1.5 million rehab that would not only reopen the theater, but also expand it from two screens to three.
The result was unveiled in mid-January, and I headed out early on a snowy Super Bowl Sunday to check it out with my youngest offspring in tow, since he had not seen “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle” and had heard mostly good things about it from the cynical middle-school crowd. The first surprise came upon walking inside: This had not been a wallpaper-and-paint makeover. This had been an extreme rehab.
Brick and tile lined the walls of what had been a musty old building, if my memory from 2006 can be trusted. Entrances to three screening rooms — one with 175 seats, another with 155 and a smaller one set to debut with “Fifty Shades Freed” this weekend — were adorned with the names of local businesses that had backed the rebuild.
Along the walls, posters for classic films like “The Empire Strikes Back” and “The Dark Knight” hinted at the past, while inside the theaters, wide recliners with immense legroom were lined up in tidy rows, as demanded by the current consumer. The stage was set to take in this updated version of “Jumanji,” which turned out to be an acceptable pregame diversion, and one that will no doubt demand another extension of the franchise, if $825 million in domestic box office still means anything.
Speaking of box office dollars, this new-age McHenry Downtown Theater charges $9 for adults before 5:30 p.m. and $7 for matinees, children and seniors (aged 60 and older). Hot tip: That’s about $3 less than you’ll pay at the big-boxes, and two tickets at the discount rate almost covers a large, refillable popcorn.
The rebirth of the McHenry Downtown follows the 2015 rehab-and-reopening of the Antioch Theatre, and if this is a trend, it’s a welcome one. For whatever reason, the aforementioned Waukegan and Zion are still waiting for the return of a first-run movie theater, and this should not stand. When it comes to experiencing a movie more than just seeing one, not everyone has surrendered to the Netflix culture.
The Catlow Theatre reopens Friday, January 10 though efforts continue to seek financial assistance to keep afloat. “Little Women” will be screened at at 5:10 and 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 7 p.m. Sunday through Thursday. “Future movies here will be a week-to-week thing until we get back on our feet, so, of course, we will need heavy, heavy, heavy support during this feature’s run to keep things moving along at the Catlow,” said manager Tim O'Connor to patrons today, adding “We still need your help to get us to the next level — a live stage venue,”
The Catlow Theatre closed because owner Tim O'Connor didn’t have the cash to pay bills. He sent an email over the weekend to say “Unless we meet our crowd fundraiser goal, we may not be able to book any movies until we come up with enough money to pay more bills.” The Catlow was to open for special events such as scheduled screenings of Oscar-nominated short films on Feb. 8 and Feb. 9. (Tickets for those are available through the village government: www.barrington-il.gov/oscars ) The Catlow nearly closed over unpaid taxes last October but struggled through. Still, Catlow Theater LP filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in U.S. District Court in Chicago that month with the majority of its creditors listed being film studios. O'Connor says the Catlow is in disrepair and cited a lack of interest in its offerings there.
In 2012, supporters raised $175,395 online to buy a digital projector. Crowdfunding paid for some repairs to the heating system and marquee. The latest online fundraising drive seeks $30,000. As of last week, almost $15,000 had been raised.
The orchestra floor will have two aisles that divide the seating in thirds to avoid long distances to the aisles. Marcus Corporation, which owned the theatre until 2017, is being lauded for caring for the historic fixtures and maintaining and heating the theatre over the 20-plus years that it stood empty. While scrupulously restoring the Warner Grand Theatre, catering kitchens, party rooms, HVAC equipment, loading docks, and new lavatories are being added. On the balcony level, the original lavatories will be restored with their green, black and lavender tile … actually mandatory to earn historic-preservation tax credits to support the $90 million project. (The symphony doesn’t pay taxes but it can sell the tax credits to other developers.) Conrad Schmitt artisans are redoing the original paint, plaster, metal and other decorative surfaces and an acoustical firm comes in at least once a month to check progress. The auditorium’s very rear space below the balcony will become a bar and a control booth, because acoustic engineers discovered it to be a “bass trap” with the worst sound in the house.
Closed amid controversy on April 25, 1986, several individuals and groups have tried, since then to revive the historic Fox theatre. At a special city council meeting last Monday night, Urban Evolutions Inc. of Appleton was selected to demolish two-thirds of the building, fix the roof and seal off the front one-third to make it “weather tight,” said Mayor Mike Wiza to mark the end of the Fox’s 125-year history in downtown Stevens Point. G.F. Andrae purchased the land for an opera house in 1893 and The Grand Opera House opened Sept. 19, 1894, transforming to the Majestic Theater in 1920 and the Fox Theater in 1929 amid challenges including protests over student ticket prices, disputes over wages, television, and even a projectionist strike. The city also began looking at the Fox for potential developments. By April 1973, the city’s Redevelopment Authority eyed several downtown buildings for demolition, including the Fox, not a popular proposal. The Common Council rejected that, but talks of a mall resurfaced in 1980 calling for demolishing the Fox and retaining only the facade as an entrance to the mall. By 1981, the plans changed to raze only the dressing rooms and other theater spaces. In response, owner Jeanette Sanders — G.F. Andrae’s granddaughter — sought historical protection. In 1982, the Fox was added to the National Register of Historic Places. City leaders argued the dressing rooms weren’t historically significant and in February 1984, the city received the approval it needed. Forty feet of the Fox Theatre were demolished on March 11, 1985. About a year later, the operators closed for the last time, blaming post-demolition heating issues. Over 100 people gathered Jan. 25, 2011, to hear Ada Andrae Sanders, her sister Jeanette Sanders and brother Donald Sanders announcing plans to reopen the Fox Theatre. Others expressed interest in using the theatre for venues such as a teen night club, church and roller rink. The Sanders family denied them because they wanted it to reopen as a theatre and restore the elegance of their great-grandfather’s opera house for performances and films, with a restaurant on the second floor. They started to work with the Arts Alliance of Portage County (now CREATE Portage County) to develop a nonprofit and raise money to make their dream a reality. The Arts Alliance formed a nonprofit called Fox on Main in 2013, and the Sanders family donated the title for the theatre to the group. “Fox on Main” began working on designs, a business plan and feasibility studies … but those studies claimed that operating the Fox Theatre as a theater would not be possible without a partner but could be successful if it “filled a need in the community”. CREATE had a 2016 “IDEA Center” program to support entrepreneurship and innovation and in April 2019 announced plans to preserve the Fox’s facade, demolish the auditorium, relocate that IDEA Center there and began a $3.5 million fundraising campaign. Then the city’s building inspector said if Fox on Main didn’t have the roof “water-tight” soon, he would issue a raze order. As of June, no work had been done on the roof, and the inspector issued a 90-day raze order in July, saying the Fox was now so badly damaged and dilapidated that it was a threat to health and public safety. Fox on Main had until mid-October to make sure the roof was water tight, shoring up trusses and repair loose bricks by October to delay the raze order until May 1, 2020. Fox on Main said they wanted to demolish the auditorium and raise money to start as soon as possible. The city agreed to allocate $250,000 toward that … after the demolition contractor was paid. Suddenly an architect firm that Fox on Main had earlier worked with submitted new plans to save the whole theatre … but since this didn’t match the agreement just signed with the city, a new, hard deadline for demolition was set for Dec. 15 … and any changes would need re-approval by the city. Then on Oct. 23, Fox on Main gave up. It would no longer fight the raze order and now wasn’t even interested in the Fox Theatre site for its IDEA Center. (And couldn’t pay for any demolition anyway.) So the city said it’d initially pay for the work but bill Fox on Main’s property taxes for the next three years anyway. If Fox on Main didn’t pay, the property would go to Portage County and eventually the city, but that’d leave a vacant hole in the downtown where no development could take place for at least three and a half years. So Fox on Main’s board voted Nov. 5 to dissolve its donation agreement with the Sanders family and to sell the Fox Theatre to the city for $1. The city agreed, but the actual sale hinged on the Sanders family also dissolving their original Oct. 2013 agreement with Fox on Main with its permissible and forbidden uses for the Fox, allowed only “civic, governmental, cultural or educational purposes including but not limited to: movie theater, stage for theatrical performances, art gallery, music studio, music hall, dance studio, school, restaurant, specialty food store, culinary arts and general or related activities supporting arts, entertainment and culture” (and incidentally prohibiting use for sexual-oriented business, gambling, pawnshop, body piercing business or tattoo parlor.) On Nov. 25, the Sanders family announced it didn’t support the city’s plans to demolish the Fox and were considering dissolving the agreement with Fox on Main.
During the special council meeting Monday, Wiza said the family made it clear they did not intend to dissolve the agreement, that the entire Fox building could be saved, blamed the city for wanting to demolish it, and compared it to the 1970s and 1980s when the city wanted to demolish the Fox to build a mall. “The city has tried to destroy the Fox three times,” D.K. Sanders told a reporter. “The mall failed. We knew it was going to fail. Nobody would listen to us then, and they’re not listening now.”
The mayor, Tony Wiza, said nobody did the work to save it and would ask the city council to consider taking ownership of the Fox even with the restrictions from the original agreement for the next 13 years which would make development “pretty challenging,” but at least would let the city maintain the facade.
In November, 2018 the Community Development Commission was told that construction was expected to begin in summer, 2019. No work has begun. The delay, according to Jam Productions' Jerry Mickelsen, involves financing. Public funding included $14 million through the state’s Property Assessed Clean Energy Act; $13 million in tax-increment financing; $10 million in Build Illinois bond funding; $8.7 million in federal tax credits; and $3.7 million in the City of Chicago’s Adopt-a-Landmark funds. That money’s committed, but $26 million is still needed that was supposed to come from loans and investments. Mickelson said he expects that financing to come in early 2020. The reopening is now projected to be in 2022.
A newly-founded Uptown Theatre Foundation is intended to act as a steward of the theatre and potentially receive donations to help restore it. Peter Strazzabosco, deputy commissioner in the Chicago Department of Planning and Development, told Chicago Tribune reporter Chris Jones that his department is continuing to work with the developer on a restoration plan that will also revitalize the Uptown entertainment district, to hopefully start before summer.
The ELKADER Theatre is seen in a color photo and small article (“Main Street, USA”) on Page 8 in the December/January 2020 issue of Reminisce Magazine.
The Sanders family announced Monday they do not support the city’s plans to demolish the Fox Theater and they have not yet decided if they will dissolve an agreement with a local nonprofit that could potentially save the downtown theater’s facade.
In a letter sent to the Stevens Point Journal, D.K. Sanders, Ada Andrae Sanders and Jeanette Sanders said the city is choosing to demolish the building instead of saving it. They are the great-grandchildren of G.F. Andrae, who built the theater in 1894.
The Sanders family said neither Fox on Main nor the city made any effort to correct the problems with the building that sparked a raze order in July, and the focus from everyone involved has been to demolish the building.
“It’s not that they didn’t do anything,” D.K. Sanders told a Stevens Point Journal reporter Monday. “It’s just that they didn’t do enough.”
The family said they worked to give alternative options that corrected the deficiencies and eliminated the raze order.
The city’s main concern is safety, said Mayor Mike Wiza. Work could have been done to preserve the whole building, but since the raze order was issued in July, no improvements have been made. At this point, time is running out, Wiza said. Inspectors have said the building will not survive another winter, and DJ Schneider, the city’s building inspector, said the building needs to be razed and secured by Dec. 15.
The family claims that in 2013, Meyer Borgman Johnson, a structural engineering firm, investigated the Fox building and said the building was well taken care of and identified 12 items that needed attention. The same group visited the building in May 2018 and said the building was in similar condition to what it was in 2013, the family said.
According to the Sanders family, the total cost to fix the major issues with the building in order to remove the raze order is $164,000. The family claims the entire building could be fixed and saved for $254,400. They said the figures were also given to the mayor.
In contrast, the cost of demolition is estimated to be $250,000.
“And so the Fox comes down by the city’s choice, not by supported necessity,” the Sanders family wrote.
Wiza said the company that supplied those estimates didn’t go into the building. He said the city asked the company if it would hold true to the number, and the company said it was an estimate, and they would need to be inside the building to have a better idea on costs. The Sanders family refutes that claim and said they were inside the building with the company a year ago.
Wiza said none of the companies the city has talked to would be able to do any work to preserve the entire building before winter.
The theater building has remained in the Sanders family almost its entire existence, and it was passed down from generation to generation. Ada Andrae Sanders and D.K. Sanders say the city’s current plans are consistent with the history of the building, and the multiple attempts from the city to tear it down.
The city’s Redevelopment Authority eyed the Fox Theater and other downtown properties in 1973, then again in 1980 to build a mall. Jeanette Sanders then sought historical protection, and the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places. City leaders at the time argued they needed the back portion of the theater for the mall. The back 40 feet of the Fox Theater was demolished on March 11, 1985. “The city has tried to destroy the Fox three times,” D.K. Sanders said. “The mall failed. We knew it was going to fail. Nobody would listen to us then, and they’re not listening now.” D.K. Sanders and Ada Andrae Sanders said they put $50,000 worth of theater equipment into the historic theater before they donated the title in 2013 to the Portage County Arts Alliance, known today as CREATE Portage County. The group created a nonprofit organization called Fox on Main to handle everything from studies to development at the site. “We were convinced if we gave it over, it would be a theater,” the Sanders siblings said. “We have no heirs to leave it to.” The family wanted the Fox Theater to remain as a movie theater because it would be too difficult to keep it as a live theater stage. They said they wanted it to be used for a restaurant on the second floor and to be able to rent the facility for weddings and events.
After it ran feasibility studies, Fox on Main learned a theater would not be successful on its own, but that the space could be successful if it filled a need in the community. In 2016, CREATE started its IDEA Center to address a lack of support for entrepreneurship and innovation in the area. The program is currently running at 1039 Ellis St. in Stevens Point. CREATE announced in April its plans to preserve the Fox Theater’s facade, demolish most of the back of the building and relocate its IDEA Center there. Plans hit a roadblock in July, however, when the city issued a 90-day raze order for the building, saying it was so badly damaged that it was a threat to health and public safety. The order referenced failing trusses, a sagging ceiling and roof, and water leaking into the building. Fox on Main was given until mid-October to show it had made significant progress to address those concerns. At the end of October, Fox on Main announced it would stop fighting the raze order. Earlier this month, Fox on Main agreed to sell the Fox Theater property to the city for $1. The sale would give the city authority to demolish the building and work with developers to redevelop the site. At committee meetings in November, city leaders said they wanted to save the facade of the building if it was safe to do so. In order for the sale to go through, however, the Sanders family needs to dissolve its agreement with Fox on Main. Wiza said the Sanders family had verbally agreed to do so, but the city has not received the paperwork. Until the city receives those papers, the raze order is still in effect, Wiza said. If the raze order remains, the entire building — including the facade — will be demolished. If the Sanders family does not dissolve its agreement, Fox on Main will also remain the owner of the property and will be responsible for the cost of demolition. D.K. Sanders and Ada Andrae Sanders said they haven’t decided yet if they want to dissolve the agreement with Fox on Main. They’re still debating what they want to do, they said. D.K. Sanders said the Fox Theater is a cultural and economic resource that is vital to the downtown. It’s a unique building that makes the area a central point for the city and the county. He said he doesn’t understand how the city is willing to throw away a whole building for fixable problems. “If you have a leaky bathroom, you don’t tear your whole house down,” D.K. Sanders said.
Wiza said he hopes the situation can be resolved to help the city preserve history in the downtown. Crews have been performing asbestos abatement work at the building, and that work is scheduled to be completed Tuesday. Demolition on the Fox Theater could start as early as Dec. 3, Wiza said.
A $23 million plan to redevelop the city-owned RAMOVA Theatre into a 1,600-capacity concert and performance space was announced at a community meeting Tuesday night by 11th Ward Ald. Patrick Daley Thompson. Developer Tyler Nevius plans to buy a privately-owned parking lot across the street and privately-owned vacant commercial spaces adjacent to the theatre that would be transformed into a brewery and a revived Ramova Grill Restaurant, with the help of nearby native and chef Kevin Hickey.
Maureen Sullivan, a neighborhood native and past aldermanic candidate, had been campaigning to revive the RAMOVA for fourteen years. Her pro-restoration petition got 5,000 signatures in a few months, but without funding, her efforts stalled.
Sullivan said her first memory of the RAMOVA was seeing “Bambi” there at age four and described it as ”like walking into another world. You smelled the popcorn as soon as you walked in, and it was like you were entering into a playground.”
The RAMOVA was intended as a larger version of the MUSIC BOX Theatre some miles to the northeast, and was owned by a Lithuanian family who named it using a word for “peaceful place.” The city of Chicago acquired the RAMOVA in 2001 and advertised for a developer while spending $364,000 in masonry, roof and drainage repairs. Ald. Thompson said many were nervous over the signs of deterioration over three decades, but Nevius approached him in 2017 with enthusiasm. Nevius started a development company, One Revival Chicago, specifically for the RAMOVA, which seeks to get the theatre and a neighboring vacant lot from the city for $1 and $6.6 million in tax-incremental financing (TIF) assistance for the redevelopment. Nevius says he’s been negotiating with the city on staying on the project for at least ten years, or else the TIF funds would be repaid to the city. The plan goes before the Community Development Commission as early as December 10, then needs to be approved by the Plan Commission for zoning changes and the Commission on Chicago Landmarks (the terra cotta exterior of the theater could be considered a landmark), before it goes before the City Council for final approval.
In July of 1970, Urban Renewal purchased the Marlow Theatre from Paul Holenstein’s Diversified Realty, Inc. of Butte for $97,900. Diversified Realty was formed in 1963 as a consequence of the bankruptcy and reorganization of Holenstein’s Prudential Diversified Services. Holenstein had numerous interests in Montana, and operated the Placer Hotel in Helena 1961-1965. He died in 1974.
Feb 21, 2006:
Less than a year into its reincarnation, the Rocket Theater in downtown Rock Island will fall dark again, a victim of growing competition in the independent film market.
However, Rocket owner and operator Devin Hansen said a couple of as-yet-unnamed parties are interested in reopening the venue once again as a dinner-beverage-and-movie theater.
“I believe we were instrumental in ushering in the commercial independent film market, along with the help of the hundreds of independent film lovers in the area,” Hansen said in a news release Monday. “With the increased competition from the new cinemas in Moline, independent films have become a hot commodity.”
The type of films shown at the Rocket — and Hansen’s former theater business venture, Brew & View, which closed in August — began to be shown at Showcase Cinemas 53 in Davenport and Great Escape Theatre, Moline, taking away much-needed business from the theater that operates on narrow margins.
“ ‘March of the Penguins’ and ‘Brokeback Mountain’ became big hits in multiplexes across the country,” he said. “Had we landed one of these films, our future may have been different.”
While the Rocket owners tried to diversify by showing some mainstream movies and booking local, regional and even some national music acts, it was too little, too late.
“We might have been able to survive as a music-only club had we not had so much debt from both movie theaters,” Hansen said. “Movies were always our main focus, our bread-and-butter, and that simply died.”
Hansen said moving from the smaller Brew & View on 2nd Avenue to the larger Rocket on 19th Street was not a contributing cause to going out of business.
“True, we carried over some debt from the small venue, but it was imperative to our survival to have this larger facility,” he said. “We needed a larger venue to carry us through the dry periods. Unfortunately, we ran out of money and credit before we could see how successful this new venue could be.”
Hansen did not give specifics on the potential new theater operators. He did say that they are not purchasing the business from him, but rather starting from scratch. He said one of the possible operators is a national dinner/movie chain with greater resources.
Darkened theater lit by memories (Eileen Schoville, La Crosse Tribune, December 5, 1975)
SOLDIERS GROVE – The lights are out at the Electric Theater now, but for nearly 35 years they were a bright spot in this village. And more than one old-timer will tell you about the days when movies were a nickel and a dime — and before “talkies” came in. Not so many years ago, when going to town on Saturday night was almost as important as going to church on Sunday, the Electric Theater was the gathering place for kids, while their folks bought up supplies and caught up with the latest news as they visited curbside with friends. The Electric Theater and its equipment is still owned by Bertha Larson, who operated it for 20 years with her husband, Art, and before that for her brother, Mike Young. The theater is now idle. Movie fare in the old days consisted of a newsreel, cartoon, a rundown of coming attractions, a serial, and then the feature. The first show started at 7 p.m. and the last show finished about 1 a.m. Bertha remembers that “running a movie theater meant a lot of hard work, and still does, if you want to make a go of it.” A typical week’s fare in the 1940s is shown in an old clipping from the Kickapoo Scout, the village weekly newspaper: Showing Friday. Saturday and Sunday — “Salty O’Rourke” featuring Alan Ladd, Bruce Cabot, Gail Russell, Stanley Clements and Spring Byington. Tuesday and Wednesday — William Bendix and Joan Blondell in “Don Juan Quilligan.” Coming attractions: “Song of Bernadette” — “Diamond Horseshoe’’ — “Nob Hill” “Coulee Chanticleer”. A column by Ray Peacock which appeared in the Tribune pages back in 1939 had this to say: “Mike’s theater, the Electric, is following the practice of many theaters in going in for bank nights.” The jackpot, when we were in town, was $85, having climbed $10 each bank night from a modest $15 start. They have to arrange the theatergoers in layers …” Another Tribune writer got this laugh out of Mike and his Electric Theater: “Speaking of lazy people, take Mike Young of Soldiers Grove, for instance. Mike, who is in his early 30s, is manager of the Soldiers Grove theater, promotes various night sports, operates the Grove team in the Kickapoo-Wisconsin baseball league, and owns and operates Dancehaven. “Puzzled to find a theater manager who also promotes conflicting night spots, we were told that Mike removes the conflict by darkening the lights of the theater the night he turns on the lights of the arena. We didn’t ask but wouldn’t have been surprised to find out that Dancehaven doesn’t open until the theater lets out.” And there’s another story about a picture salesman who called on Mike. Mike was asking for the kind of films his clientele liked and said, “We want some good westerns with a lot of shooting.” “But how about “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”? the salesman suggested. “Aw, hell no, they don’t go for football pictures here.” said the theater boss. “We want westerns.” Emil Asperheim, who grew up in Soldiers Grove, remembers the silent movie days when he used to go to the “flickers” at the first movie house in town, opened by Otto Bell in 1914. That was the beginning of movies in Soldiers Grove, but it was Clarence Erickson who opened the first Electric Theater after coming home from service in World War I. The Electric Theater has been opened twice since 1966, when the Larsons closed it. A youth group tried running it for a year or so. but heating costs, mechanical problems and competition from TV discouraged the group. Later it was opened on a part-time basis, but going to the movies just wasn’t like it used to be and so the lights are out again.
There’s a meeting on the RAMOVA Theatre set for Tuesday, November 19th, 2019 at 6pm CST in the Nativity of Our Lord Church basement, as per 11th Ward Ald. Patrick D. Thompson. A developer has expressed interest in the property for entertainment purposes. Anyone wishing to comment and/or who cannot attend may email Ald. Thompson at and/or call him at 773-254-6677.
Doug Peterson: “I operated the old Simplex projectors at the Electric Theater in the Grove for almost four years. At one point Art Larson tried running movies four nights a week, but because of TV it was a losing proposition, so we went back to Sat and Sun only.”
Robert Shedd: “I was one of the last to run them. Joe Leary taught me.”
Doug Peterson: “They lasted longer than the processed film that ran through them. I have many stories about how Art and I kept them running with baling wire and paper clips.”
Robert Shedd: “At the last when the theater was being run by a CAP youth group, the leader found a guy who worked as a mechanic for a theater supply place in Milwaukee. He had a pair of them in his collection, since he didn’t care if they worked or not he would swap us parts (for a price). According to him they were the oldest working projectors in the U.S. and maybe in North America, he wasn’t sure about Mexico.”
Betty Mindham: “I remember so many full houses there.”
Co-owner Shad Branen was determined that the Geneva Theatre would survive the coronavirus shutdown and re-emerge as a cultural center. He and his staff used this downtime to complete cleaning and interior renovation work. Damaged seats were repaired, computer software upgraded, and walls that needed touchup were painted.
“We will be opening up better and cleaner,” he said. “It’s a good opportunity to do cleaning and improvements throughout the buildings.”
At the Plaza Theater, Branen said they have stripped and epoxy sealed the floors, a process that typically requires 24 hours to dry, something near impossible when the theater is operational. They have also taken the opportunity to work on cleaning projects and update computer software.
The Plaza Theater originally opened in 1928, the same year as five other theaters opened in the Racine area. “All these theaters have a history dating back to the vaudeville era,” Branen said. The Geneva Theatre was closed and dormant for years before Branen acquired the property and reopened it in March 2017 following an estimated $2 million restoration. The city extended a $900,000 loan for the effort, to be forgiven if Branen owns the theater for at least five years. It’s home to the Geneva Theatre Actors Guild, a group that presents live stage productions and contributes the proceeds to area charitable organizations. The Geneva Theatre Actors Guild planned to resume operations in the fall.
Branen said he had to throw away concession items such as pizza ingredients, and he is no longer ordering soft drinks or beer. He had planned to order a new movie screen, but the manufacturer is temporarily closed. Branen said that he has approximately 20 employees total between two theaters, with a dozen who work at the Plaza in Burlington and some at work at both facilities.
While the theatre offers curbside concessions during limited hours on Friday and Saturday, Branen said the COVID-19 has forced him to furlough “virtually the entire staff.” Branen was recently approved for a paycheck protection program which allowed him to bring back some of his staff, but he looks forward to resuming normal operations as soon as possible. Movie studios currently are not releasing any new movies to theaters. “The biggest challenge theaters will face when reopening is what products will be available from the studios,” said Branen. Some studios have released films instead to online streaming services, but Branen said “I think there will always be a place for movie theaters, because people like to go out.”
Co-owner Shad Branen is determined that the Plaza Theater and Geneva Theater in Lake Geneva will survive the current coronavirus shutdown and will re-emerge as cultural centers. Branen and his staff are using this downtime to complete some cleaning and interior renovation work on the theatres, repairing damaged seats and more. The lobby floor has been seal-coated. Computer software has been upgraded. Walls that needed touching up were painted.
“We will be opening up better and cleaner,” he said. “It’s a good opportunity to do cleaning and improvements throughout the buildings.”
The Plaza Theatre floors have been stripped and epoxy-sealed, a process that typically requires 24 hours to dry, something near impossible when the theater is operational. The Plaza was fourplexed, closed briefly due to bankruptcy, and reopened approximately 20 years ago to its previous owner. Branen has owned the theater for 11 years.
Branen also owns Mercantile Hall, a wedding venue located at 425 N. Pine St., in Burlington. He said that he has approximately 20 employees total between the two theatres, with a dozen who work at the Plaza, and some employees at work at both facilities.
While the Plaza offers curbside concessions during limited hours on Friday and Saturday, Branen said the COVID-19 has forced him to furlough “virtually the entire staff.” Luckily, Branen was recently approved for a paycheck protection program which will allow him to bring back some of his staff. But he looks forward to resuming normal operations as soon as possible. “It’s all a waiting game,” Branen said. “Everyone is anxious to get back to work.”
Movie studios currently are not releasing any new movies to theaters. “The biggest challenge theaters will face when reopening is what products will be available from the studios,” Branen.
Some studios have released films instead to online streaming services, but Branen said he is not worried about it. “I think there will always be a place for movie theaters,” he said, “because people like to go out.”
Federal inspectors found multiple safety violations by a Kenosha-based subcontractor at the Fox Theater demolition site in February, according to citations issued to the company.
The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration issued citations to Recyclean, a demolition company, in March totaling $5,205 after observing electrical hazards and a lack of proper demolition plans on Feb. 5, which the company said in a statement it immediately fixed.
Recyclean worked as a subcontractor on the Fox Theater demolition and specializes in sustainable deconstruction and recycling of building materials, particularly those from historic properties. Urban Evolutions of Appleton served as the primary contractor on the project as contracted by Stevens Point.
The 126-year-old theater in downtown Stevens Point closed permanently in April 1986 and remained unused for decades despite efforts to reopen the building as a theater, performance space or a business incubator. The city took control of the building in late 2019 and tore down the back two-thirds with the goal of using the land and the remaining facade to attract a developer to build on the property.
Recyclean failed to use a ground fault circuit interrupter, a type of circuit breaker meant to protect against ground faults, when workers used extensions cords to power equipment, according to the citation. OSHA inspectors said they saw extension cords missing ground pins that workers used on lifting equipment and that other cords were not protected against sharp objects.
OSHA observed that the Kenosha company started demolition work before it had developed a demolition plan, which should include an engineering survey of the building’s condition and the possibility of unplanned collapses, according to the citation. The company said in a statement that it had not properly posted its plans at the site.
“These issues were immediately corrected and our employees will continue to practice industry leading safety standards in the growing deconstruction field,” according to a statement from Recyclean.
The final outcome of the case is pending corrective action on the violations, according to OSHA’s inspection database.
OSHA inspectors visited the Fox Theater demolition site in February as part of a planned inspection that observed the hazards affecting five workers, according to the citations. The visit from federal inspectors was not complaint-based and Recyclean was not given advanced notice, according to OSHA’s inspection database.
OSHA last fined the Kenosha company in 2014 for issues related to aerial lifts and asbestos abatement, which resulted in Recyclean paying $2,800 and $4,400 respectively in informal settlements with the regulatory agency.
The end of Chicago’s majestic rat-ridden movie palace (Mitch O'Connell)
Short story first- I heart movie palaces. Now for the long story – I moved to Chicago in 1979 right after high school to attend the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. For a film lover, it was perfect time and place. I got to relish the last days of the cavernous decaying grindhouses where you could just lose the day watching action and horror schlock, and catch the evening screenings of the classic and cult at the revival theaters such as The Parkway, Varsity and Sandburg (among others). I’d have my first time exposure to so many great films as they should be seen, on the big screen with an appreciative audience. Double features of Hitchcock to Marx Brothers, to John Waters and David Lynch. This is a story about one of the former, the majestic rat-ridden wonderful centers of entertainment that weren’t long for this earth. In its heyday, downtown Chicago was the place to catch a flick with dozens and dozens of downtown movie palaces projecting away day and night, but by 1989 only the Woods was left standing as the last surviving operating Loop movie theatre. Opened in 1940 with a yearlong showing of Gone With the Wind, for it went out with “I’m Gonna Get You Sucka” and “Hellraiser Hellbound 2” (not a pithy judgement call, I like ‘em all!). I went there for the first time when visiting my dad and happily stood in a line around the block to watch the James Bond flick “Diamonds Are Forever.” Back then I was doing weekly drawings for a Chicago Tribune column titled “Around Town” where I’d illustrate whatever reporter Rick Kogan wanted to write about. I was also researching the history of Chicago theaters for a never-realized graphic novel (which, 34 years later, will finally turn into blog postings). This time I thought I’d slightly fudge the facts and let the tail wag the dog using the press phrase “I’m from the Chicago Tribune” to get an all-access pass to the Woods’ last day. The manager, who was around my age, lets me, my camera and note-taking yellow legal pad right in. Today’s crowd for the 9am first showing consisted of three teens already caught up in talking back to a 40-foot-tall Isaac Hayes on the screen. The sleepy candy counter girl just seemed to be there out of habit. The popcorn machine is unplugged, there are no cups for soda and only 3 packs of candy are available under the glass display. I snapped away and worked my way up the 2 flights of stairs, stepped around the “Balcony Closed” sign, to the projectionist’s room door and knocked. Morton Krugman, projectionist for the Woods Theatre since 1953, lets me in. As soon as I get off my “I’m from the Tribune” greetings, a buzzer goes off warning that it’s one minute before the cue appears in the upper right hand corner of the screen to signal the reel change. When that shows, he has another 2 minutes before the next reel starts. Morton starts to rewind the wheel on the table which quickly spins until the last bit of celluloid feeds through, turning off the machine. Today’s films have been duly written on the pages he keeps secured to a clipboard chronicling the last 10 years of movies shown there. I pester and photograph away for the next half hour asking every unprepared question that pops in my head. I find out that normally his door is locked and chained to keep out the curious and intoxicated, but I just lucked out. Today was a late start since the manager didn’t get in until 8:50am but he still had to spend a half hour getting the machines ready. He’ll be able to get everything back to showtime schedule by just dropping out the coming attractions. He can watch the movie through the glass panel in the room, but since he doesn’t like much of what’s being screened, prefers to watch the TV (channel 5 comes in great but he can’t get in channel 2). Right next to the TV is a tape player where he puts cassettes management supplies of “urban” music to pipe in during intermission, which he also doesn’t like and doesn’t listen to. I ask to take a picture of him in his red chair that’s perched front of the viewing window. He objects. “A projectionist sitting down! Are you crazy?!” His long career has had him working at most of the Loop theaters. It’s in the blood as his father owned a chain of theaters all down Milwaukee Avenue. He remembers as a tot spending the day riding in a limo with dad to check on all the movie houses. It’s still a family affair since to get in the union you’ve got to already be related to a member. It’s also a strong union (the highest paid in the nation in fact). He started out at $60 a week and now he earns enough to easily retire. If fact, enough to have traveled to 30 countries over the years and, next week, has tickets to fly to Bora Bora with the wife. He started out like his father, acquiring second-run theaters that changed double features every three days, but ending up with an almost 40 years projectionist’s career. Along with two side businesses running a collection agency (including all Marshall Fields' accounts) and owning an “active seniors” complex, Mr. Krugman seems to be doing well. Hobbies? Bridge every week. He starts to tell me a story about projectionists who would have loud conversations in the booth and disturb the patrons. I keep on talking for another 10 minutes before it dawns on me that that was my cue to leave. I chit-chat with some other staff, and former employees who are hanging out and reminiscing. Within a month, the East West corner of Chicago and Randolph is an empty lot.
A GESTURE TO THROW NEW LIGHT ON THE GRANADA (Paul Gapp, Architecture critic, Chicago Tribune, 1987) When this city saved the Chicago Theatre, it earned no right to turn its back on the three other major movie palaces of the 1920s surviving here. Those are the Uptown, the Avalon and the Granada—and among them, the Granada is perhaps the grandest of all. You have probably seen the elaborately ornamented and arched terra cotta facade of the now-threatened Granada, which stands on a prominent site at 6433 N. Sheridan Rd. But if you
ve never been inside the theater (which has been dark for several years except for a few rock concerts), you may wish to visit one of two photo exhibitions that will continue through July 31. One is on the fourth floor at the south end of the Chicago Public Library Cultural Center, 78 E. Washington St.; the other at the Rogers Park Branch Library, 6907 N. Clark St. The recently shot black and white photos of the Granada by Mike Williams are part of a suddenly escalating, last-ditch public effort to find a new use for the theater to prevent its demolition by developers who have talked about building an apartment tower in its place. Architect Daniel D. Watts curated the photo exhibits. He also organized the Save the Granada Theater Committee, which is working in league with the Rogers Park Community Council and the Theater Historical Society. Williamsphotographs show the exterior of the Granada, some of the more sweeping expanses of its interior and a number of its decorative details. The pictures also convey impressions of desolation and incipient decay in the 3,447-seat house, which opened in 1926. The Granada is nominally Spanish baroque in style, although it manifests many of the other eclectic, whimsical and deliberately overblown twists and turns of form and ornamentation found in big urban stage-and-screen venues of the time. Its grand staircase, crystal chandeliers, stained glass, use of marble and bronze, coffered ceilings and acres of ornamented plaster give it a marvelously gaudy quality. Cleveland-born Edward E. Eichenbaum designed the Granada while working for the architectural firm of Levy & Klein in Chicago. He had begun his career in Detroit with the distinguished Albert Kahn and at another point was associated with the Chicago-based design firm of A. Epstein & Sons. Other Chicago theaters credited to Eichenbaum include the Regal and Diversey. He also designed the Palace in South Bend, Ind., and the Regent in Grand Rapids, Mich. Eichenbaums love of legitimate theater originated during his student days at the University of Pennsylvania, and he even understudied the great George Arliss in ''Disraeli'' for a year when the play was running in Philadelphia. Eichenbaum once called the Granada ''the greatest design I have ever been privileged to make,'' according to a 1983 article by Sharon Lindy published in Marquee magazine. Film palaces were being built so rapidly in the 1920s that Eichenbaum sometimes used the same terra cotta molds on different theaters, ingeniously assembling them into fresh configurations to save time and money. When the Granada was still on the drafting boards, Eichenbaum told an interviewer: ''I want this building to be paradise, so that the common man can leave his meager existence at the door and for a few hours feel that he, too, is among the very rich class that he reads about in the paper.'' Fifty years after he designed it, Eichenbaum returned to the Granada for a visit to receive a 1976 Marquee magazine award from Joseph DuciBella of the Theater Historical Society. Eichenbaum detested the plainness of modern theaters. ''Theyre nothing but barns,‘’ he said. Eichenbaum died in 1982. The present effort to save the Granada is supported by DuciBella, a theater historian, and by preservationists. Early this month, a representative of the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency said the Granada was a ‘'very good candidate’‘ for listing on the National Register of Historic Places. Architect Watts, spearheading the Granada campaign, points out that most of the theater is unaltered and in good condition: Its original marble floor is sound, its organ intact, and even its original stage lighting is in working order. The Granada does not have Chicago municipal landmark status as does the Chicago Theatre on downtown State Street, now a busy venue for live entertainment. Yet it doesnt necessarily make sense to compare the strategy or business rationale for saving the Granada with the scenario that led to the Chicagos salvation after a slide to the brink of demolition. The location, economics and re-use factors are disparate, after all. Still, neither can such differences be used as alibis for shrugging off the Granada. The old North Side movie palace is part of the citys sociocultural fabric and its brilliant architectural heritage. There is no doubt, then, about the Granadas credentials. And so we are left with the basic question about any major preservation effort: How many people care, and how hard are they willing to work?In 1983, after the last devastating flood, the municipality bought the Electric Theatre building and contents, minus two projectors, from the Larson family for $12,600.
The Warner Grand Theatre will bear the name of late Allen-Bradley co-founder Harry Bradley and Peg Bradley. The Bradley family gave a combined $52 million to the MSO’s $139 million project. Donations came from the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, David and Julia Uihlein, and Lynde Uihlein (the grandchildren of Harry and Peg Bradley and the children of philanthropist Jane Bradley Pettit). The Jane Bradley Pettit Foundation also made a significant gift to the project. The 1,650-seat auditorium will be named Allen-Bradley Hall to honor of the builders of the Allen-Bradley Company, founded in 1903 by Lynde and Harry Bradley. David and Julia Uihlein led the campaign which has raised over $128 million to date. The theatre is scheduled to open in the fall.
The last remaining funds needed for the Uptown Theatre should be available soon, we’re hearing. Ald. James Cappleman (46th) said so in an email to residents. Work on the building could begin shortly after that, and today Cappleman said funding will likely be in place by late spring.
The Uptown Theatre since 1981 has largely been maintained by a dedicated group of volunteers who spent their own money to make sure the theatre didn’t deteriorate.
As of today, the petition to save the theatre had more than 13,000 signatures. Recent news that the addition of a second Costco in Naperville would shutter the Ogden 6 Theatres has brought out an influx of protest from fans of the theatre. To further the efforts, a former employee has started a petition to help save the theatre.
The former employee, who has worked at Ogden 6 since 2016 wrote, on the Change.org petition,
“This place is very different than any other movie theater. The experience is personal and you start to remember the faces that come in. I have bonded immensely with the regular guests that come in and I’m forever grateful for them and the kindness they have shown me. To see this place go would be devastating, as it would be destroying 44 years of history.” The petition, which was started Monday, had more than 13,000 signatures as of Thursday afternoon.
Owners of the Ogden 6 Theatres announced Monday on Facebook that the theatre would likely have to close or relocate to make way for a Costco that is preparing to build at the Ogden Mall in the space that was formerly home to KMart. The news brought a flood of comments from longtime fans of Ogden 6 who shared their memories and lamented the impeding closure.
The petition, which aims to “bring attention to Costco, the Ogden mall management, and Classic Cinemas,” also encouraged signers to share their own personal memories about the theatre and “how the demolition impacts you.”
One signer wrote, “We all (me, friends&neighbors) reacted viscerally to the news of Ogden 6’s closure. It’s a landmark to us…”
Another added, “This theater is such an important part of Naperville culture. Such memories of this place.”
Kenosha’s short-lived and forgotten first Crystal Theater was established by the Crystal Theater Company by Jones and Miller. The Kenosha Evening News reported on January 23, 1907 that the fireproof Bullamore Building at 260 Park Street (today’s 710 57th Streetand still there at this writing) had been leased for a new electric 5-cent theatre, and that it was to be ready over the next two weeks. On Saturday, February 23 of that year, the Kenosha Evening News published an announcement that the Crystal Theatre would have a complete change of program the next day with Baby Gladys to sing and dance and illustrated songs by Miss Lillie Jones and Mr. Jones. And on May 31, 1907, the newspaper published an advertisement for the Crystal Theatre inviting the public to its evening performances, adding “we are and intend to continue giving a clean up-to-date show, one that women and children may attend without fear.” But weeks later, in June, property owner H. L. Bullamore listed the building for rent. (Thanks to Al Westerman for his research on the 57th Street Crystal Theatre.)
Downtown McHenry movie house gets a gut rehab By Dan Moran Not every old movie theater is worth saving. Those of us who pinched pennies by watching the finest G-rated films of the 1990s on postage-stamp screens at The Dunes in Zion or the Belvidere Mall Cinema in Waukegan were a little sad to see them go, if not in a way that would require chaining oneself to the door to stop progress. But in an economic marketplace dominated by multiplexes that charge whatever it takes to cover the salary of a Mark Wahlberg — your highest-paid actor in 2017 at $68 million, according to Forbes, and that was for “Transformers: The Last Night” and “Daddy’s Home 2,” if you want to be really angry about it — it’s easy to root for a grassroots effort to restore a 20th century neighborhood movie house for use in the 21st century. That is the case just a short hop across the border of Lake and McHenry counties, where Scott Dehn of Golden Age Cinemas opened the doors last month on a renovated McHenry Downtown Theater. As area movie-going fans might already know, the Golden Age stable already included the Liberty 1 and 2 Theaters in Libertyville and the McHenry Outdoor Theatre (which is set to re-open on May 4 with “Avengers: Infinity War,” for those of you already sick of February). The indoor version when it comes to the McHenry nameplate sits on the west side of the Fox River on Green Street, and it has witnessed an on-again, off-again existence in the last generation or so. According to the invaluable website CinemaTreasures.org, the storefront location’s history as a movie theater dates back to 1919, and it operated as The Empire and The Colony before becoming the McHenry Theatre during the Boomer years. After joining and departing the umbrella of the Rhyan Management Co. — which ran everything from the Grayslake Outdoor to the aforementioned Dunes once upon a time — the McHenry gave it a go in the early 2000s as discount first-run venue. I remember taking the kids to see one of the many “X-Men” movies there in 2006 or so, and then trying to take them back to McHenry to see one of the many “Toy Story” movies, only to find it closed. Cinema Treasures reports that the last iteration of the McHenry Downtown closed shop in 2014, and a lot of smaller theaters simply don’t make it back from a slow death like that. But published reports last year revealed that Golden Age was tackling a $1.5 million rehab that would not only reopen the theater, but also expand it from two screens to three. The result was unveiled in mid-January, and I headed out early on a snowy Super Bowl Sunday to check it out with my youngest offspring in tow, since he had not seen “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle” and had heard mostly good things about it from the cynical middle-school crowd. The first surprise came upon walking inside: This had not been a wallpaper-and-paint makeover. This had been an extreme rehab. Brick and tile lined the walls of what had been a musty old building, if my memory from 2006 can be trusted. Entrances to three screening rooms — one with 175 seats, another with 155 and a smaller one set to debut with “Fifty Shades Freed” this weekend — were adorned with the names of local businesses that had backed the rebuild. Along the walls, posters for classic films like “The Empire Strikes Back” and “The Dark Knight” hinted at the past, while inside the theaters, wide recliners with immense legroom were lined up in tidy rows, as demanded by the current consumer. The stage was set to take in this updated version of “Jumanji,” which turned out to be an acceptable pregame diversion, and one that will no doubt demand another extension of the franchise, if $825 million in domestic box office still means anything. Speaking of box office dollars, this new-age McHenry Downtown Theater charges $9 for adults before 5:30 p.m. and $7 for matinees, children and seniors (aged 60 and older). Hot tip: That’s about $3 less than you’ll pay at the big-boxes, and two tickets at the discount rate almost covers a large, refillable popcorn. The rebirth of the McHenry Downtown follows the 2015 rehab-and-reopening of the Antioch Theatre, and if this is a trend, it’s a welcome one. For whatever reason, the aforementioned Waukegan and Zion are still waiting for the return of a first-run movie theater, and this should not stand. When it comes to experiencing a movie more than just seeing one, not everyone has surrendered to the Netflix culture.
The Catlow Theatre reopens Friday, January 10 though efforts continue to seek financial assistance to keep afloat. “Little Women” will be screened at at 5:10 and 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 7 p.m. Sunday through Thursday. “Future movies here will be a week-to-week thing until we get back on our feet, so, of course, we will need heavy, heavy, heavy support during this feature’s run to keep things moving along at the Catlow,” said manager Tim O'Connor to patrons today, adding “We still need your help to get us to the next level — a live stage venue,”
The Catlow Theatre closed because owner Tim O'Connor didn’t have the cash to pay bills. He sent an email over the weekend to say “Unless we meet our crowd fundraiser goal, we may not be able to book any movies until we come up with enough money to pay more bills.” The Catlow was to open for special events such as scheduled screenings of Oscar-nominated short films on Feb. 8 and Feb. 9. (Tickets for those are available through the village government: www.barrington-il.gov/oscars ) The Catlow nearly closed over unpaid taxes last October but struggled through. Still, Catlow Theater LP filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in U.S. District Court in Chicago that month with the majority of its creditors listed being film studios. O'Connor says the Catlow is in disrepair and cited a lack of interest in its offerings there. In 2012, supporters raised $175,395 online to buy a digital projector. Crowdfunding paid for some repairs to the heating system and marquee. The latest online fundraising drive seeks $30,000. As of last week, almost $15,000 had been raised.
The orchestra floor will have two aisles that divide the seating in thirds to avoid long distances to the aisles. Marcus Corporation, which owned the theatre until 2017, is being lauded for caring for the historic fixtures and maintaining and heating the theatre over the 20-plus years that it stood empty. While scrupulously restoring the Warner Grand Theatre, catering kitchens, party rooms, HVAC equipment, loading docks, and new lavatories are being added. On the balcony level, the original lavatories will be restored with their green, black and lavender tile … actually mandatory to earn historic-preservation tax credits to support the $90 million project. (The symphony doesn’t pay taxes but it can sell the tax credits to other developers.) Conrad Schmitt artisans are redoing the original paint, plaster, metal and other decorative surfaces and an acoustical firm comes in at least once a month to check progress. The auditorium’s very rear space below the balcony will become a bar and a control booth, because acoustic engineers discovered it to be a “bass trap” with the worst sound in the house.
Closed amid controversy on April 25, 1986, several individuals and groups have tried, since then to revive the historic Fox theatre. At a special city council meeting last Monday night, Urban Evolutions Inc. of Appleton was selected to demolish two-thirds of the building, fix the roof and seal off the front one-third to make it “weather tight,” said Mayor Mike Wiza to mark the end of the Fox’s 125-year history in downtown Stevens Point. G.F. Andrae purchased the land for an opera house in 1893 and The Grand Opera House opened Sept. 19, 1894, transforming to the Majestic Theater in 1920 and the Fox Theater in 1929 amid challenges including protests over student ticket prices, disputes over wages, television, and even a projectionist strike. The city also began looking at the Fox for potential developments. By April 1973, the city’s Redevelopment Authority eyed several downtown buildings for demolition, including the Fox, not a popular proposal. The Common Council rejected that, but talks of a mall resurfaced in 1980 calling for demolishing the Fox and retaining only the facade as an entrance to the mall. By 1981, the plans changed to raze only the dressing rooms and other theater spaces. In response, owner Jeanette Sanders — G.F. Andrae’s granddaughter — sought historical protection. In 1982, the Fox was added to the National Register of Historic Places. City leaders argued the dressing rooms weren’t historically significant and in February 1984, the city received the approval it needed. Forty feet of the Fox Theatre were demolished on March 11, 1985. About a year later, the operators closed for the last time, blaming post-demolition heating issues. Over 100 people gathered Jan. 25, 2011, to hear Ada Andrae Sanders, her sister Jeanette Sanders and brother Donald Sanders announcing plans to reopen the Fox Theatre. Others expressed interest in using the theatre for venues such as a teen night club, church and roller rink. The Sanders family denied them because they wanted it to reopen as a theatre and restore the elegance of their great-grandfather’s opera house for performances and films, with a restaurant on the second floor. They started to work with the Arts Alliance of Portage County (now CREATE Portage County) to develop a nonprofit and raise money to make their dream a reality. The Arts Alliance formed a nonprofit called Fox on Main in 2013, and the Sanders family donated the title for the theatre to the group. “Fox on Main” began working on designs, a business plan and feasibility studies … but those studies claimed that operating the Fox Theatre as a theater would not be possible without a partner but could be successful if it “filled a need in the community”. CREATE had a 2016 “IDEA Center” program to support entrepreneurship and innovation and in April 2019 announced plans to preserve the Fox’s facade, demolish the auditorium, relocate that IDEA Center there and began a $3.5 million fundraising campaign. Then the city’s building inspector said if Fox on Main didn’t have the roof “water-tight” soon, he would issue a raze order. As of June, no work had been done on the roof, and the inspector issued a 90-day raze order in July, saying the Fox was now so badly damaged and dilapidated that it was a threat to health and public safety. Fox on Main had until mid-October to make sure the roof was water tight, shoring up trusses and repair loose bricks by October to delay the raze order until May 1, 2020. Fox on Main said they wanted to demolish the auditorium and raise money to start as soon as possible. The city agreed to allocate $250,000 toward that … after the demolition contractor was paid. Suddenly an architect firm that Fox on Main had earlier worked with submitted new plans to save the whole theatre … but since this didn’t match the agreement just signed with the city, a new, hard deadline for demolition was set for Dec. 15 … and any changes would need re-approval by the city. Then on Oct. 23, Fox on Main gave up. It would no longer fight the raze order and now wasn’t even interested in the Fox Theatre site for its IDEA Center. (And couldn’t pay for any demolition anyway.) So the city said it’d initially pay for the work but bill Fox on Main’s property taxes for the next three years anyway. If Fox on Main didn’t pay, the property would go to Portage County and eventually the city, but that’d leave a vacant hole in the downtown where no development could take place for at least three and a half years. So Fox on Main’s board voted Nov. 5 to dissolve its donation agreement with the Sanders family and to sell the Fox Theatre to the city for $1. The city agreed, but the actual sale hinged on the Sanders family also dissolving their original Oct. 2013 agreement with Fox on Main with its permissible and forbidden uses for the Fox, allowed only “civic, governmental, cultural or educational purposes including but not limited to: movie theater, stage for theatrical performances, art gallery, music studio, music hall, dance studio, school, restaurant, specialty food store, culinary arts and general or related activities supporting arts, entertainment and culture” (and incidentally prohibiting use for sexual-oriented business, gambling, pawnshop, body piercing business or tattoo parlor.) On Nov. 25, the Sanders family announced it didn’t support the city’s plans to demolish the Fox and were considering dissolving the agreement with Fox on Main.
During the special council meeting Monday, Wiza said the family made it clear they did not intend to dissolve the agreement, that the entire Fox building could be saved, blamed the city for wanting to demolish it, and compared it to the 1970s and 1980s when the city wanted to demolish the Fox to build a mall. “The city has tried to destroy the Fox three times,” D.K. Sanders told a reporter. “The mall failed. We knew it was going to fail. Nobody would listen to us then, and they’re not listening now.” The mayor, Tony Wiza, said nobody did the work to save it and would ask the city council to consider taking ownership of the Fox even with the restrictions from the original agreement for the next 13 years which would make development “pretty challenging,” but at least would let the city maintain the facade.
In November, 2018 the Community Development Commission was told that construction was expected to begin in summer, 2019. No work has begun. The delay, according to Jam Productions' Jerry Mickelsen, involves financing. Public funding included $14 million through the state’s Property Assessed Clean Energy Act; $13 million in tax-increment financing; $10 million in Build Illinois bond funding; $8.7 million in federal tax credits; and $3.7 million in the City of Chicago’s Adopt-a-Landmark funds. That money’s committed, but $26 million is still needed that was supposed to come from loans and investments. Mickelson said he expects that financing to come in early 2020. The reopening is now projected to be in 2022. A newly-founded Uptown Theatre Foundation is intended to act as a steward of the theatre and potentially receive donations to help restore it. Peter Strazzabosco, deputy commissioner in the Chicago Department of Planning and Development, told Chicago Tribune reporter Chris Jones that his department is continuing to work with the developer on a restoration plan that will also revitalize the Uptown entertainment district, to hopefully start before summer.
The ELKADER Theatre is seen in a color photo and small article (“Main Street, USA”) on Page 8 in the December/January 2020 issue of Reminisce Magazine.
The Sanders family announced Monday they do not support the city’s plans to demolish the Fox Theater and they have not yet decided if they will dissolve an agreement with a local nonprofit that could potentially save the downtown theater’s facade. In a letter sent to the Stevens Point Journal, D.K. Sanders, Ada Andrae Sanders and Jeanette Sanders said the city is choosing to demolish the building instead of saving it. They are the great-grandchildren of G.F. Andrae, who built the theater in 1894. The Sanders family said neither Fox on Main nor the city made any effort to correct the problems with the building that sparked a raze order in July, and the focus from everyone involved has been to demolish the building. “It’s not that they didn’t do anything,” D.K. Sanders told a Stevens Point Journal reporter Monday. “It’s just that they didn’t do enough.” The family said they worked to give alternative options that corrected the deficiencies and eliminated the raze order. The city’s main concern is safety, said Mayor Mike Wiza. Work could have been done to preserve the whole building, but since the raze order was issued in July, no improvements have been made. At this point, time is running out, Wiza said. Inspectors have said the building will not survive another winter, and DJ Schneider, the city’s building inspector, said the building needs to be razed and secured by Dec. 15. The family claims that in 2013, Meyer Borgman Johnson, a structural engineering firm, investigated the Fox building and said the building was well taken care of and identified 12 items that needed attention. The same group visited the building in May 2018 and said the building was in similar condition to what it was in 2013, the family said. According to the Sanders family, the total cost to fix the major issues with the building in order to remove the raze order is $164,000. The family claims the entire building could be fixed and saved for $254,400. They said the figures were also given to the mayor. In contrast, the cost of demolition is estimated to be $250,000. “And so the Fox comes down by the city’s choice, not by supported necessity,” the Sanders family wrote. Wiza said the company that supplied those estimates didn’t go into the building. He said the city asked the company if it would hold true to the number, and the company said it was an estimate, and they would need to be inside the building to have a better idea on costs. The Sanders family refutes that claim and said they were inside the building with the company a year ago. Wiza said none of the companies the city has talked to would be able to do any work to preserve the entire building before winter. The theater building has remained in the Sanders family almost its entire existence, and it was passed down from generation to generation. Ada Andrae Sanders and D.K. Sanders say the city’s current plans are consistent with the history of the building, and the multiple attempts from the city to tear it down. The city’s Redevelopment Authority eyed the Fox Theater and other downtown properties in 1973, then again in 1980 to build a mall. Jeanette Sanders then sought historical protection, and the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places. City leaders at the time argued they needed the back portion of the theater for the mall. The back 40 feet of the Fox Theater was demolished on March 11, 1985. “The city has tried to destroy the Fox three times,” D.K. Sanders said. “The mall failed. We knew it was going to fail. Nobody would listen to us then, and they’re not listening now.” D.K. Sanders and Ada Andrae Sanders said they put $50,000 worth of theater equipment into the historic theater before they donated the title in 2013 to the Portage County Arts Alliance, known today as CREATE Portage County. The group created a nonprofit organization called Fox on Main to handle everything from studies to development at the site. “We were convinced if we gave it over, it would be a theater,” the Sanders siblings said. “We have no heirs to leave it to.” The family wanted the Fox Theater to remain as a movie theater because it would be too difficult to keep it as a live theater stage. They said they wanted it to be used for a restaurant on the second floor and to be able to rent the facility for weddings and events. After it ran feasibility studies, Fox on Main learned a theater would not be successful on its own, but that the space could be successful if it filled a need in the community. In 2016, CREATE started its IDEA Center to address a lack of support for entrepreneurship and innovation in the area. The program is currently running at 1039 Ellis St. in Stevens Point. CREATE announced in April its plans to preserve the Fox Theater’s facade, demolish most of the back of the building and relocate its IDEA Center there. Plans hit a roadblock in July, however, when the city issued a 90-day raze order for the building, saying it was so badly damaged that it was a threat to health and public safety. The order referenced failing trusses, a sagging ceiling and roof, and water leaking into the building. Fox on Main was given until mid-October to show it had made significant progress to address those concerns. At the end of October, Fox on Main announced it would stop fighting the raze order. Earlier this month, Fox on Main agreed to sell the Fox Theater property to the city for $1. The sale would give the city authority to demolish the building and work with developers to redevelop the site. At committee meetings in November, city leaders said they wanted to save the facade of the building if it was safe to do so. In order for the sale to go through, however, the Sanders family needs to dissolve its agreement with Fox on Main. Wiza said the Sanders family had verbally agreed to do so, but the city has not received the paperwork. Until the city receives those papers, the raze order is still in effect, Wiza said. If the raze order remains, the entire building — including the facade — will be demolished. If the Sanders family does not dissolve its agreement, Fox on Main will also remain the owner of the property and will be responsible for the cost of demolition. D.K. Sanders and Ada Andrae Sanders said they haven’t decided yet if they want to dissolve the agreement with Fox on Main. They’re still debating what they want to do, they said. D.K. Sanders said the Fox Theater is a cultural and economic resource that is vital to the downtown. It’s a unique building that makes the area a central point for the city and the county. He said he doesn’t understand how the city is willing to throw away a whole building for fixable problems. “If you have a leaky bathroom, you don’t tear your whole house down,” D.K. Sanders said. Wiza said he hopes the situation can be resolved to help the city preserve history in the downtown. Crews have been performing asbestos abatement work at the building, and that work is scheduled to be completed Tuesday. Demolition on the Fox Theater could start as early as Dec. 3, Wiza said.
A $23 million plan to redevelop the city-owned RAMOVA Theatre into a 1,600-capacity concert and performance space was announced at a community meeting Tuesday night by 11th Ward Ald. Patrick Daley Thompson. Developer Tyler Nevius plans to buy a privately-owned parking lot across the street and privately-owned vacant commercial spaces adjacent to the theatre that would be transformed into a brewery and a revived Ramova Grill Restaurant, with the help of nearby native and chef Kevin Hickey. Maureen Sullivan, a neighborhood native and past aldermanic candidate, had been campaigning to revive the RAMOVA for fourteen years. Her pro-restoration petition got 5,000 signatures in a few months, but without funding, her efforts stalled. Sullivan said her first memory of the RAMOVA was seeing “Bambi” there at age four and described it as ”like walking into another world. You smelled the popcorn as soon as you walked in, and it was like you were entering into a playground.” The RAMOVA was intended as a larger version of the MUSIC BOX Theatre some miles to the northeast, and was owned by a Lithuanian family who named it using a word for “peaceful place.” The city of Chicago acquired the RAMOVA in 2001 and advertised for a developer while spending $364,000 in masonry, roof and drainage repairs. Ald. Thompson said many were nervous over the signs of deterioration over three decades, but Nevius approached him in 2017 with enthusiasm. Nevius started a development company, One Revival Chicago, specifically for the RAMOVA, which seeks to get the theatre and a neighboring vacant lot from the city for $1 and $6.6 million in tax-incremental financing (TIF) assistance for the redevelopment. Nevius says he’s been negotiating with the city on staying on the project for at least ten years, or else the TIF funds would be repaid to the city. The plan goes before the Community Development Commission as early as December 10, then needs to be approved by the Plan Commission for zoning changes and the Commission on Chicago Landmarks (the terra cotta exterior of the theater could be considered a landmark), before it goes before the City Council for final approval.
In July of 1970, Urban Renewal purchased the Marlow Theatre from Paul Holenstein’s Diversified Realty, Inc. of Butte for $97,900. Diversified Realty was formed in 1963 as a consequence of the bankruptcy and reorganization of Holenstein’s Prudential Diversified Services. Holenstein had numerous interests in Montana, and operated the Placer Hotel in Helena 1961-1965. He died in 1974.
Feb 21, 2006: Less than a year into its reincarnation, the Rocket Theater in downtown Rock Island will fall dark again, a victim of growing competition in the independent film market.
However, Rocket owner and operator Devin Hansen said a couple of as-yet-unnamed parties are interested in reopening the venue once again as a dinner-beverage-and-movie theater.
“I believe we were instrumental in ushering in the commercial independent film market, along with the help of the hundreds of independent film lovers in the area,” Hansen said in a news release Monday. “With the increased competition from the new cinemas in Moline, independent films have become a hot commodity.”
The type of films shown at the Rocket — and Hansen’s former theater business venture, Brew & View, which closed in August — began to be shown at Showcase Cinemas 53 in Davenport and Great Escape Theatre, Moline, taking away much-needed business from the theater that operates on narrow margins.
“ ‘March of the Penguins’ and ‘Brokeback Mountain’ became big hits in multiplexes across the country,” he said. “Had we landed one of these films, our future may have been different.”
While the Rocket owners tried to diversify by showing some mainstream movies and booking local, regional and even some national music acts, it was too little, too late.
“We might have been able to survive as a music-only club had we not had so much debt from both movie theaters,” Hansen said. “Movies were always our main focus, our bread-and-butter, and that simply died.”
Hansen said moving from the smaller Brew & View on 2nd Avenue to the larger Rocket on 19th Street was not a contributing cause to going out of business.
“True, we carried over some debt from the small venue, but it was imperative to our survival to have this larger facility,” he said. “We needed a larger venue to carry us through the dry periods. Unfortunately, we ran out of money and credit before we could see how successful this new venue could be.”
Hansen did not give specifics on the potential new theater operators. He did say that they are not purchasing the business from him, but rather starting from scratch. He said one of the possible operators is a national dinner/movie chain with greater resources.
(Tory Brecht, Quad City Times, Davenport, IA)
Darkened theater lit by memories (Eileen Schoville, La Crosse Tribune, December 5, 1975) SOLDIERS GROVE – The lights are out at the Electric Theater now, but for nearly 35 years they were a bright spot in this village. And more than one old-timer will tell you about the days when movies were a nickel and a dime — and before “talkies” came in. Not so many years ago, when going to town on Saturday night was almost as important as going to church on Sunday, the Electric Theater was the gathering place for kids, while their folks bought up supplies and caught up with the latest news as they visited curbside with friends. The Electric Theater and its equipment is still owned by Bertha Larson, who operated it for 20 years with her husband, Art, and before that for her brother, Mike Young. The theater is now idle. Movie fare in the old days consisted of a newsreel, cartoon, a rundown of coming attractions, a serial, and then the feature. The first show started at 7 p.m. and the last show finished about 1 a.m. Bertha remembers that “running a movie theater meant a lot of hard work, and still does, if you want to make a go of it.” A typical week’s fare in the 1940s is shown in an old clipping from the Kickapoo Scout, the village weekly newspaper: Showing Friday. Saturday and Sunday — “Salty O’Rourke” featuring Alan Ladd, Bruce Cabot, Gail Russell, Stanley Clements and Spring Byington. Tuesday and Wednesday — William Bendix and Joan Blondell in “Don Juan Quilligan.” Coming attractions: “Song of Bernadette” — “Diamond Horseshoe’’ — “Nob Hill” “Coulee Chanticleer”. A column by Ray Peacock which appeared in the Tribune pages back in 1939 had this to say: “Mike’s theater, the Electric, is following the practice of many theaters in going in for bank nights.” The jackpot, when we were in town, was $85, having climbed $10 each bank night from a modest $15 start. They have to arrange the theatergoers in layers …” Another Tribune writer got this laugh out of Mike and his Electric Theater: “Speaking of lazy people, take Mike Young of Soldiers Grove, for instance. Mike, who is in his early 30s, is manager of the Soldiers Grove theater, promotes various night sports, operates the Grove team in the Kickapoo-Wisconsin baseball league, and owns and operates Dancehaven. “Puzzled to find a theater manager who also promotes conflicting night spots, we were told that Mike removes the conflict by darkening the lights of the theater the night he turns on the lights of the arena. We didn’t ask but wouldn’t have been surprised to find out that Dancehaven doesn’t open until the theater lets out.” And there’s another story about a picture salesman who called on Mike. Mike was asking for the kind of films his clientele liked and said, “We want some good westerns with a lot of shooting.” “But how about “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”? the salesman suggested. “Aw, hell no, they don’t go for football pictures here.” said the theater boss. “We want westerns.” Emil Asperheim, who grew up in Soldiers Grove, remembers the silent movie days when he used to go to the “flickers” at the first movie house in town, opened by Otto Bell in 1914. That was the beginning of movies in Soldiers Grove, but it was Clarence Erickson who opened the first Electric Theater after coming home from service in World War I. The Electric Theater has been opened twice since 1966, when the Larsons closed it. A youth group tried running it for a year or so. but heating costs, mechanical problems and competition from TV discouraged the group. Later it was opened on a part-time basis, but going to the movies just wasn’t like it used to be and so the lights are out again.
The Grant County Historical Society.
There’s a meeting on the RAMOVA Theatre set for Tuesday, November 19th, 2019 at 6pm CST in the Nativity of Our Lord Church basement, as per 11th Ward Ald. Patrick D. Thompson. A developer has expressed interest in the property for entertainment purposes. Anyone wishing to comment and/or who cannot attend may email Ald. Thompson at and/or call him at 773-254-6677.
Doug Peterson: “I operated the old Simplex projectors at the Electric Theater in the Grove for almost four years. At one point Art Larson tried running movies four nights a week, but because of TV it was a losing proposition, so we went back to Sat and Sun only.”
Robert Shedd: “I was one of the last to run them. Joe Leary taught me.”
Doug Peterson: “They lasted longer than the processed film that ran through them. I have many stories about how Art and I kept them running with baling wire and paper clips.”
Robert Shedd: “At the last when the theater was being run by a CAP youth group, the leader found a guy who worked as a mechanic for a theater supply place in Milwaukee. He had a pair of them in his collection, since he didn’t care if they worked or not he would swap us parts (for a price). According to him they were the oldest working projectors in the U.S. and maybe in North America, he wasn’t sure about Mexico.”
Betty Mindham: “I remember so many full houses there.”