Palace Theatre

CSWalczak on June 11, 2010 at 10:37 pm

According to this source: View link opened in 1903 as the Greenwall. Also “Orpheum” appears on the marquee; I wonder if at one time it was part of the Orpheum Circuit of vaudeville houses.

dallasmovietheaters on May 21, 2026 at 5:55 pm

Henry Greenwall was the last of the great theatrical owner-managers in the City of New Orleans. The long-time manager of the Grand Opera House on Canal Street had the Stone Brothers Architects draw up a house that he could be proud to put his name on in 1903. It would open on October 20, 1904 with the play, “The Wife.” Greenwall made it through 1908 with live fare and sublet the place in 1909.

On a subleasing agreement, it was downgraded (somewhat) to a vaudeville house known as the American Music Hall in February of 1909. But it was good vaudeville programmed by none other than the William A. Morris Company as they broke into the NOLA market. Lew Rose also did some of the bookings. For some live events - sports - it was referred to as the Greenwall Theatre. The vaudeville ended after two years February 16, 1911.

With Morris and vaudeville off of its sublease, Greenwall rechristened the venue as the Greenwall Theatre in 1911. But it would slip a peg or two doing a combination of vaudeville and movies. with Arthur Leopold programming. Prices were cheap at a dime and top end pricing at 15 cents down from the quarter and half dollar pricing just days earlier. It was the only “popular price” vaudeville house in the city as motion pictures were the far more profitable play. Greenwall would die in his apartment over the Greenwall Theatre on November 27, 1913. The Greenwall name would play on until the vaudeville ended in January of 1916.

In 1916, Ernest Boehringer, noted NOLA film exhibitor, took the venue on on a one-year leasing agreement as the Triangle Theatre (sometimes the Greenwall Triangle Theatre perhaps due to existing signage) on January 14, 1916. The Triangle played feature films from the Triangle film studio. Boehringber began the Triangle with Normal Talmage in “The Missing Links” supported by “The Submarine Pirates” and “Because He Loved Her.” On June 2, 1917, he purchased the Greenwall Theatre for $100,000 and deemed it “the most extraordinary photoplay theatre in the entire South.” Wow! But on July 15, 1917, Boeringer Amusement would move to larger and newer digs with the new-build Liberty Theatre. In turn, he would sell here to the Eastern Vaudeville Circuit which would reprogram and rename here.

As the Palace Theatre, the vaudeville returned on September 2, 1917 - again with popular price vaudeville. That lasted until 1920 when the Palace returned almost primarily with motion pictures. The theatre was not poised to become a major sound theatre and tried mixing in more live programming by decade’s end before being sold for $311k. The movies were back in the 1930s as the Palace operated as a third-run grindhouse and welcoming of African American audiences. It was converted to widescreen. The Palace made it to its 1962 Twist dance contests and an April 10, 1962 showing of “The Premature Burial” with “The Long Rope.”

A theatre salvage sale took place in April of 1962 hours after the last showing as the venue would be demolished in favor of the Central Parking Garage Lot and that started on April 17, 1962. A block away, the Dauphine Theatre also staged a surplus sale and would also be demolished for a multi-floor parking structure - a plan that was put on hold until 1970.