707 Adult Theatre

The 707 address of Main Street once had a reputation as a bawdy nightclub locale. And by the 1960s, it had become a frequently raided adult theater. That theater went by four different names in a wild eight-year period.

The nearly 40-year tradition of 707 Main as an entertainment hub of sorts began when The Clover Grill and Clube opened on September 10, 1938. Odell Allen operated the venue in which a steak dinner could be paired with a trip upstairs to the Clover Club, a cabaret with live jazz music, dancing and frivolity. It was one of many downtown night clubs in Fort Worth.

The flight to suburbia following World War II ended most of Fort Worth’s cabaret club activity. The Clover Club survived two fires being one of the very last jazz cabarets in the city when it closed in February of 1956. But Odell Allen continued the operation after a major refresh as the Empire Club in June of 1956.

The Empire would move two blocks away and during 1965, a decided shift took place as the venue went from live jazz and dancing to exotic entertainers and go-go dancers – much more in line with a gentleman’s club. The Empire would return to its 700-block location on May 2, 1968.

On August 1, 1969, the upstairs cabaret was turned into a 16mm adult film venue with live entertainment during what is commonly called the porno chic period of film exhibition. The opening film for the Cinne Arts Theatre was “The Purse Snatcher".

Cinne Arts Theatres Inc. was a circuit of Southwest adult theaters in cities including Dallas, Houston, Fort Worth, Wichita Falls, Austin, Albuquerque, NM, New Orleans, and one in Tampa, Florida. Memberships to the Fort Worth location were sold for a mere dollar as the venue tried to skirt local obscenity enforcement laws.

On May 21, 1970, the venue moved to the former Ritz Theatre location at 909 Calhoun Street. It co-existed with a burgeoning adult film industry in Fort Worth which included the Cine 16 and Studio V. The 707 Main Street location became the Cinema-X Theatre on May 21, 1970.

The days of the Empire Club ended as the facility became a two-screen operation becoming the Empire Theatre (downstairs) and the Cinema-X (upstairs). In March 2, 1975, the advertisements stopped - likely due to one of a dozen raids on the venue.

On August 20, 1975, the venue reopened as the 707 Adult Theatre operated by the same folks who operated the 157 Theater. But the image of Fort Worth’s central business district took an upscale turn. One of the projects, the Continental Plaza Building, was announced and the 707 was in the way. The 707 Main Street and 157 Theaters joined forces in December of 1977 outside of downtown.

For reasons that are likely clear to someone, the 707 Adult Theater staged a closing sale and its final ten days under the moniker of the Sun Theater operating from December 21, 1977 to its closing December 31, 1977. The building was demolished along with the entire block and replaced by the modern high-rise.

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