Variety Theatre

Henry Greenwall was living over the theatre with his name on it just a block away when he decided the City of New Orleans needed another live stage, despite the fast growth of nickelodeons. The 1,800 seat Baldwin Theatre would become the home of Greenwall’s and Walter S. Baldwin’s Baldwin-Melville Company. The troupe didn’t have to go far moving a block away from the Greenwall Theatre to the newly-built Baldwin. The Baldwin’s architect was Stone Brothers, initially working with a $100,000 projection but expanding to a more feasible $150,000 budget. D.H. Barnes was signed on as its contractor. Estimates put it the Baldwin Theatre project as much as $50,000 over the revised budget - a portent of financial woes to follow.

The venue opened on December 7, 1906 with Louisiana Governor Newton C. Blanchard addressing the sold out crowd. Within a few years, NOLA had surged from just three to nine large, live venues, just as live programming and opera houses were becoming less profitable nationwide. Acting troupes were often housed at the nearby and swanky St. Charles Hotel. Greenwall changed the name of the venue within just two years to the Dauphine Theatre, installing a new production company on August 21, 1908. On that date, the Barry-Burke Players performed The King and Queen of Gamblers. The six new local theaters were soon competing for a dwindling audience, a reality Greenwall lamented in 1913, saying:

“The moving picture shows are reaping big benefits from the condition of the [live] theatrical world. Few local managers can keep their heads above water… With rent and other expenses soaring, and no attractions to fill their time, they simply can’t hold out.”

Greenwall didn’t get to see how correct his forecast was. He died in his apartment above the Greenwall Theatre just two months later, and the Greenwall changed names upon adopting a full-time movie policy not long after. Meanwhile, in August of 1914, the Dauphine Theatre ended legit stage plays and switched to full-time burlesque. They secured arguably the biggest name in burley programming when the Columbia Amusement Company’s Eastern Burlesque Wheel assumed control beginning August 30, 1914. It would prove to be the venue’s bread and butter for much of its programmatic future, though fights hosted on the stage of the Dauphine proved even more popular for a brief period during World War I.

The Dauphine’s most incredible highlight took place on January 27 and 28, 1917 when actress Sarah Bernhardt’s promoters were booking her “Farewell Tour.” The seat count was high even if the programming match wasn’t there. She made her last appearance in NOLA memorable with two sold out performances… that is, until she was booked at the Orpheum vaudeville house in 1918 on that same tour.

In the meantime, the shakeout of large live venues continued across New Orleans. The city’s iteration of the Hippodrome (also known as the Winter Garden) went dark on February 7, 1916, while the Shubert was renamed the Lafayette as it moved from live presentations to film. And things would abruptly get worse for the Dauphine just after the War. A high-profile legal case against Dauphine Theatre programmer Lew Rose in 1919 for permitting lewd dancing cast a pall over the Dauphine, forcing an early closure of that season’s schedule.

The Dauphine went dark for four years and never really recovered. But when it came to dark venues, the old show biz adage, “One manager’s perceived failure is only another’s invitation to dream."

The first dreamer was J. Miller of the Lafayette Theatre (formerly the Shubert) who, as he did at the Lafayette, took over the Dauphine Theatre to showcase silent films, beginning September 6, 1925 It began with Cecil B. DeMille’s Adam’s Rib. That venture lasted only until Halloween of 1926, as Miller found himself with more trick than treat.

The theatre struggled through sporadic live event programming before turning to a policy of fight films and exploitation films aimed at an African American crowd. A screening of the Tunney-Dempsey fight scored massive audiences. And the first rule in Louisiana was if you saw a fight film, you did not talk about the fight film because of state laws. And sure enough, the fight films ended as the Dauphone operators lost in court.

In 1929, the next dreamer entering the Dauphine’s locked doors helped it to become the largest African American cinema in the South. That “era” ended within a year, however, as the theatre failed to make a successful transition to sound. In 1930, it returned to operating as a burlesque house for African American audiences, but it was unable to make it through a complete year without being rung up for lewd programming once again and shuttered.

On May 9, 1931, it reopened and was wired for sound as a movie house, but it failed quickly—resulting in a reported $10,000 loss for its operator. The Dauphine Theatre then returned to sporadic live events for African American audiences before successfully restoring burlesque in 1933, though business trailed off by early 1934.

On January 3, 1935 (after delaying a planned Christmas launch), the venue became the Eagle Music Hall—a live music and events pavilion. That iteration ended by the summer with a lien and a forced sheriff’s auction, which was reportedly won for a bid of $9,000.

The venue was relit by Mike Lucca, who gave it a $15,000 streamline moderne makeover. This included a name change to the Variety Theatre, where he programmed local vaudeville and third-run films for African American audiences. Operations began on June 13, 1940, as the House of Variety, featuring seven acts of vaudeville—advertised strictly as “not burlesque"—and the film Tom Boy starring Jackie Moran. The Variety Theatre closed permanently on July 1, 1940, bowing out with Sonja Henie in Everything Happens at Night alongside seven final acts of live vaudeville.

Its next iteration was as an ice-skating rink. That ended very quickly with yet another forced sale, sheriff’s auction in 1946, where buyers could purchase and de-install the rink and its associated equipment. (Any damage caused by the removal of the equipment would result in a fine according to the auction listing.)

In 1948, the building received a $20,000 makeover to transition it back into a theater, returning to its original mission as a live venue run by the New Orleans Theater Guild. It reopened on November 11, 1948, with the play John Loves Mary. That final play ended in April and the final one-off show ended on June 29, 1949. That turned out to be the last dreamer. And, predictably, a sheriff’s sale followed—only this time, they sold the seats, the heaters, and everything else of value, entirely stripping the building on December 28, 1949. It was their polite way of stopping anyone else from sinking into what had become a high profile money pit.

Demolition was seemingly right around the corner… but in this sad case it took twenty years to reach that moment. Pictures of the vacant building make it appear quite regal which may have led to the hesitation in tearing it down. But on August 7, 1970, Ricca Demolishing finally leveled the moribund playhouse.

The Dauphine’s was a mercy razing, but not before a salvage sale took place clearing out the remaining marble, brick, and framing—the only things that hadn’t been sold at the 1949 sheriff’s auction. The theatre proved incredibly stout during demolition from August of 1970 to early 1971; most derelict buildings of that period would have easily given way. But the project of demolishing the structure went well beyond the most liberal estimates for completion. The Dauphine’s final pushback served as a final testament to the original plans of the Stone Brothers and the work of D.H. Barnes, the contractor of the job some 65 years prior. It deserved a curtain call.

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