Bijou Theatre
1229 Hermosa Avenue,
Hermosa Beach,
CA
90254
1229 Hermosa Avenue,
Hermosa Beach,
CA
90254
8 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 34 comments
Reopened as the Bijou twin cinema on September 30th, 1983. Grand opening ad posted.
1996 photo as the Bijou Cinemas added, courtesy of Mary Jo Brookes.
Late `70’s Satirical cover added featuring the Cove Cinema, courtesy of Gail Bakke Donaldson.
The space is now a Chase bank branch. It opened a couple of months ago.
I grew up in Hermosa Beach in the 70’s-80’s. The Cove, as I remember it best, holds some vivid memories for me. I saw Rocky Horror Picture Show and Rock N Roll High School too many times to count. Lets not forget the 70’s surf flicks! I also attended that Redd Cross punk gig where our anti-Reagan youth let loose on the theater and surrounding store windows. That might have been the last punk gig at that venue. However, what the punks did to the theater is nothing compared to what the city did by leveling the interior of the theater, behind the movie screens. It was an awesome sight, what a shame. Great reading these stories!
I must have seen Rocky Horror Picture Show ab out 50 Times at the Cove between 1978-1982. Other Midnite shows were Rock n Roll High School, Dawn of The Dead, Eraserhead. It w2as the only in-door theater that I have ever been to where you could drink alcohol (BYOB) and smoke a joint. However, after a while the Hermosa Police would do a quick walk through from time to time.
I remember this as the Cove Cinemas back in the early 80’s and was there a number of times.
Can anyone reconstruct the years that the various name changes occurred?
It certainly changed appearance from its original look in the photo at the top of this page, to the 1982 photo of The Cove linked to in the Apr 11, 2009 comment above…
In the early seventies I rented the doctor office that was above the theater. I had a large window in one room that looked out over the theatre. It was next to the Projection booth. I used it to set up the first lasers system used for concert tours with THE WHO, YES and PINK FLOYD. I could do the effects on the screen in the daytime and practice. At night the projectionist would come by and we would watch the movies a differant film every night. Sat midnight was the most fun to watch not the movie the audience we would watch the whole audience dancing, singing and acting out the whole Rocky Horror Picture Show every week. It was a lot of fun. A time I will never forget. The third floor was rented by a a strange artist who collected everything to use for art exhbits. There was a great helath food store downstairs part of the building next to theatre entrance. Great old theatre I worked in hundreds this was a fav.
Richard Borders
WWW.NextStar.TV
Just went by today and there’s a banner up that says “Space Available.” Ken, next time you go by, take a look at what would have been the entrance/lobby. It looks like they restored the original ceiling.
I’m not sure if the art gallery is still in the building.
Here are two April 2009 photos:
http://tinyurl.com/cl4lt6
http://tinyurl.com/d4pjyv
Here is a 1982 photo. City is misidentified.
http://tinyurl.com/cekjnd
Does any one know what happened to Phillip Bierley the manager of the Hermosa circa 1966-67?
This theatre had a five-rank Robert Morton pipe organ, installed in 1923. I have the console. Does anyone have any pictures of the interior of this theatre?
I saw many kid’s movies at Saturday matinees at this theater when I was growing up in Hermosa Beach in the 1960’s. Of course as a kid you don’t appreciate places like this, and think they will alway be around as time goes by. Alas, it isn’t so!
It’s been a pleasure reading everyone’s memories – thanks!
I saw Rocky Horror umpteen times at the Cove in Hermosa in the late 70s/early 80s. Someone please tell me this is not the same theater. Did Easy Reader used to have their offices in the bldg? I have a mounted print of the old Easy Reader cartoon based on the New Yorker one, and the Easy Reader offices are labled on the Cove bldg. I’ve carried that all over the world since I left LA in 1982 (grew up in Torrance and Redondo). I’m so sad.
Yes, that’s the building, LM. The acoustics in the rear of the building are still the same as they were during its time as a cinema.
I think that’s the building I saw. If so, you can see the resemblance to the former theater. I will take another look when I’m in that neighborhood.
I think the Bijou has been remodeled out of existence. I drove by recently and saw a box, no marquee, nada. If I misplaced the theater, let me know.
I saw “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” here.
I used to live in Hermosa in the 70’s and grew up in Rolling Hills Est. in the 60’s. I always got a kick out of the old Hermosa theater the movie I remember seeing was “Slaughter House Five”, I even remember the date I had. When I went it had only one screen. But it indeed was a “beach theater” during those heady daze. When the lights went down it seemed everyone could be heard opening beers and then the lighting of the joints started as well. I eventually tried my hand at stand up comedy and performed across from the Theater at Shenanigans Bar and used the theater for some of my jokes. DOES ANYONE OUT THERE REMEMBER AND HAVE PICS OF THE VERY OLD FOX REDONDO THEATER CIRCA 1966??? During that time Hermosa was filled with a lot of vets returning from ‘Nam and a lot of bikers would always be around, it wasn’t the super high priced yuppie city it is today. Is Mickey’s deli still there?
Great old theater… I saw “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” at this theater. Big red, velvet seats; the large awesome velvet curtain; and a funky circular restroom entrance. Unfortunately, alot of charm, including this theater, has been lost in all the South Bay’s beach cities. At least the building still stands…
Hermosa Beach
Ken, Thanks, but what city is the Bijou from? Does not look like Hermosa or Visalia!
A photo from 1923, via the LA Library:
http://jpg1.lapl.org/pics36/00037506.jpg