Beverly Theater

It’s not often that two historic theaters are simultaneously razed in any town, let alone Beverly Hills. The Beverly Theater was demolished last week, along with the Canon Theatre. I took some photos which can be seen here: http://barryphoto.smugmug.com/gallery/794486

The original “oriental” facade was revealed as the workers stripped off the modern skin. Two of the photos were used in last week’s Beverly Hills Weekly. They accompanied a story about the futile last ditch legal efforts to save them.

For the record, I drove past this building on Saturday and there was no fence around it or any other sign demolition was to begin today.

In the Special features part of the DVD “That’s Entertainment” you can see a exterior shot of the theatre during the premiere of that feature.

From:
View link

On August 22, demolition is to begin on three well-known Beverly Hills buildings.

First, and most importantly, is the 1923 dome-topped Beverly Theater. Next to City Hall and Rodeo Drive, this iconic structure — though dwarfed in recent years by taller buildings — symbolized old Beverly Hills. I live next door to the woman whose father built the theater. Fortunately, she won’t have to witness the demolition from her window. A massive Jerry Snyder “mixed use” project currently under construction now blocks the view.

The other two buildings slated for demolition include the old Canon Theater, which before it went legit showed movies as both The Canon Theater and, in earlier times, The Hitching Post. And next door to that, the Gucci warehouse, once a Bekins or Lyons storage building, also will fall. This building, by the way, was the first poured concrete structure to feature a “waterfall windows” facade.

David Harrison Levi – Beverly Hills High School Alumni – Class of 1970 – Child Actor – TV & print – Art Linkletter’s “Kids Say The Darndest Things” LMNO Productions – CEO/President David Levi Entertainment, Inc. David Levi Productions, Inc. Personal Management TV /Screen /writer (TV & Film Prop rental sales leasing) in Beverly Hills, California – Top 50 Sexiest Men in Hollywood – Producer of various charity telethon events i.e.: Jerry Lewis MDA , Variety Clubs International, March of Dimes, American Cancer Research, Easter Seals, SPCA , John Wayne Institute for Cancer Research ( Dr. Lee Morton ), Founder/ CEO Recycle Smiles AMERICA ( toys to medically challenged children), working partner and management/ Chippendales, Inc. Los Angeles, CA. 1979-1991 – Partner/co-creator / Beverly Hills Diner / Chippendales Nightclubs / (Partner)Los Angeles, CA. CEO/President Levi Corporation of America

An article in today’s NY Times states that a new hotel will take over the site where the Beverly Theater now stands.

Here is a portion of the article dealing with the theater:

“For the city, the project solves a problem that had irked city officials for more than a decade: how to remove the empty and unusable buildings on the site. The most visible of those structures is the Beverly Theater, a 1920’s movie house with onion-shaped domes inspired by the Taj Mahal, and now fronted by an incongruous entryway of black glass added in the 1980’s.

After the theater closed in the 1970’s, the building served as a clothing store and a discount bank before shutting its doors in the early 1990’s. Five years ago, the city said that the building was structurally unsafe. "

There’s a nice photograph of the Beverly here: http://www.yesterdayla.com/Graphics/beverly2.jpg

In the 1970s, I took my young niece to see “That’s Entertainment!” here. I still look for the theater dome when driving through BH.

General Cinema picked up this house and other Loew’s Theatres in the Southern California market, when Loew’s dropped the Southern California market from the chain. Most of the theatres were like brucec said were suburban mall market and Drive-In screens. This former Fox house was the oldest in Beverly Hills. Fox West Coast Theatres dropped the theatre back in 1960. After that Statewide, Century and then Loew’s Theatres would run it. General Cinema dropped this theatres lease after grosses had died down and Westwood started to show more business after films like the “Exorcist” did Blockbuster business at the National Theatre. But also the releasing patterns of the studios changed during this time. The time of the Roadshow was dying, these pictures that would only play two times a day. There are many things that killed this theatre and the Warner Beverly Theatre around the corner. The Art-Deco Warner Beverly died because a savings and loan company that owned the property found it would cost around 14 Million to do a earthquake retro-fit and restoration on the theatre. Now you want to talk about a real lost to the city and area.

The City of Beverly Hills helped cause the demise of the movie palaces in downtown Beverly Hills. The big Three were the Fox-Wilshire,Beverly and the Beverly Warner. As long as they were able to play the exclusive reserved seat attractions these theatres did very well.The studios were also to blame for not placing the proper movies in the 1970’s that wouldn’t have attracted the unruly crowds that caused problems with the residents in the area.They opened “Woodstock” in Beverly Hills instead of Westwood or Hollywood and the “Excorcist” instead of Hollywood on exclusive runs.The Beverly Hills market was great for the upscale and roadshow films such as “The Sound of Music”.I saw “On A Clear Day” at the Beverly what a great film presentation. General Cinema was the wrong chain to be running this theatre. They were mainly in the suburban mall market and didn’t run single screens in the city. After problems with the “Excorcist” and “Woodstock” Beverly Hills started resticting parking and not allowing for midnight shows. The City help destroy going to the movies in Beverly Hills during the 1970’s. The Fine Arts and the Music Hall are upscale smaller cinemas that have been able to survive because they attract the audience that the city is happy with. It was not until the Beverly Center was built did movies return to Beverly Hills in a major way but this was in a mall on the cities border.brucec

But since that picture and book has come out the theatre has gone from being a store to being a bank. So most of the interior has been gutted. Remember the book was published in 1981. That theatre stopped being a theatre back around 1977. And it sat empty for a few years after the store left.

For many years this theatre was operated by the Fox West Coast Theatre chain till around 1960. It was then part of a few more chains: Century, Statewide, Loew’s and finally General Cinema Theatres. During the 60’s it was one of the Roadshow houses in Los Angeles. It was equipped with Norelco AAII projectors.

This theatre was operated by Fox West Coast Theatres from 1925 to the late 50’s. Then Amusement Corp. of America, Statewide theatres, Century theatres, Loew’s theatres then the last chain was GCC theatres.