This opened as the Magnolia Theatre in 1948. It did receive a brief closure before reopening under the Cine Theatre name. It then made a brief closure in 1998 and was renamed the Magnolia Civic Center. It wasn’t until December 2023 when the original Magnolia Theatre name returned following the theater’s 75th anniversary.
New Albany also had two older indoor theaters, which were the Ritz and the Royal. The Ritz likely opened in late-1939 at the Cohn building on South Front Street after being purchased by David Webster and J.M. Lamb that July. Unfortunately the Ritz was destroyed by a fire in October 1953 and its aftermath remains unknown. I cannot find any information about the Royal for now.
The Richelieu Theatre, named after owner Charles H. Richelieu, opened its doors on February 29, 1924 with Tom Moore in “Big Brother” (unknown if extras added). It was renamed the Manos Theatre on October 20, 1936, and renamed again the Penn Theatre in April 1950.
The Penn Theatre likely closed as a movie theater on March 21, 1971 with “Woodstock”, and reopened the following day as a concert venue. It didn’t last long, and it closed by 1973.
Throughout the afternoon of April 14, 1942, Stroudsburg suffered a massive loss following a massive fire that destroyed several buildings, including the Sherman Theatre, estimating a loss of $250,000 in damages. The fire started inside a barn along 5th Street located a few roads north of Main Street, destroying several cars and a pipe organ from in and out. It then spread westwardly towards the Sherman Theatre. Despite nobody injured, the Sherman Theatre suffered destruction from the roof and suffered damage inside the auditorium from the roof collapse. The barn was blazing fiercely at the time making the fighting very difficult.
Fred Schuermann, the projectionist at the time, believed that the Sherman Theatre’s then-2½ inch concrete reinforced steel projection booth wasn’t damage at all but he had been unable to ascertain definitely. He expressed the opinion that only possibility of water entering through a ventilator on top of the booth suggested damage there. Seven units of the Stroudsburg Fire Department were called around 12:58 PM ET followed by arrival seven minutes later. Ten streams of water were being used on the flames by 2:30 PM which at the time the fire had burned through the Sherman’s roof. The roof edge of high aerial “well” into which stage scenery was hoisted was the last stronghold of the blaze, and water was being poured on it long after 4:00 PM that evening. The walls and the interior of the Sherman Theatre were saved from the fire but the walls of the auditorium were cracked and scorched as they are all made out of brick.
Two cars that had been stored in the barn were undamaged but two others therein and three outside were destroyed except for their tires, running gear, and chassis. Francis Meredith of the Wyckoff stores nearby rushed to the scene of the fire and drove his car out of the garage and to a nearby lot while flames crackled through the building above him. He then assisted a group of men in pushing an unmodeled Packard belonging to Joseph Wallace from the building. The other two cars inside were destroyed and the tops, upholstery, and other parts of car outside were burned.
One of the first to discover the blaze was Fred Salathe, the operator of a bakery and delicatessen store near the theater. He rushed into the Sherman after sounding the alarm, just as the flames began to eat into the auditorium. He and his employees attempted to find sufficient water to stop the blaze and some fire extinguishers were used but the blaze continued outside prevented them from halting the flames inside. Units form both Stroudsburg and East Stroudsburg made it into scene. The Hometown Bakery Building with living apartments in its upper floor nearby abutting the theater lobby on the East were very minorly damaged, with the very small damage being by water but flames on the roof were halted at the edge of the building’s eaves.
The Sherman Theatre reopened later that year following the fire with an updated roof.
There is some information that the Major Drive-In was still open in 1967. Its likely that the Major Drive-In was just closed for the season and not permanently. It was already gone by 1983.
It was still open in 1990, but the screen was demolished by 1994, meaning that the drive-in closed in the early-1990s. As of 2025, the concession/projection booth still stands as well as many of its traces.
The Lyric Theatre suffered destruction from a fire twice. The first fire happened on December 23, 1939. It was rebuilt and reopened on August 22, 1940, and the second fire happened on November 19, 1957 when a furnace exploded which ended its life.
Opened on August 25, 1936 with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in “Follow The Fleet” (unknown if extras added), and was first managed by Cecil P. Taylor, who also operated the Majestic Theatre in Beaver Dam.
The Fugate’s Cinema most likely opened its doors as a twin on August 29, 1984 with “Ghostbusters” in Screen 1 and “Tightrope” in Screen 2. A third screen opened around Thanksgiving of that same year and became a triplex. I cannot find any information on when it became a fiveplex.
This started life as the Starlight Theatre, and was renamed the Marian Theatre in September 1940. It was renamed the Novo Theatre on August 28, 1970, and was still open in 1985.
The actual opening date is March 1, 1911, but its first performances didn’t start until three days later on March 4, 1911.
The Imperial Theatre was first founded by a whole team of 10 Japanese residents, which were Hirobumi Ito, Taro Masuda, Keinosuke Nishino, Eiichi Shibusawa, Heigoro Shoda, Sutejiro Fukuzawa, Momosuke Fukuzawa, Onsuke Hibi, Tsunenori Tanaka, and Takemasa Tezuka. It was first built as a Renaissance-style theater designed by Tamsuke Yokogawa.
Shochiku took over the Imperial in 1930 and became the SY chain’s flagship movie theater. However, it wasn’t until 1939 when Toho merged with the theater’s management company, and Toho took over and restored the theater into its original form as a theatrical entertainment venue in 1940. The basement dining hall downstairs opened during World War II (possibly around January 1944) as a rice porridge restaurant.
On January 5, 1955, the Imperial Theatre became the first ever movie theater in Japan featuring Cinerama installations. Tokyo had two of them in total, with the other being the Theatre Tokyo. Cinerama in the Imperial lasted until December 16, 1962, leaving the Theatre Tokyo the only Cinerama theater operating. It reopened as a 70mm house six days later on December 22, 1962 and continued to screen first-run films with 70mm projection until its final closure as a movie theater on January 31, 1964 after its final showing of “Lawrence Of Arabia”. It last had 1,826 seats, with 1,138 seats on the first floor and 688 seats on the balcony.
The original Imperial Theatre was demolished and a newer Imperial Theatre, a live theater, was built on the site. The building, an integrated complex with the Kokusai Building, was designed by Yoshiro Taniguchi. It was completed on September 29, 1966, and reopened that October. Part of the building has been used as the headquarters of the oil giant Idemitsu Kosan since its completion, and the top floor is now the Idemitsu Museum of Arts Tokyo, which displays the antique art collection of Idemitsu Sazo (Idemitsu Kosan moved to Otemachi in 2021). The revolving stage has four large and small elevations inside, is 16.4 meters in diameter and 22 meters high, and runs from the first floor above ground to the 6th floor underground.
The newer Imperial featured a mix of stage shows and special events, including the Japan Record Awards presentations from 1969 to 1984 and the year-end Jumbo Lottery held on some New Year’s Eves, once in 1977, and again from 1997 until 1999, and again from 2001 until 2005. Those shows were previously held at the Nippon Theater, the Tokyo Takarazuka Theater, the Shinjuku Koma Theater, the Tokyo Welfare Pension Hall, the Melpark Tokyo, and finally the Akasaka ACT Theater. Ever since 2017, it was always held at the Tokyo Opera City Concert Hall.
On September 27, 2022, Toho announced that they’ll work with Idemitsu Arts Center and Mitsubishi Estate to rebuild the whole theater. After closure on February 28, 2025, Toho immediately signed a lease agreement with Meijiza for multi-year, multi-month performances from March 2025. This updated theater is scheduled to be completed in 2030. The building itself will have 29 floors above ground and 4 below, with the theater located on the lower floors, from the 4th floor above ground to the 2nd floor below. The design itself was done by architect and Hosei University professor Tetsuo Kobori, and based on the concept of “THE VEIL,” it aims to create a comfortable space that embodies “Japanese-ness that looks to the future” by taking advantage of the natural environment around Hibiya, such as by incorporating natural light. The difference from the second-generation theater is that the theater layout will be rotated 90 degrees from the previous one, with the audience seats located directly in front of the entrance, and a flow plan will be made to reduce congestion at the start and end of performances. The number of seats will be almost the same as before, 1,900 seats, but with more space. The stage space will be the same size as before, but a technical gallery will be provided above the stage wings, and world-class cutting-edge stage technology will be introduced. Other plans include expanding the lobby and foyer space, improving the cafe and bar, expanding utility facilities such as restrooms, adding a cafe that the public can use, making the facility barrier-free, and building a new underground theater lobby directly connected to the subway concourse.
The entire building, excluding the theater, will be designed in accordance with the Otemachi, Marunouchi, and Yurakucho District Urban Development Guidelines 2023, preserving the historic 31m (100 shaku) eaves line, and the upper floors, which will house high-grade offices, will be set back to ensure continuity with the existing eaves line of the lower floors, and a terrace open to the public overlooking the Imperial Palace will be built on the roof of the lower floors. The Idemitsu Museum of Arts will be redeveloped in the upper part of the lower floors to enhance its function as a museum, and a commercial zone will be created, forming an underground station town space linked to the subway Yurakucho Station and Hibiya Station, and an east-west underground passage connecting to JR Yurakucho Station will also be built.
The Skyview Twin Cinema was built at the former drive-in’s site. This was the only drive-in in East Liverpool.
So I’m very sure it means that it did open during the 1954 season.
A 1955 aerial view does show the drive-in operating, meaning that the theater had been operating since either 1955 or beforehand.
This opened as the Magnolia Theatre in 1948. It did receive a brief closure before reopening under the Cine Theatre name. It then made a brief closure in 1998 and was renamed the Magnolia Civic Center. It wasn’t until December 2023 when the original Magnolia Theatre name returned following the theater’s 75th anniversary.
The Richelieu Theatre, named after owner Charles H. Richelieu, opened its doors on February 29, 1924 with Tom Moore in “Big Brother” (unknown if extras added). It was renamed the Manos Theatre on October 20, 1936, and renamed again the Penn Theatre in April 1950.
The Penn Theatre likely closed as a movie theater on March 21, 1971 with “Woodstock”, and reopened the following day as a concert venue. It didn’t last long, and it closed by 1973.
Throughout the afternoon of April 14, 1942, Stroudsburg suffered a massive loss following a massive fire that destroyed several buildings, including the Sherman Theatre, estimating a loss of $250,000 in damages. The fire started inside a barn along 5th Street located a few roads north of Main Street, destroying several cars and a pipe organ from in and out. It then spread westwardly towards the Sherman Theatre. Despite nobody injured, the Sherman Theatre suffered destruction from the roof and suffered damage inside the auditorium from the roof collapse. The barn was blazing fiercely at the time making the fighting very difficult.
Fred Schuermann, the projectionist at the time, believed that the Sherman Theatre’s then-2½ inch concrete reinforced steel projection booth wasn’t damage at all but he had been unable to ascertain definitely. He expressed the opinion that only possibility of water entering through a ventilator on top of the booth suggested damage there. Seven units of the Stroudsburg Fire Department were called around 12:58 PM ET followed by arrival seven minutes later. Ten streams of water were being used on the flames by 2:30 PM which at the time the fire had burned through the Sherman’s roof. The roof edge of high aerial “well” into which stage scenery was hoisted was the last stronghold of the blaze, and water was being poured on it long after 4:00 PM that evening. The walls and the interior of the Sherman Theatre were saved from the fire but the walls of the auditorium were cracked and scorched as they are all made out of brick.
Two cars that had been stored in the barn were undamaged but two others therein and three outside were destroyed except for their tires, running gear, and chassis. Francis Meredith of the Wyckoff stores nearby rushed to the scene of the fire and drove his car out of the garage and to a nearby lot while flames crackled through the building above him. He then assisted a group of men in pushing an unmodeled Packard belonging to Joseph Wallace from the building. The other two cars inside were destroyed and the tops, upholstery, and other parts of car outside were burned.
One of the first to discover the blaze was Fred Salathe, the operator of a bakery and delicatessen store near the theater. He rushed into the Sherman after sounding the alarm, just as the flames began to eat into the auditorium. He and his employees attempted to find sufficient water to stop the blaze and some fire extinguishers were used but the blaze continued outside prevented them from halting the flames inside. Units form both Stroudsburg and East Stroudsburg made it into scene. The Hometown Bakery Building with living apartments in its upper floor nearby abutting the theater lobby on the East were very minorly damaged, with the very small damage being by water but flames on the roof were halted at the edge of the building’s eaves.
The Sherman Theatre reopened later that year following the fire with an updated roof.
There is some information that the Major Drive-In was still open in 1967. Its likely that the Major Drive-In was just closed for the season and not permanently. It was already gone by 1983.
It was still open in 1990, but the screen was demolished by 1994, meaning that the drive-in closed in the early-1990s. As of 2025, the concession/projection booth still stands as well as many of its traces.
February 9, 1928
The Lyric Theatre suffered destruction from a fire twice. The first fire happened on December 23, 1939. It was rebuilt and reopened on August 22, 1940, and the second fire happened on November 19, 1957 when a furnace exploded which ended its life.
Opened on August 25, 1936 with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in “Follow The Fleet” (unknown if extras added), and was first managed by Cecil P. Taylor, who also operated the Majestic Theatre in Beaver Dam.
On March 29, 1961, the Rialto became a Cinerama theater and was the only movie theater in the state of Kentucky to have Cinerama.
Also opened with a special Universal Newsreel involving the Bombing Of The USS Panay.
Opened on October 10, 1975.
Closed on April 20, 1996.
The Lyric Theatre opened its doors on November 21, 1934 with Gene Raymond in “Transatlantic Merry-Go-Round” (unknown if extras added).
The Fugate’s Cinema most likely opened its doors as a twin on August 29, 1984 with “Ghostbusters” in Screen 1 and “Tightrope” in Screen 2. A third screen opened around Thanksgiving of that same year and became a triplex. I cannot find any information on when it became a fiveplex.
Still open in 1976.
The Green River Drive-In opened its gates on May 29, 1952 with Eddie Foy Jr. in “Country Fair” along with a few unnamed shorts.
This started life as the Starlight Theatre, and was renamed the Marian Theatre in September 1940. It was renamed the Novo Theatre on August 28, 1970, and was still open in 1985.
Started life as the Chiefland Theatre.
Closed on October 4, 1970 with Clint Eastwood in “Paint Your Wagon” along with an unnamed cartoon.
The actual opening date is March 1, 1911, but its first performances didn’t start until three days later on March 4, 1911.
The Imperial Theatre was first founded by a whole team of 10 Japanese residents, which were Hirobumi Ito, Taro Masuda, Keinosuke Nishino, Eiichi Shibusawa, Heigoro Shoda, Sutejiro Fukuzawa, Momosuke Fukuzawa, Onsuke Hibi, Tsunenori Tanaka, and Takemasa Tezuka. It was first built as a Renaissance-style theater designed by Tamsuke Yokogawa.
Shochiku took over the Imperial in 1930 and became the SY chain’s flagship movie theater. However, it wasn’t until 1939 when Toho merged with the theater’s management company, and Toho took over and restored the theater into its original form as a theatrical entertainment venue in 1940. The basement dining hall downstairs opened during World War II (possibly around January 1944) as a rice porridge restaurant.
On January 5, 1955, the Imperial Theatre became the first ever movie theater in Japan featuring Cinerama installations. Tokyo had two of them in total, with the other being the Theatre Tokyo. Cinerama in the Imperial lasted until December 16, 1962, leaving the Theatre Tokyo the only Cinerama theater operating. It reopened as a 70mm house six days later on December 22, 1962 and continued to screen first-run films with 70mm projection until its final closure as a movie theater on January 31, 1964 after its final showing of “Lawrence Of Arabia”. It last had 1,826 seats, with 1,138 seats on the first floor and 688 seats on the balcony.
The original Imperial Theatre was demolished and a newer Imperial Theatre, a live theater, was built on the site. The building, an integrated complex with the Kokusai Building, was designed by Yoshiro Taniguchi. It was completed on September 29, 1966, and reopened that October. Part of the building has been used as the headquarters of the oil giant Idemitsu Kosan since its completion, and the top floor is now the Idemitsu Museum of Arts Tokyo, which displays the antique art collection of Idemitsu Sazo (Idemitsu Kosan moved to Otemachi in 2021). The revolving stage has four large and small elevations inside, is 16.4 meters in diameter and 22 meters high, and runs from the first floor above ground to the 6th floor underground.
The newer Imperial featured a mix of stage shows and special events, including the Japan Record Awards presentations from 1969 to 1984 and the year-end Jumbo Lottery held on some New Year’s Eves, once in 1977, and again from 1997 until 1999, and again from 2001 until 2005. Those shows were previously held at the Nippon Theater, the Tokyo Takarazuka Theater, the Shinjuku Koma Theater, the Tokyo Welfare Pension Hall, the Melpark Tokyo, and finally the Akasaka ACT Theater. Ever since 2017, it was always held at the Tokyo Opera City Concert Hall.
On September 27, 2022, Toho announced that they’ll work with Idemitsu Arts Center and Mitsubishi Estate to rebuild the whole theater. After closure on February 28, 2025, Toho immediately signed a lease agreement with Meijiza for multi-year, multi-month performances from March 2025. This updated theater is scheduled to be completed in 2030. The building itself will have 29 floors above ground and 4 below, with the theater located on the lower floors, from the 4th floor above ground to the 2nd floor below. The design itself was done by architect and Hosei University professor Tetsuo Kobori, and based on the concept of “THE VEIL,” it aims to create a comfortable space that embodies “Japanese-ness that looks to the future” by taking advantage of the natural environment around Hibiya, such as by incorporating natural light. The difference from the second-generation theater is that the theater layout will be rotated 90 degrees from the previous one, with the audience seats located directly in front of the entrance, and a flow plan will be made to reduce congestion at the start and end of performances. The number of seats will be almost the same as before, 1,900 seats, but with more space. The stage space will be the same size as before, but a technical gallery will be provided above the stage wings, and world-class cutting-edge stage technology will be introduced. Other plans include expanding the lobby and foyer space, improving the cafe and bar, expanding utility facilities such as restrooms, adding a cafe that the public can use, making the facility barrier-free, and building a new underground theater lobby directly connected to the subway concourse.
The entire building, excluding the theater, will be designed in accordance with the Otemachi, Marunouchi, and Yurakucho District Urban Development Guidelines 2023, preserving the historic 31m (100 shaku) eaves line, and the upper floors, which will house high-grade offices, will be set back to ensure continuity with the existing eaves line of the lower floors, and a terrace open to the public overlooking the Imperial Palace will be built on the roof of the lower floors. The Idemitsu Museum of Arts will be redeveloped in the upper part of the lower floors to enhance its function as a museum, and a commercial zone will be created, forming an underground station town space linked to the subway Yurakucho Station and Hibiya Station, and an east-west underground passage connecting to JR Yurakucho Station will also be built.
This opened as the Richland Opera House in January 1898, and was renamed the Richland Theatre by 1930. It was closed in 1970.
Opened on January 26, 1941 with Ann Sheridan in “Honeymoon For Three” (unknown if extras added).