McClurg Court Cinemas

Paul Fortini,

If you want a good idea of how auditorium #1 looked, then here’s some examples for you. It was like these in size (though the screen to me appeared to be taller, from my memory)

Last picture in this link
url=http://www.fromscripttodvd.com/70mm_in_los_angeles_hollywood_pacific.htm
[]http://www.fromscripttodvd.com/70mm_in_los_angeles_hollywood_pacific.htm[/url]

View link

But McClurg had this on the auditorium walls
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bwchicago/1368935125

I hope these will help you visualize #1 better, has it helps me sometimes. But I still hope for a comeback as an art-house or so.

McClurg Court was very spacious as a one screen. The exterior had an office building like facade.
Even when they altered the signage for the 3 screens, it was fairly non descript. Though they had employed some of the backlit, movie poster style signage.

Mr. T at one time had a unit in the adjacent residential portion. His red Rolls convertable with “BA” plates could sometimes be seen parked around McClurg & Ohio Streets. Just prior to or possibly while he was living in Lake Forest. He had previously worked at a club called Dingbats which I think was in or near McClurg Court.

Most memorable was seeing “Network” at McClurg. The opening trailers for a upcoming pic called “Star Wars”, garnered it’s own cheering & applause. Before “Network” got it too. Something that rarely happens in movie theatres anymore.

Down the street there was an art deco Kraft office building facing the lake.
The city used it for offices in the `80’s, then sadly it was torn down. Would have made awesome retro, lakefront condos in it’s own right, had someone with vision & dough gotten to it first. A block away was a former Holiday Inn, with it’s famous rotating restaurant on the roof.

I also saw “Demon Night” with Chicago’s own Billy Zane, “Priscilla Queen of the Desert”, “Titanic” and lastly “Gladiator” at Mclurg.
The last two having long lines.
McClurg was still a clean, well run place near the end. Just couldn’t compete I guess.

Michael: Thanks for the info. I didn’t think even if the “Fiddler” story were true that the two theatres were owned by the same firm at the same time. The idea was that if Lubliner was involved, they let Nederlander have the theatre for the tourning company of “Fiddler” in return for the exclusive first run of the film version at the McClurg. It’s still a good story — wonder where it originated? I am glad that I did accurately remember Trans-Beacon. I thought they were involved at one point along with (perhaps) the Micael Todd and the Cinestage. Considering the number of 70mm roadshow houses they were involved with, I wonder if the demise of the roadshow was responsible for them going out of business in a relatively short time. I guess by the last time I was in the McVickers it was during the Diana years (another odd company), and the house was getting pretty run down.

BWChicago: Just checked your 2/1/2008 comments on the McVickers. Even if B&K held the lease I’m sure they were not operating it during the Todd-AO, Cinerama days. If you have any more information, post it on that link and I’ll look for it there, so as to not muddy up this one. Thanks.

The McVickers was Balaban and Katz before Nederlander, and Jones, Linick & Shaefer before that.

Bob Halperin, Bob Lubliner, Mike Stern, and Sanford Wolff were the owners of Center. The original carpet was designed by Lubliner’s wife. The original decor also featured artistic film strip tapestries by Linda Kriegel. It also featured the brick walls, a “small room with photograph murals of electric lights, a vending area for popcorn and soft drinks in the center of the lower lobby, and an auditorium a restful monotone of beige, as well as a decorative pool under the stairs.”

The McVickers was owned by the Nederlanders at the time.

Michael and BWChicago: I’d be interested in anything you can find. As I mentioned above, I had heard that McClurg Court was built as part of a deal with Lubliner & Trinz that if the McVickers would be made available for the stage run of “Fiddler On The Roof”, L&T would get the premiere of the film version when it opened in Chicago. At this point I can’t remember who told me that, but I do remember going to see “Fiddler” at the McClurg Court specifically because of that story. I also seem to remember that the “Trinz” was Bruce Trinz, who I believe later was the operator and booker of an art house (houses?) here in New York and was much revered. Perhaps he was a relative of the original Trinz in the circuit taken over by B&K in the ‘30’s. A cross check of the operator of the McVickers at the time of “Fiddler” might help.

Prior to Cineplex Odeon taking over, who owned and operated McCLURG COURT? I see a lot of conflicting details: In the posts above there are references to “Center” and “Lubliner & Trinz.” Newspaper ads in the Chicago newspapers never identified an owner, at least the ads I’ve referenced. Industry trade VARIETY, during the 1970s in their weekly gross section, listed it as “Center.” And Dolby Stereo installation documents from the late 1970s list it as “Lubliner & Sterns.”

So…does anyone know definitively the ownership history of McCLURG COURT?

Several of the Norridges are pretty large, but I don’t know about THAT large

Thanks, Life’s Too Short for the update. That’s too bad. Those Ciepex Odeon marquees are a real time piece. Only a few of those left in the city. I know Lincoln Village still has one (but they’re closing soon) and North Riverside does too. Can’t think of many others. Just seems to be an unusual step to remove such a big thing if nothing’s being done to the theater. It’s almost like they’re letting it blend in with the rest of the building kind of like they did with Oak Brook 1-4 I think. As long as they leave the inside alone, there’s still hope for a revival. I’m just trying to visualize that big auditorium and the huge screen in it’s hey day. Can any fellow users tell me where in the Chicagoland area I can have a similar experience in a large room with a huge screen?

Do you mean the whole marquee was removed Life’s Too Short? If so, that spells trouble. Why would they take that step unless the property was sold? Damn it, I was hoping somehow this place could be revived. Reading all these posts about what a great experience it was to catch a blockbuster here makes me really sad that I never caught a flick here and now probably never will. Has anybody heard anything regarding the sale of the site?

When Cineplex Odeon remodeled it in 1987, theater 1 had a large dark blue, maybe purple colored curtain covering it’s large screen. That’s the main thing I remember about seeing the “Star Wars” re-release in 97.