Rialto Theatre
1023 Fair Oaks Avenue,
South Pasadena,
CA
91030
1023 Fair Oaks Avenue,
South Pasadena,
CA
91030
37 people
favorited this theater
Showing 151 - 175 of 247 comments
I’ll be there. Part of the reason of the success of the Nuart is that it’s freeway accessible, lots of street parking, and its Landmark’s flagship theatre. The Rialto is far away from downtown Pasadena and people just don’t feel like making the trudge. The balcony sits behind a locked iron gate these days, although you can pull back the bolt and check it out – as long as you don’t mind total darkness and the bolt’s inability to slide back into its catch when you sneak back out.
anybody going the last night?
Check out the Kentucky Fried Movie and Scream 2 for some really good views. Scream 2 in particular because the blade marquee is actually turned on.
Any photos of the auditorium?
How many of the seats are in the Balcony, which is rarely if ever open?
Landmark owns the Nuart and the Rialto, among others, right? Why does the Nuart succeed and the Rialto does not? Location? The Nuart is a smaller theater, not as much upkeep? I don’t know.
>>Mundorff declined to disclose box office or concession counter revenues but said the Rialto was rarely more than half full.
Which means that if it was a 600 seat theater it would always be full, and if it was a 500 seat theatre it be often sold out.
To save the Rialto as a movie theater, a similar program to that of San Francisco’s historic www.castrotheatre.com would suffice. Even sharing the same excellent program would reduce costs, possibly for both venues.
And no, (straight) people… the Castro’s screenings are NOT all gay… but that classification of film kept the lights on there!
here’s the text of the LA Times article:
Dire projections for South Pasadena’s Rialto
The South Pasadena institution, eclipsed by multiplexes, will close soon, though a revival is possible.
By Roger Vincent
August 10, 2007
Map
The jazz-age Rialto Theater in South Pasadena, one of the few remaining single-screen cinemas in Southern California, will roll its last film Aug. 19. The operator, Landmark Theatres, has run out of patience with the money-losing movie palace built in the 1920s.
But plans are in the works for a major real estate project surrounding the theater on Fair Oaks Avenue, and the theater may come back to life as part of the new development. For the foreseeable future, however, it’s curtains for the Rialto.
“It’s too expensive to operate,” said Ted Mundorff of Landmark Theatres. “It can’t compete against the new modern theaters that people prefer.”
The stately, 1,200-seat theater that opened with the Universal release “What Happened to Jones?” in 1925 will close with “The Simpsons Movie.” It also hosted the cult favorite “Rocky Horror Picture Show” as a midnight feature for three decades.
“We love the theater. We love South Pasadena,” said Mundorff, chief operating officer of the Los Angeles-based Landmark theater chain. “The economics just don’t work.”
Mundorff declined to disclose box office or concession counter revenues but said the Rialto was rarely more than half full. Although Landmark installed a new sound system last year, it would cost at least $1 million more to properly restore the theater, Mundorff said.
The seats are in particular need of repair, but the carpets are also frayed, paint is chipped and the place sometimes has a musty odor. In short, the Rialto is the kind of weary aging moviehouse that many people remember fondly but few think to patronize on a night out.
“Very few old theaters can make it,” said Jim Rosenfield, owner of the single-screen Aero Theatre in Santa Monica, which dates to 1938. American Cinematheque operates the Aero primarily as a revival house.
“I get calls all the time from people who want to save their neighborhood theaters,” said Rosenfield, who restored the Aero in 2005. “Unless they have someone behind them who is a patron of the arts or an angel landlord,” the theaters usually can’t be saved, he said.
Modern multiplexes have several advantages for moviegoers over traditional single-screen venues, including more choices of movies, more screening times and stadium-style seating offering better sightlines. Like many other old theaters, the Rialto doesn’t have a parking lot.
Landmark controls the theater under a long-term lease. Eventually it will revert to a trust held by the Jebbia family, which has owned it since the 1930s, said trustee Philip Jebbia, who has an investment business in South Pasadena.
In the meantime, Landmark would need a white knight to help pay for restoration.
“If we can develop an economically viable plan to restore the theater, that would be our preference,” said Bill Banowsky, chief executive of Landmark. “If we are unable to do so we will make the space available for other uses that are compatible with the neighborhood.”
One potential suitor is Decoma Developers Inc. Decoma is working on a revitalization project intended to create a more pedestrian-friendly retail, residential and leisure district in the core of South Pasadena, including blocks around the Rialto.
“The theater is a treasure and we are all working on the possibility of keeping the Rialto a single-screen theater,” said Marinel Robinson, principal of Torrance-based Decoma. “One day the theater will be renovated. Everybody needs to be patient.”
If Decoma’s project is approved by the city, it would start work next summer and complete the development in three years, Robinson said. “We will work with whoever ends up controlling the theater.”
The Rialto was one of the great luxurious theaters of its day, built to feature both movies and live performances. It had 10 dressing rooms, a green room, an orchestra pit and a deep stage for vaudeville performances.
A backstage fire damaged the theater in 1938, about the time the vaudeville era ended. Another fire in 1969 burned the organ loft, though the large Wurlitzer that once was used to accompany silent films was saved and later sold.
Plans to raze the theater to make way for a parking lot in 1977 were successfully resisted by local residents and Landmark backed off a proposal to divide the theater into a multiplex in the 1990s.
It has been featured in many films and commercials, most notably Robert Altman’s “The Player” and more recently “Scream 2,” Landmark said.
“Its a very special theater for our town,” said nearby merchant Lucia Wiltrout. “It’s got lots of good memories.”
Duh….krammy…you brought it up. As for the Rialto, maybe they can turn it into an Arclight Theare, so krammy and his west-side pallys can have quiche popcorn with their movie.
As for a tunnel being hard to insure….terrorist attack? Unlikely but possible(thanks mr. bush) and earthquakes?? I suppose earthquakes can hinder construction and damage any unsecured construction equipment etc., but as Caltrans itself and 99% of all seismic scientists have stated repeatedly that in an earthquake, a tunnel is the safest place to be.
I’m sorry Mc, I can’t access the LA Times article, but thank you for catching my HUMONGOUS typo:
[The Rialto is owned by “a family trust who’s trustee has business interests in” the city of So Pas.]
Also to clarify:
[Plus Caltrans itself has stated that such a 710 tunnel could never be insured during construction because of “the vulnerability of such an ambitious structure to” terrorism and earthquakes “and the resultingly high cost of insuring against such mishaps, might still preclude the tunnel’s construction.]
I guess anyone who wants some last photos should head out there in the next week or so. I know I will. You never know what will happen with the building.
Glovedude, save your speech and condescending attitude for another forum. One where the topic is bikes, buses, and carpool lanes. ;-P
Back to the Rialto. Closing it is the best thing to happen because now they can finally figure out what to do with it.
Hmmm,
the LA Times says someone else owns the Rialto: View link
In Any case, I will go out an play the lottery tonight, so I can help!
There was a freeway proposed through Beverly Hills in the 60s, but the idea was put to rest rather quickly.
The Rialto is owned by the city of So Pas. It was leased to Landmark for 100 years. They apparently are exiting early.
Regarding the 710 frwy:
The sole purpose for the 710 “tunnel freeway” is to provide a goods movement route from the Ports of LA and Long Beach to shipping destinations in CA, AZ, NM, and NV. The ports have a plan to quadruple in size and jam all local freeways with their trucking of goods. They want “us CA’s” to pay for this tunnel freeway with our tax dollars so that they can boost profits without the cost outlay. Have you driven on the 710 south of the 5 frwy?. Imagine that traffic x4 now using the 210, 134, 60, 10, 5, 91, and 405. Trucks destroy/chew up freeways and we the taxpayers again will have to pay for the repairs (and slog through the years of repair construction). On top of that, Trucks bring a deadly form of pollution to the communities surrounding the freeways (both diesel and tire particulate). Plus Caltrans itself has stated that such a 710 tunnel could never be insured during construction because of terrorism and earthquakes.
I highly suggest we all support Supervisor Mike Antonovich’s concept of using short haul trains (“electric” I hope) to transports goods to a hub located outside LA to eliminate the need for a good deal of our current inner city truck traffic (plus planned Ports increase). We need to think long term into the future, or we will all be paying the price later with over-congestion on all freeways. Developers are treating So. California as though we aspire to be like Manhattan NY. Most Manhattans don’t own cars (they’ve given up). All this high density building and Ports expansion we are doing is only going to take us down that same path.
I’m meant Kohl’s, not Lowes
In any case…Freeways are no longer the answer. If we allow the freeway men their way, L.A. would be carved up into neighborhoods of less than 5 square blocks, think about that , Krammy my boy. And we still get stuck with traffic , air and a quality of life ten times worse.
Wouldnt be much point in saving historic theatres in a city like that, except to use them as high-density apartments, which is another great plan from the dame folks that brought you the freeways.Besides that, new freways never alleviate traffic, they only make it worse.Take for instance the cry-babies in Alhambra, crying and whing about how much traffic they get because the 710 was never completed. What a BUNCH of little bitches!!!! You why there is bad traffic in Alhambra??? Because all through the 60s, 70s and 80s, developers greased the palms of Alhambra councilmen and knocked down hundreds of single-family dwellings to build multi-story high density apartment houses. You know what Alhambra did recently?? They allowed the building of a Lowes and dozens of shops in a very large mall, directly on some of the worst congested streets in that city.You want a freeway, krammy, lets build one through Beverly Hills, or better yet, where do YOU live????
I meant to write…“The whole town of South Pasadena is historic”.
The whole is historic, Krammy my boy. I read somewhere that is historic Paris neighborhood, one that is several hunder years old but with a population of mostly working class and middle calss folks, like South Pas, stopped a freeway that would have destroyed the town. AS for the 710 extension, its a trucker freeway, so by its very nature will have to built wide. Stilts are fine, but dangerously unstable in any earthquake over 6.0. A tunnel…a real tunnel, not a cut and fill trench, something dug out by a TBM, would be okay. In Europe, there are dozens of tunnels through the Alps, some of them 30 miles long. The 710 connection would be only 6.1 miles. The only problem, Europeans are highly advanced technology and science-wise, here in America, its rich men who control our resources and have stifled scientific development.
The reason why it wasn’t economical to run the Rialto is because a lot of people don’t want to go to a theater that looks like it’s falling part and not being maintained. New seats, a proper wide screen, and a good sound system would go a long way.
I thought one of the plans would go around all those historic homes. Like more to the west. Oh well, something has to be built eventually. On stilts, a tunnel, etc. Doesn’t have to be super wide.
Well folks…its the END….FIN, for the Rialto. It is set to close down as of August 20th. The end of an era. Here is a snippet from the Pasadena Star-News,and quoting Bill Banowsky, CEO of Landmark Theatres, “Like so many aging single-screen theaters, the Rialto has become uneconomical to operate as a movie theater. If we can develop an economically viable plan to restore the theater, that is our preference.” One thing though, they will not tear down of in any way demolish the theater…..for now. What can we do?
Building the connection through South Pas would destroy over 1000 homes, many of them, about 500, historic. The thing about the Pasadena-South Pasadena-San marino area, is that we have more historic homes than in all the rest of Los Angeles County PUT TOGETHER!!
South Pas has TWICE more Craftsman style homes than Hollywood, Santa Monica, Venice, West Los Angeles, Fullerton, Echo Park, Silverlake and Glendale, COMBINED!!!
(Hey, I better shut up…we’ll have the goddamed yuppies moving here next!!)
It would also be the first time history that a regular community, the “little guy” mangaged to beat the freeway bullies. Come on Ken….you ever wonder why there are no freeways through Beverly Hills????
Besides, when you come to South Pas, this is the birthplace of “Mission” and “Arts & Crafts” in California.
I can’t figure out why the 110 never connected to the 210. What a pain to hit all the red lights on Arroyo Parkway before you get to the 210.