International Music House
16 Sixth Street E,
Cincinnati,
OH
45202
16 Sixth Street E,
Cincinnati,
OH
45202
4 people
favorited this theater
Showing 20 comments
Just for the record, in case anyone’s confused: This theater closed with the original 1976 “Sparkle” starring Irene Cara and Philip Michael Thomas (later to become bigger stars via “Fame” and “Miami Vice,” respectively). Jordin Sparks, who starred in the 2012 remake alluded to above, wasn’t even born yet. :)
The RKO International-70 Theater closed at a whopping seat count of 3,037 on April 27, 1976 with the film, “Sparkle.” The RKO International signage was removed in a $1 million makeover in 1978. It reopened as a live venue with an October 23, 1978 concert with Count Basie and Ella Fitzgerald. The last show at the Palace Theater was the Cincinnati Ballet Company’s “Jubilee” on March 7, 1982 after efforts to save the theatre fell short. It was demolished that December in favor of the new Cincinnati Center Building.
I remember going to this theatre when it was the International 70 movie theatre and seeing “Hello, Dolly!” and “The Shoes of the Fisherman” and being overwhelmed by the enormous size of the movie screen. When this theatre was torn down (along with most of the other theatres in Cincinnati), I felt a tremendous amount of sadness.
Ads for the Cinerama films that played at the theatre:
http://incinerama.com/rko.htm
Some of those chandeliers found their way to the lobby of the Chicago Th. in Chicago,Ill. So their beauty helps decorate another stunning theatre which was also designed by Chicago’s prominent architectural firm of Rapp&Rapp. Daily tours can be had of the Chicago Th. which is now managed by the firm which runs Radio City Music Hall in NYC. Still a real loss our Palace Theater
When the Palace was restored in 1982 as a new home for the Cincinnati Ballet, a massive chandelier was installed from the Hippodrome Theatre in Cleveland. It still stuns me that this completely restored theatre was then demolished for a generic office tower.
International 70 reopening ad from May 29th, 1964
December 6th, 1919 grand opening ad
I purchased and removed the above mentioned WurliTzer organ from this Palace Theater, along with several others of note, and took it to Louisville, KY. If anyone would like to hear more about it, feel free to e.mail me at
Naming the Theater the Palace was a tip of the hat to The Palace Hotel from the 1880’s which still exists today, but is renamed the Cincinnatian Hotel, a most posh place to stay as evidenced by the many national personalaties who stay there.
The Palace Th. Cincinnati,Ohio held the world premiere of the 1943 re-make of ,“Phantom Of The Opera”,starring Claude Rains, the original ,“Phantom”,was a silent starring Lon Chaney from 1925. Why our Palace was chosen for the opening is anybodys guess.
It’s too bad the library put their logo on top of the marquee, though.
Great photo, tinyurl. Never saw that one before. Looks like the mid-30s by the cars on the street.
Here is a 1930 photo:
http://tinyurl.com/qp8rp
I have one fairly decent photo of the Palace. Email me at and I will attach it to a reply.
Chuck: Thanks for the beautiful b/w photo of this former theatre.
The RKO Palace Theatre was an early design from the architectural firm of Rapp & Rapp.
On 24th October 1978 it re-opened as a concert and roadshow house with a newly decorated interior, additional lobby space with new bars, new lighting and sound equipment installed. Sadly this didn’t last too long, as it states in the opening description here that it was torn down in 1982 (or was it 1992 according to the first posting above?)
This was quite a theatre! In the 60’s and 70’s, it booked mostly what was known as reserve seat/Roadshow films. “The Sound Of Music” probably played there for a year. It was the Cinerama theatre after The Capitol closed and it’s where I saw “2001: a space odyssey”. Other first run films that played there exclusively included: “Far From the Madding Crowd”, “Carnal Knowledge”, “Hello Dolly” and I believe “The Godfather”. Located across Fountain Square from the RKO Albee and just down the street from The Grand and the Times Towne Cinema and around the block from the Studio Cinemas and The Shubert. I left Cincinnati for Los Angeles in 1975 and am glad that I didn’t have to witness all these wonderful theatre’s fall from greatness.
I remember going to the RKO 70 when I was a kid. For a young lad under 5'-0" tall, these places become more larger than life than they actually were!
In high school the theater had become a 2nd run movie house – we went to see EARTHQUAKE in Sensoround – oh, the poor theater. Pieces of paint would fall from the ceiling every time they turned the big sub woofers on.
When they changed the venue and renamed it the Palace, they started booking one dumb road show after another – you can only see Dawn Wells in productions of Chapter Two so many times! That was the beginning of the end. Too bad – it was the last of the downtown Cincy theaters – of course the Emory is chugging along. A homely theater by comparison.
The Palace (aka RKO International 70) was demolished about a decade ago. Located on the lower floors of an office building, I remember a Cincinnati Enquirer article of a dentist refusing to vacate his space in a vain effort to delay demolition of the theatre.