Northgate 1 & 2

Northgate Shopping Center was announced in 1959. Nesmith and Lane were the architects of the Center which launched on May 1, 1960 and called Northgate Mall. Expansion in 1965 led to Interstate getting a prime spot for a new theater also architected by Nesmith and Lane. It also brought the Northgate Popular Department Store. Ground was broken on February 23, 1966. The $325,000 suburban theatre opened June 24, 1966 with “Doctor Zhivago”. It was on an outparcel strip making parking easy with 500 spots. It was just across the way from the Northgate - later turned NorthPark Mall.

Interstate became part of ABC Interstate and then, simply, ABC Theatres causing some slight tweaks to the theater’s official name. It was twinned in 1978 and became the Plitt Northgate Twin 1 & 2 in September of 1979 when Plitt took over ABC Theatres. In 1983, it became the Commonwealth Northgate Twin when Commonwealth Amusements . UA took on Commonwealth officially becoming the UA Northgate 2 in 1989. Boomerangs opened across the lot in the NorthPark Mall beginning as a four-plex and extending to six screens.

UA began to shed older twins and quadplexes in its portfolio in favor of 6- and 8-screen multiplexes. It had threatened to close the Northgate in 1990 at the end of a 25-year lease. A new four-screen theater, the Northeast (later NorthPark 4) opened inside the NorthPark Mall in 1990 in anticipation of the closure. However, an additional leasing period of ten years was arranged likely at exceedingly favorable terms to UA and its Northgate. A slight oddity was that - though having two theaters in a mall area was common - it was rather unusual for both to be discount houses. But citing few customers, UA closed the Northgate as a $1 discount, subrun house on September 24, 1994 with “Wagons East” and “Speed.”

But Take One Cinemas took on the lease and it was the interior Boomerangs theatre that closed in 1996. A rumored 10-screen replacement to the Boomerangs fun center and cinema was advertised but never was completed. Take One eventually closed this location on February 28, 1999 (technically as the Take One Cinema - though nobody likely new that since the Northgate signage remained until closure. It did so maintaining discount status and running summer “camps” for kids. The retail strip was later demolished followed by the entire NorthPark Mall in 2011 after being purchased by the City of El Paso.

2 screens on June 2nd, 1978. Ad in photo section.

There was also another Northgate Theatre in Durham, North Carolina as well that is also listed on the Cinema Treasures site,but it is listed as the Northgate Twin Theatres. That theater opened on Christmas Day 1962 with Doris Day and Stephen Boyd in “Jumbo” that had a seating capacity of 750. It was twinned on June 17, 1975 and closed in 1986. I do have the opening ads for the Northgate Theatre’s grand opening in Durham from Christmas Day 1962. Contact me at

Hey simbared “contrary” to what I suspect maybe even you can click on this link Northgate Theatre Photo and see why our description says “possibly” the end of a strip mall.

Doesn’t anyone read the older comment postings??? I cited the correct 1966 opening date in my post of March 31, 2009.

Contrary to the description above, the Northgate Theatre was/is a free-standing building, not part of a strip mall. The building included a few small retail spaces to the left of the theatre entrance. The theatre was built near the Southwest corner of Northgate Shopping Center, a large and popular mall in the 1960’s. Patrons parked in the shopping center parking lot. It was the only walk-in theatre in Northeast El Paso for decades, and offered first-run movies as well as 50-cent Saturday matinees for kids. Sonny and Cher actually made an appearance there when their movie “Good Times” made its El Paso debut in 1967. It was originally a single-screen theatre, and later divied into two screens.

I need to correct a detail I mentioned a few posts ago.

The Northgate was not the first theater in Texas to get Dolby Stereo as originally claimed. That distinction, I believe, belongs to the Medallion in Dallas. Nor was Northgate the first in El Paso to get Dolby. That distinction belongs to a place called American Star (which I don’t think has a page here on Cinema Treasures).

Northgate did eventually install Dolby (a CP50) in autumn 1977 for their engagement of “Close Encounters Of The Third Kind.”

What’s your point, raysson? Do a “Northgate” search here and you’ll find eleven theaters with that name. Do the same search on CinemaTour.com and you’ll get a hit of over twenty.

I vaguely remember that place. I grew up in El Paso, and every time we went to the movies, it was either a drive-in or on Fort Bliss post. Cheap movies that way. My father had a friend that was the ticket taker, and well you can guess we never paid to get in.

The photo in the link from the post above illustrates the Northgate was a theatRE, not a theatER.

I hate to nit-pick over that detail, but the Cinema Treasures posting guidelines encourage members to make the distinction.