UA Cine I & II
Yale Boulevard and Central Expressway,
Dallas,
TX
75206
Yale Boulevard and Central Expressway,
Dallas,
TX
75206
9 people
favorited this theater
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Here’s a new 4-page 50th anniversary FIDDLER ON THE ROOF retrospective featuring a roadshow playdate chronology and historian Q&A. This cinema’s run is mentioned in the piece.
Fiddler on the roof promo https://youtu.be/LgnJChP-5yM
I visited Dallas a lot when I was younger and I LOVED visiting the Cine. I saw “Leaving Las Vegas,” “The Sweet Hereafter,” “Tumbleweeds,” “Cold Comfort Farm” and others there. I really miss how BIG this theatre felt.
This was the place to see art house films when I was coming up in Dallas. I think the last film I saw here was Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas with Johnny Depp and Benicio Del Toro.
Matt54 above is correct…the theater was never in a shopping mall. When I saw that pic at the top of the page of the theater lobby, it really jogged my memory of being there in the 1970’s…wow, long time ago.
As I recall, I saw the Bond flick ‘Live and Let Die’ at the UA-Cine in the summer of 1973 with my then girlfriend. I do remember it was a nice theater.
Two Assistant Managers I worked with at the UA Prestonwood later went on to be GMs here. Michael Graham in 1985 and Steve Wilcox a few years later. An employee from here, Bob Pinson, later worked with me as a junior Assistant Manager at the UA Northstar 8 in Garland. He was a real goofball. I have one question about the Cine. Who was the genius that decided to build a open toilet in the projection booth? The booth was multilevel. And if you walked out of the office and looked down the booth and someone was on the toilet. You just saw the toilet goer’s head sticking up above the floor. A female Assistant and myself came over after closing one night to watch a screening and were shown upstairs. And were walking by the projector for the number 2 house (the small one). And I see Mike Graham’s head sticking up and he yells out “Stop!” The night got worse after that. The movie we screened was “The Golden Child”. Horrible.
Earnie Hackney was the first general manager and his wife Betty was in the box office his kids worked as ushers and the candy girls were his daughter and my sisters Kathy and Karen Sutton . I saw every show played at the Cine and was hired when I turned 16 and worked many years since off and on but total 25 years with United Artist and Regal theaters . Met my husband and many good friends working at the Cine . Saw a few movie stars and football teams . They had many film premiers with champagne and open concessions with movie stars and film big shots of the day .. Many good memories of great classic films,movie stars , and the people that made it all possible to watch the Big Screen ! Love with fondness this particular theater and many were sad to see it demolished . What a shame for the once first biggest curved screen movie house in Dallas . – Linda S.
December 20th, 1972 grand opening ad as Cine I & II in photo section.
I would love to see a movie on a curved screen just like this one!
Conceived in 1967 to be built on a tract of land previously used by the Dallas Cowboys and just across the highway from Southern Methodist University (SMU) was the UA Ciné 150. It was designed as a hard ticket roadshow theater and would be United Artists’ first Southwest theater to use UA in the building’s name. The floor to ceiling screen was 34’ by 85’ designed to play D-150 films such as “The Bible.” Planned for 1,000 seats, wider aisles would drop the final seat count to 840 rocking style chairs. Raquel Welch helped break ground for the theater on July 27, 1967. As noted in other comments, the design was virtually identical to UA 150 theaters by George Raad and Associates in Oak Brook, IL and Santa Clara, CA and markedly dissimilar from the curved-building UA 150 screens in Little Rock, AR or Colorado Springs, CO.
“Far From the Madding Crowd” was the announced opening film for Christmas of 1967. But weather delayed completion and Christmas and January/February and March opening dates came and went with April 30, 1968 being a private opening and May 2d being the official public opening. A ribbon made of 70mm film was cut to open the theater with Dallas' mayor in attendance. The UA Ciné 150 with the delayed “Madding Crowd” sold out its first night.
The roadshow of “Funny Girl” filled the theater again not long after with Columbia Pictures President Leo Jaffe and Director William Wyler in attendance. The film ran 17 weeks before moving to the Granada to continue the roadshow run. “Lion in the Winter” and “Hello, Dolly” completed the roadshow schedule in 1969 with quasi-roadshow return of “South Pacific” between. In 1970, the Ciné had the roadshow of “Tora! Tora! Tora!” and in 1971, “Fiddler on the Roof.” But the roadshow era was closing and no D-150 films graced the Ciné. So with competition from Interstate’s Medallion and Wilshire just to the north and south and General Cinema’s NorthPark I & II to the north, the Ciné’s initial business concept no longer made sense. So the theater was closed in September of 1972 for the purpose of twinning and reconfiguring the screens. The reopened Ciné 1 & 2 held 500 and 300 patrons and had “Sounder” and a roadshow of “Man of LaMancha.”
As downtown Dallas’ theatre row decayed the success of the Central Zone theatres led to further expansion in the territory General Cinemas' NorthPark III&IV, Plitt’s Caruth Plaza and more importantly the AMC Glen Lakes. The competition was brutal and Interstate Theatre Circuit sold the Medallion to United Artists in 1986. Not long after UA converted the Medallion into three auditoriums, the Ciné became part-arthouse and hosted the USA Film Festival. When United Artists opened its high tech UA Plaza in May of 1989, the Medallion became a second run bargain theatre and the UA Ciné became a full-time arthouse which it remained until closing Nov. 2, 2000.
The Ciné had great runs with movies including, “Sex, Lies and Videotape” and “Pulp Fiction.” It closed with “Dancer in the Dark” and “I’m the One That I Want.” SMU bought the building using it for storage before demolishing it in 2008 for additional parking for its east campus. Arthouse theater goers' void was not long as the Angelika Film Center opened in 2001 walking distance from the former Ciné.
Saw a lot of movies, here, including Ghostbusters. When The Piano played here, they had a grand piano in the lobby.
By it’s last months, the place had become run down. The Angelika was about to open about a block from it, the art house with the cafe, 7 screens, and Trinity Hall attached to it in Mockingbird Station, so the Cine was allowed to die.
Some photos I took of the Cine I & II back in both 2005 & 2007.. Today, nothing remains of this Theatre.. Enjoy.. Randy A Carlisle – Historical Photographer
Description is all wrong – the UA Cine 150 (name reverting to UA Cine when twinned in the early 1970’s) was NEVER in a shopping mall – it was free-standing until the day it was demolished. The “150” in its original name designated its capability of projecting Dimension 150 prints – only two pictures were ever photographed in this process, which was simply Todd A-O with a new name and a better lens, and these were “The Bible” (1966) and “Patton” (1970). Ironically, both opened their exclusives downtown at the Tower! Oh, well…
Maybe!
Wonder if “NORTH DALLAS FORTY” played there.
<<< On a Friday evening, in the spring of 1975, Steven Spielberg and the executives from Universal choose the UA Cine 150 to have the first sneak preview of JAWS for an audience. >>>
This sneak-preview “test” screening took place on Wednesday, March 26, 1975 and was at the Medallion, not this theater.
<<< The following evening, Universal took the picture for a second sneak to the Lakewood Center Theatre in Lakewood , CA. >>>
The Lakewood screening was on March 28, two nights later.
Theatre demolished, building footprint has been paved and striped for parking. Entire property is now a remote parking lot for SMU.
I also have the grand opening ad from May 1st, 1968 as UA Ciné 150 at View link . They claimed that this was the first 8-channel stereophonic theatre in the world. This theatre was at 5540 Yale accord to the ad.
Pictures of the lobby of this theatre is at http://cinerama.topcities.com/150dallas.htm
The aka UA Cine 150 needs to be added. Like the two UA Cinema 150 houses (I don’t know why UA gave the Dallas location a variant name) in Oak Brook, Illinois, and Santa Clara, California, this theater was designed by San Francisco architect George Raad of George Raad & Associates.
On a Friday evening, in the spring of 1975, Steven Spielberg and the executives from Universal choose the UA Cine 150 to have the first sneak preview of JAWS for an audience. Spielberg was in attendance. The word got out in Dallas before the picture screened and there was pandemonium at the theatre with people trying to be admitted. There were so many people, Universal had to have a second screening later on that same evening. Something that’s rarely done. Needless to say, the audience loved the picture which went on to be a gigantic success. The following evening, Universal took the picture for a second sneak to the Lakewood Center Theatre in Lakewood , CA.
Saw ‘Tora Tora Tora’ there when it was a single screen. In late 1974 saw a revival of ‘2001’, remember being disappointed in comparison to the screening it had at the Capri in 68. Also, first time I saw ‘2001’ where there were a lot of ‘heads’ down front who lit up at a certain point.
In the last couple of years of operation it seemed rather desolate. I think it was torn down a couple of years ago.
This theater opened as the United Artists Cine 150 and was indeed intended to play the Dimension 150 process wide-screen features. It was a single screen with a very high end sound system. Later it was split into 2 theaters. It was a free standing theater located very near the tony suburb of Highland Park.
OK, reserved-seat then.