Bricktown Square Cinema
6420 W. Fullerton Avenue,
Chicago,
IL
60707
6420 W. Fullerton Avenue,
Chicago,
IL
60707
5 people
favorited this theater
Showing 1 - 25 of 33 comments
I, too, lived and grew up in the neighborhood, at the corner of Grand and Narragansett. As others have said, that other website is wrong. Sportmart, Babies R Us, and Toys R Us, all opened in 1987. If I remember correctly, the location of the theater in 1987 was an empty lot and was late to build, finally opening in 1989. At the time, The Brickyard was desperate for a theater. The only first run theater near us was Norridge. I saw Back to the Future 2 here, Christmas of 1989, and a bunch of friends and I saw a midnight showing of one of the then new Faces of Death movies here in the 1990s.
I got in a fight with some gang bangers the year it opened in 89. It was already a terrible neighborhood by then, but is much nicer now.
May 14th, 1989 grand opening ad in photo section.
I grew up in the area and went to this theater many times. The Bricktown Square was solely in the gym space. Sportmart and the theater were built and were opened at the same time. Cinematour is wrong. I would really like to see pictures of the Bricktown before it closed too, but I haven’t been able to find anything online. I remember seeing Back to the Future 3 here opening weekend. It played on 4 of the 6 screens! This was a great theater, but the area surrounding it did it in as well as it being sold to short lived Meridian Theaters. I am still surprised Loews didn’t acquire this theater when they bought out Cineplex Odeon-
Also, the address of the Sports Authority is the same as that for the theater – 6420 W. Fullerton.
They’re right next to each other. I would guess the cinemas were in the gym, looks about right for a six-plex, but they could have extended into the Sport space too.
I don’t know, PF; you can move around in the Google street level photo above and move in close into the shopping center and you can see that the building pictured on the Cinema Tour page is still there, now branded Sports Authority. I think the gym may be a new build, at least by its pictures on other websites. I will be up in that area in about a month and I will look around.
CSWalczak,
I was hoping to find photos of it as a cinema. I don’t think Cinema Tour is correct. A gym went in there, not a Sportmart. Although that arch on the Sportmart makes it look like a 1990s Loews design.
I remember that theater…Is it gone?
There are pictures of the former theater after it became a Sportmart on its entry page at CinemaTour. The design was used for a number of other theaters around the Midwest especially.
Does anybody have any photos of this place?
I do remember seeing a few movies there in 1991 and 1992 “Strictly Business”, “JFK”, “Mo' Money” and “A Few Good Men”. The theatre was nice and clean during that time years before it fell apart.
Talk about a short lifespan! Besides the mall failing around, I gather this place had some serious managerial issues towards the end.
This theater turned into trash. I lived a short walk away, and have fond memories of the whole area, from the mall to Funcoland to Petland. But the gangs ruined it, just like they ruined the whole of Grant west into EP
Ridge Plaza was in Arlington Heights.
Ridge Plaza? Did you mean The Commons of Chicago Ridge? The theatre as located in a shopping center across from the Chicago Ridge Mall. It was only 4 screens, but was kept up very well and a great place to see a movie. I miss the 80’s style cinemas. I work out at the XSport that has taken its place. The 6 screen theatre in the mall is still in operation.
And the Ridge Plaza, too. All three are XSport Fitness locations. Interesting.
I echo Paul’s sentiments. Amazing how quickly this theater deteriorated. I remember seeing Back to the Future 3 there as a kid when it was brand new. 7 or 8 short years later, I remember seeing Scream 2 there and worrying about getting beat up in the front.
I was just in the neighborhood the other week and to answer an earlier posting, looks like they left the front of the theater intact and they just gutted it from the inside. It is now a 24 hour extreme fitness center. Almost exactly what they did with the old Golf Mill theater-
If i recall their is now a Sportmart or some kind of sporting goods store on this spot.
Thanks for that.
Life’s Too Short:
In reading several histories of the Brickyard Mall, many in the neighborhood did not want it in the first place. Initially the mall did a renumerative business however as the years went on it began to be more of a hangout. As I said above, the mall lost its three anchors (Wards, Penneys, and Kmart) within a matter of months of one another.
The “Lifestyle Center” of big box stores that replaced the mall appears to be doing well. The “Lifestyle Centers” tend not to be hangouts because people go there to shop and then leave.
The Bricktown wasn’t really located in the Brickyard. It was located in a shopping center—a strip mall—located adajacent to the mall.
The Bricktown wasn’t exactly
It seems to me that the Brickyard Mall has never been any good to anyone. I guess I am a little surprised that it did not totally close up like other failing malls with crime problems (EX: Dixie Square in Harvey).
Cinemark Fan,
As I recall, the theatre was a single story one. There were about 2 or 3 free-standing pay booths as you entered. The auditoriums I beleive, were to the right on the south side of the building. I believe that the gym occupies the same structure tho I’m not 100% sure of this.
You seem to have the same affinity for these 1980s ‘plexes that I do. When you did your papers for school, did you include Cineplex-Odeon and its rapid downfall? I read a link to an article when C-O first entered the Chicagoland Area and the great optimisim the company had. I often wonder what went wrong. Of the 17 or so cinemas opened by C-O between 1987-1989, most have closed and some have even been demolished.
One more note on the Bricktown. By 1993 the theatre had already become rundown and scuzzy.
To Paul: I wish there were pictures I could see of this place. Can you describe this place to me? Was it a two level building like Burnham and Lincoln Village 1-6?
To some extent, the Bricktown was intended to be the replacement for the Will Rogers and the Mercury (and to a lesser extent the Montclare, but that theatre was never owned by C-O/Plitt). As other people have said, the Bricktown was nice when it opened up, but quickly fell into decline. It lasted only 11 years.
I must admit that I have a peculiar interest in these 1980s multiplexes opened by Cineplex-Odeon. They were once considered modern, but quickly became obsolete and now only a few remain.