Fox Theater, a 1931 Art Deco movie theater, now hosts the Spokane Symphony. Its located in Spokane, Washington as well as our pest management local Spokane company. Robert C. Reamer, who designed Yellowstone’s Old Faithful Inn, designed it. William Fox started the Fox Film Corporation. The cinema opened on September 3, 1931, and closed after Russell Crowe’s Gladiator on September 21, 2000.

History

Construction Planning

Fox Film Corporation was believed to build a “million-dollar cinema palace” in Spokane in 1927. The Spokesman-Review released early drawings of the Mediterranean Revival theater. After the 1929 stock market crash, Fox Film Corporation reorganized as Fox West Coast Studios, delaying the project. Early 1930 construction employed 200. Robert Reamer, who designed the Old Faithful Inn in Yellowstone National Park, designed the Art Deco architecture. Whitehouse & Price and Anthony Heinsbergen designed the theater’s interior. Heinsbergen’s decorations and appointments fused Art Deco and Art Nouveau. Spokane Fox cinemas’ motif is a Hollywood rendition of art deco, a late 1800s combination of modernism and art nouveau. 

 

The building has air conditioning and cost $1,000,000 (about $17,800,000 in 2021).

First decades

On September 3, 1931, the 2,350-seat Fox Theater opened. El Brendel, Anita Page, Mitzi Green, George O’Brien, and Victor McLaglen attended. 20,000 people jammed the streets outside the theater to watch free outdoor entertainment and see celebrities as they left the Davenport Hotel. The public was astonished by the building’s modern art deco facade, which contrasted with Spokesman-Review illustrations. Newspapers praised the interior decor. Wilbur Hindley of the Spokesman-Review said the design was “so odd, strange, and futuristic that the casual observer catches his breath in astonishment and wonder.” The inside decor includes hand-painted murals of undersea flora and etched glass light panels.

 

Fanchon and Marco’s About Town followed by Merely Mary Ann at the Fox. Laurel and Hardy and the Fox Theater Orchestra also performed. This mix of traditional vaudeville-style live entertainment and fashionable Hollywood talkies represented the public’s developing interests. The Great Depression made movies a cheap escape. Spokane’s first 30 years were dominated by The Fox.

Cinema Complex & Reduction

In May 1961, the Fox Theater sold its theatre organ to a Los Angeles-area collector, who disassembled and hauled it to California. On 14 November 1975, the Fox Theater’s main screen was divided into three screens. In 1989, second-run movies cost $1 (equal to $2 in 2021). Regal Cinemas sold the Fox when it built a 12-screen megaplex at NorthTown Mall. On 21 September 2000, Regal Cinemas and the Spokane Symphony exchanged a symbolic $1.3 million cheque for the theater’s keys before the final movie, Gladiator.

 

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