Photo Essay: The Last Movie Theatre of Beverly Hills (Updated for 2020)

[Last updated 10/27/20 9:29 PM PT]

After nearly six years, it's getting to the point where hardly anything seems impossible in LA.

As long as a building is still standing, I'll probably eventually get into it.

Case in point: the lovely little jewel box of a single-screen cinema, the Fine Arts Theatre.



With its stepped tower and neon-lit marquee,* here's a moviegoing throwback that somehow managed to dodge the seemingly inevitable fate of getting split up into a multiplex.



Yet, for the first five years of my time living in Beverly Hills, it was closed to the public.



Before that, it was used only occasionally for private events.



Built in 1936 by famed theatre architect B. Marcus Priteca (of Warner Bros. Theatre and Warner Grand fame), the Fine Arts Theatre opened in 1937 as the Regina (also called the Wilshire Regina and the Regina Fine Arts Theatre).



Many of its original, historic elements still exist, like the reeded curved walls that serve as entrances into the voluminous auditorium (which was downsized from ~800 to ~400)...



...metal seats (now outfitted with cupholders)...



...plaster ornamentation...



...and quilted wall coverings.



The ceiling light fixtures, however, date back to a prior remodel, circa 1993 (when it was known as the "Cecchi Gori" Fine Arts Theatre, operated by AMC).



Last year, it was rebranded yet again. Now operated by the local, family-run Laemmle chain (in business since 1938, founded by cousins of Universal Pictures founder Carl Laemmle), it's now known as the Ahrya Fine Arts Theatre. [Ed: As of 11/1/19, Laemmle has pulled out of the Fine Arts and the theatre name has dropped "Ahrya."]



Laemmle actually already had history with the theater, having operated it from 1985 to 1993 as a foreign film arthouse cinema. (According to the 2014 Beverly Hills Cultural Commission Report, it was operated before that by Fox West Coast, National General, and Mann.)



The window that looked into the auditorium from the "crying room" was boarded up in 1993. The retail storefronts on either side of the entrance have been taken over by a theater-run concessions stand and an expanded ladies' room.
 

circa 2020

The double-faced blade sign from 1948 that read "Fine Arts" in vertically-oriented neon letters is gone—but as of October 2020, a new blade sign was installed and the *marquee was converted into LED.

circa 2020

Otherwise, it's still mostly intact—as the last neighborhood theater of its kind in the City of Beverly Hills.

circa 2020

Elsewhere, the 1925 Beverly Theatre and the 1931 Warner Brothers Theatre (also by B. Marcus Priteca) went the way of the bulldozer.

The Laemmle-run Music Hall opened as a single-screen movie house in 1938 as The Elite Theatre, but it was triplexed in 1995.

The Saban Theatre (formerly the Fox Wilshire) was built in 1930, but it's really more of an Art Deco movie palace—like those in Downtown LA's Broadway Historic District—than a neighborhood cinema. And its programming now is primarily live concerts.

As the last one standing, the Fine Arts Theatre alone tells us what it was like for Beverly Hills moviegoers in the 1930s and '40s, when Art Deco ruled—and what it's like now for locals who've got no other options in the neighborhood.

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Photo Essay: Warner Grand, San Pedro, Behind Closed Doors
Looking Up from the Streets of Downtown LA

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Photo Essay: Warner Grand, San Pedro, Open to the Public (Updated for 2024—Temporarily Closed for Renovation)

[Last updated 1/2/24 1:05 PM PT—On January 1, 2024, the Warner Grand closed for renovations. Construction is estimated to complete in late 2025.]

Despite being sick in bed, today I managed to rally enough to get myself down to San Pedro for its 125th Birthday celebration, with the promise of being able to tour the historic Warner Grand theater on 6th St, in its historic downtown waterfront.

Starting in 1906, San Pedro's downtown used to be full of theaters. The rest of them are gone. Built during the era of the Picture Palace, in 1930 under the guidance of architect B. Marcus Priteca (also known for LA's City Hall and the Pantages Theater), the Warner Grand was the first theater in the South Bay equipped with sound, and it's the only one built by the Warner Brothers (others in Beverly Hills and Huntington Park) that remains intact. 

Unlike its neighbors, the Warners had no interest in putting on stage shows, and during their ownership, focused only on the exhibition of motion pictures.

Photo Essay: The Last of Pantages' Vaudeville Palaces

I have some vague memory of my parents taking me to a circus when I was a little kid. I remember the smell of popcorn, and the discomfort of sitting on bleachers.

But then again, I'm not 100% sure that actually happened. I might've dreamt it. Or I might've seen it in a movie or on TV and accepted it as a document of my past.

In my adult years, I've refused to go to the circus because it doesn't seem like a good place for animals to be working. (Though, I'll admit that witnessing the "Elephant Walk" in Manhattan's Murray Hill neighborhood was terribly exciting, back in the day.)



But then I found out about Circus 1903, which uses life-sized puppet elephants. If nothing else, it was a great excuse to go back to the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood.



I'd been to the Pantages once before—nearly three years ago, to indulge myself in a production of Ghost: The Musical. It sort of satisfied my yen for Patrick Swayze, which is maybe why I didn't bother to take any photos back then.



Or maybe I'd just been spoiled by all the behind-the-scenes tours I'd been taking of historic theaters around LA; and maybe I'd just thought that if I couldn't get into any off-limits spaces, it wouldn't be worth writing up.



I've since come to my senses.



After all, the Hollywood Pantages is an explosion of Art Deco...



...from the forecourt to the outer lobby, and from the metal-leafed statues in the Grand Lobby...



...to all of the ornate ceilings upstairs in the mezzanine lobby...



...and the etched glass of the lounges.



It's almost too many ziggurats and stardusts and chevrons in the public area, making it practically a caricature of an Art Deco movie palace.



But it's only almost too much. Because I can't imagine what ornamentation could ever be sacrificed.



Certainly not the Malibu Tile fountains at either end of the inner lobby.



And definitely not the ceiling murals, nor the (replica) Art Deco lighting fixtures.



The auditorium is grandiose, too, with an intricate ceiling that's backlit in blue and organ grilles that never even housed an organ.



In fact, it's almost disappointing when the house lights are brought down and you can no longer crane your neck to look up at the kaleidoscope above.

This Pantages, which opened in 1930—the last of several built, though probably the grandest of them all—is now used primarily as a "legit" theatre of stage productions (Broadway touring company shows and the like) and doesn't show any movies anymore.

But it's interesting to compare it to the other works of its architect, B. Marcus Priteca, and relish in the fact that it's still intact, in all its glory.

You don't even have to wait for a periodic tour of it because tickets are available for its shows all of the time!

But get there early to take full advantage of all the staircases and hallways for wandering and ghosts for hunting—even if you don't get backstage.

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Photo Essay: Warner Grand, San Pedro, Open to the Public
Photo Essay: The Last Movie Theatre of Beverly Hills 
Elephant Walk