Milwaukee’s Movie Theaters

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A century ago, going to the movies was one of the country’s most economical entertainment options, and millions went to see them at a theater once or twice a week. In the golden age of Hollywood, elaborate temples of amusement projected huge images of screen idols like Jean Harlow, Clark Gable, James Cagney, and Bette Davis. During the Great Depression and World War II, attending a movie was an escape from employment worries or paying this month’s rent. During the Depression there were 80 single-screen theaters in neighborhoods to the south of Capitol Drive, north of Oklahoma Avenue, east of 35th Street and west of Prospect Avenue.

Downtown, huge upright signs and brightly lit marquees of the Wisconsin, Palace, Strand, Warner, and Riverside created a great white way from Sixth Street east to the river.  Between Wisconsin Avenue and Wells Street, the Miller, White House, and Princess theaters offered second-run movies at reduced admission prices. The Wisconsin Avenue theaters were passports into a world of plush draperies, magnificent chandeliers, and exotic architectural motifs, all delivered with impeccable customer service. Sometimes the film was less compelling than the atmosphere in which it was shown.

The history of motion pictures in Milwaukee began on June 26, 1896, when Thomas Edison's Vitascope pictures played at the Academy of Music. Grainy, flickering scenes of New York City traffic, a boxing match, and the famous kiss with actors John Rice and Mae Irwin thrilled audiences who paid 30-cents to experience this technological marvel. Within two years, the Schlitz brewing company’s Alhambra theater was showing “authentic” films of the Spanish-American War, although they were later exposed as having been made at a movie studio in New Jersey.

By 1900, pictures were shown regularly at the Chutes water park on the Milwaukee River; the Coney Island amusement park in Shorewood; and White City, a fairground at 48th and Vliet Street. In 1902, Max Goldstein, a real estate agent, opened the city's first permanent motion picture theater Downtown at Second and Wisconsin. It was a sparsely furnished, airless room with wooden benches and a white sheet for a screen. Admission was a nickel for 30 minutes of silent films, piano music and illustrated slides. The programs were popular with non-English speaking immigrants who enjoyed the visual slapstick scenes and zany car chases. On the downside, the volatile nitrate film stock frequently burst into flames, causing patrons to flee the tiny theater. A frustrated Goldstein sold the operation after 18 months.

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A decade later, local showmen began building 2,000-seat movie palaces to accommodate ever-increasing audiences. The architects’ designs often integrated Egyptian tombs, Roman courtyards and Moorish temples into the same building. The opening of the Wisconsin theater in March 1924 attracted crowds with a spectacular, 75-foot vertical sign that could be seen for miles at night. Competition was fierce among the venues and colorful streetside advertisements were made on-site by carpenters and artists.

Neighborhood Movie Palaces

By the time of the Great Depression, large, elegant theaters were opened in neighborhoods 30 to 40 blocks from Downtown.  The Oriental at Farwell and North, the Tower at 27th and Wells and the Venetian at 37th and Center offered all the services of the Downtown palaces. A platoon of highly trained ushers checked coats and hats before escorting customers to the best remaining seats. Senior ushers who often took 2,000 people to seats on a busy Saturday evening shift were paid $6 a week.

In 1945, the total number of movie tickets purchased nationally was close to four billion. Just three years later, the Hollywood-based movie industry lost a government anti-trust lawsuit that forbade movie studios from owning movie theaters.  As the studios complied with various court decisions, theaters they controlled fell into disrepair and most of the employees were gradually dismissed. Despite competition from television, the popularity of drive-in theaters with teenagers was instrumental in keeping big screen entertainment alive.

The local opening of the Southgate, Mayfair, and Capitol Court cinemas in the mid-1960s ushered in a new wave of suburban cinema openings. Ten years later theater owners began to add second screens. These duplex theaters were expanded again as consumers demanded state-of-the-art picture quality and digitally enhanced sound at cinemas near shopping malls.

Economic and social changes in the last 100 years have made the loss of Milwaukee’s movie palaces inevitable. On the once lively Wisconsin Avenue, only the Riverside and the newly renovated Warner theaters remain.  The Towne was demolished in 1979, the Princess in 1984, and the Wisconsin in 1986. Of the big neighborhood theaters built before 1930, only the Oriental offers patrons a chance to relive the splendor that was part of going to the movies all those years ago.