Circle Theatre

The Circle Theatre was located at 2105 Pennsylvania Ave. and it seated 670 people.

The Architect for the Circle theatre was A.B. Mallett & Co./Luther Ray.

I went to AU (American University)during the 60's.I used to play hooky a couple of afternoons a week and take the Wisconsin Ave. #30 bus down to the Circle.They always had a double feature and frequently showed Hitchcock films.The afternoon admission was 50 cents.The popcorn was 15 cents and the soda was 5 or 10 cents.Even by '62-'66 standards this was really cheap.I remember the candy concession lady.She was a dwarf,and she stood on a special platform that allowed her to serve people over the counter.There were never more than a handful of people in the theatre for those afternoon shows,but I don't remember any homeless or sleepers or perverts.

Going to an afternoon movie on a "school day" was so out of the question back home that going to the Circle was quite thrilling.I loved that little movie house and the dwarf lady etc.I never went to a hooky time movie anywhere else.

I remember going to the Circle and Inner Circle many times. They showed older movies but they were great. The Inner Circle had seats with high backs that would rock. They were so comfortable I remember falling asleep on more than one occasion. I really miss the grand old movie houses. They are mostly gone now, only the matchbox theatres at the malls are left. The young people today will never know what they missed.

Eric Royal

Does anyone remember a D.C. movie theatre that in the 1940s and later was called the "Little Cinema" or "Little Theatre"? I've seen references to it but could not find it on Cinema Treasures. It was an art house. I'd like to know the address and/or other names for this place.

The CIRCLE used to be a mildly successful neighborhood theatre until the Pedas Brothers took it over and wrote the book on REPRATORY CINEMA --- this was the best one in America. Brilliantly booking a diverse agenda of classics and foreign films, I never saw the CIRCLE any less than 80% filled --- even Mondays, even matinees. Here's how; for example: I wanted to see the Italian classic BICYCLE THIEF but the only time I could get there was for the 9:45 on a rainsoaked Tuesday night. So that's when I went. Yeah, it was full, like usual.
The PEDAS boys took profits from the CIRCLE and opened a whole chain --- for which Cineplex Odeon wildly overpaid to acquire. Two things killed the CIRCLE. (1) VHS videos made such theatres obsolete and (2) the CIRCLE was on prime real estate 4 blocks from the WHITE HOUSE. Torn down for a parking garage? I think not! There's a 12 story office complex sitting where the CIRCLE's one storey building used to be. One last thing: the CIRCLE employed a hard-to-look-at handicapped person in a high profile job. Nobody used to do that. I think nobody ever complained, either. God bless!

I don't think the Inner Circle has been listed yet?

This was quite an early theater- built sometime in the 'teens. In it's early days it used a gimmick in keeping with it's location near a traffic circle- films were projected through a circular mask, the management advertising "Perfect Circle Projection".

When the Circle was still a regular neighborhood theatre in 1956, I took Mary Louise here to see Rogers & Hammerstein's Carrousel. We started a kiss at the 20th Century-Fox drumroll and kept it up till the picture ended. Glad it was a 2 hour movie rather than the usual 90 minutes. Quite possibly the most enjoyable movie I never saw.

Built in 1911, the Circle was the oldest movie theater in DC until it was demolished in the late 1980s.

With all due respect to rivjr, there was many a matinee that was sparsely attended. Remember "WR Mysteries of the Organism"? Who showed up for that one?
That aside, it was a wonderful, funky place to see several different double features a week. And boy did I
Remember the clock, with its glowing blue face over the exit?
Sigh

The Circle was a great resource for film lovers, with an eclectic programming schedule that mixed classics with cult. Before VCRs and cable TV, venues like this were the only way to catch great films that may have had a limited local release. Miss those days!

I spent a major chunk of my youth in this theater. The nearby Biograph and AFI were more refined repertory houses, but the Circle has a certain rough charm about it. Maybe it was the large (and often vocal) homeless audience. Maybe it was the occasional out-of-sequence reel change by the projectionist. Maybe it was the fact that a double feature-sustaining Roy Rogers meal could always be snuck in with a minimum effort. Maybe it was the incredibly cheap tickets. Regardless, the Circle will always be missed by D.C. film fans who knew from the start that VHS was a poor substitute for a Circle Theater experience.

As a student at GW in the early seventies I'm pretty sure I spent more time at the Circle than I did in class...probably learned more too. Even now I look over at the abomination of a building that stands in its place and think about all those great film festivals (Bergman, Kurosawa, Trufeau, etc.)that I saw for a dollar. At their peak the Pedas owned many other Circle moviehouses in DC; the Inner Circle, the Outer Circle, Circle West End, etc. It was a great place to see a movie. How about the old DuPont, the Biograph, the Janus and the Cerberus? Wow, those were the days. Thank God the Uptown is still standing. When they junk that one, I'm going with it. - Mike Greene

Here is a circa 1930 photo of a Circle Theater in Washington, DC.

Great picture! Thanks. I had forgotten about the eatery next door...I wonder how many incarnations that had. And in the sixties there was a liquor store on the corner. Hey, what's happened to all the liquor stores?

Really hurts to think that place is gone.