Royal Oak Music Theatre

The Royal Oak opened in 1928 and I believe it closesd in April or May of this year. When it first opened it was just the Royal Oak Theastre.

Charles, the theater is still open, it just went under new ownership back in April or May. Cake is playing the Royal Oak Music Theatre on Oct. 18th.

The Royal Oak Music Theatre is open, their website is www.royaloakmusictheatre.com and provides a full list of their shows.

Specs of stage located here.

The Royal Oak theatre was designed by Rapp and Rapp, it is an excellent example of true art deco (an often mis-used description), with stylized floral relief work and geometric shapes. It is of the "shallow balcony" that many late R&R houses featured. Built for the Knusky Chain, it was part of a suburban Detroit "holy trinity" of like-sized houses, the Birimingham, the Royal Oak and the Redford. They all had identically equipped Barton 3-10 organs, the consoles varied to match the theatre interoirs, and they were sold on the same contract, and had sequential opus numbers. The Royal Oak was operated by the community theatre chain until the mid 70's. The lobbies suffered from dropped ceilings during this time. The fisrt concert held at the newly re-christened "Royal Oak music theatre" was Maria Muildar, in 1975. Various promoters have operated the theatre as a mainly rock concert venue for the last 30 years. The Barton organ was brought back from the brink of death (it was badly water damaged and thought by some to be beyond salvage) by the local ATOS chapter in 1968, led by crew chief Mert Harris. Many organ/silent film concerts were presented in the Royal Oak by the Motor City ATOS, including two performances of "Queen Kelly" with a personal appearance by it's star, Gloria Swanson. The theatre changed hands again, and in the early 90's the organ was "evicted" by the owners, who felt it didn't fit in to what they want to do. The outer lobby was wonderfully restored, and the Royal Oak area today is a thriving area of clubs,restaurants, galleries and shops.

This is a recent 2006 photo of the Royal Oak Music Theater.

This theater is located in the Washington Square Building downtown.

Here is a 2007 view of the Royal Oak.

Here is a recent article about the Royal Oak: http://www.hometownlife.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070914/LIFE/709140303/1111/NEWS18

This website has vintage photos of the Royal Oak Theater.

This is another photo of the Royal Oak.

A 2009 photo can be seen here.

1929 Picture

1982 Photo

This is a recent photo.

Here is another photo:
http://tinyurl.com/nh2qkj