Capitol Theatre

The Capitol was one of a few theatres in Canada that boasted two separate entrances. It was designed by Thomas Lamb, noted theatre architect. Originally there was an orchestra pit and a theatre organ. The organ was removed c1947. The grand entrance and foyer was located on Portage Avenue and theatregoers accessed the theatre via an inclined ramp and staircase. This entrance served strictly as a very grand, elaborately decorated, damask & mirror covered foyer hung with crystal chandeliers and wall sconces. It was connected to the theatre proper at the balcony level by an enclosed bridge spanning the alley behind Portage Avenue. Patrons wishing to sit on the main floor had to descend via another staircase. In the conversion to two screens, this entrance was sacrificed and the connecting link to the theatre was demolished. The secondary entrance on Donald St, much less grand, was maintained as the sole entry to the theatre. The theatre itself was demolished in the summer of 2003.

The Capitol Theater has an address listed as 315 Donald Street. I also found this article about the Capitol Theater.

"History of the Capitol Theatre"

"The first announcement that Winnipeg was to be graced with a new $600,000 luxury theatre came on 18 November 1919 at the request of S. E. Richards. Although the building construction was delayed by a shortage of cement and structural steel, the Capitol Theatre was officially opened on Monday, 14 February 1921. The new movie theatre was built for the Famous Players Canadian Corporation Limited (merging of Famous Players-Lasky Corporation and Paramount Theatres Limited), formed by E. W. Bickell and N. L. Nathanson in 1918. In its rival with the Allen Curcuit, Famous Players decided to errect a chain of fifty new theatres across Canada.
The architect of the Capitol was the prestigous North American theatre architect Thomas W. Lamb. Lamb became prominent in theatre design in 1913 after designing the Regent Theatre in New York City. His success continued when he designed the Mark Strand on Broadway, the Roxy, the Rivoli, and the Capital Theatre in New York. Lamb's theatre designs in Canada include the Loew Theatre chain, Loew's Yonge Street Theatre, Capitol Theatres and the Uptown theatre.
Winnipeg's Capitol Theatre is a fine and significant example of Lamb's Canadian work and delighted its patrons. Along the walls of the main floor, engaged columns and pilasters supported an entablature at balcony level on which rested the highly decorated enormous saucer dome which was described as "a thing of beauty". In front of the proscenium arch on each side of the theatre were tall, gilt, round headed grills decorated by winged female figures. Similar figures were found throughout the plaster work of the dome. Even the permanent stage, scenery and curtain were noteworthy, being designed by John Wenger, a Russian who was considered one of the leading artists of the day with an 'inimitable' personal stamp to his work.
Over 2,000 people attended the opening nght of the Capitol Theatre and many others had to be turned away from its doors. As was typical in the days of short silent films, the evening's entertainment consisted of a combination of a silent movie, music and live entertainment. The Capitol Theatre continued to be one of the most lavish and attractive movie palace auditoriums in Winnipeg".

According to industry technicians, the Capitol remained as a changeover house until it closed, as did the Met.

Equipment wise, it had:
Cinema 1:
2- Cinemeccanica VICTORIA 10 Projectors
2- Xebex Supersol 4kw Lamphouses

Cinema 2:
2- Strong Simplex XL Projectors
2- Xebex Hi-Beam III 3kw Lamphouses

It upgraded its carbon arc (like two welding rods making contact to prodcue light) lamphouses in 1979 when it was divided.

The Capitol originally had a Warren 3/13 organ which was removed c1947. The organ is currently installed in the O'Brien theater in Renfrew Ontario, along with parts from two other area theater organs.

The Capitol Theatre apparently had best Dolby Stereo sound system in Winnipeg.

This was stated by Paul McKie and Randall King when they did ratings of each theatre in town.

From http://www.film-tech.com:
Yeah, right, have them tell you another. Thomas Lamb always did them the same way, hung with steel cable about 1/2" to 3/4" thick on a windlass that doesn't need a brake or ratchet, mounted on the girders in the ceiling. None of his chandeliers have fallen. Somebody cut it loose. Whether it was cut loose for fun by vandals or by someone who just wanted it out of the way is an interesting question. But not a hard one.

This was in response to the fact that the chandelier came crashing down one night and was never replaced.

How sad. My mother is from Winnipeg and as a child, we always went to this theatre, and saw many good films there, including Sound of Music and many roadshows. My grandfather worked for Rolstein(spelling?) theatres and booked the movies in these cinemas. So we got in free all of the time. We went to Winnipeg many times, maybe 2 or 3 a year while I was young. This year (2005) I am going up and wanted to tour it, so very sad that they have torn it down, it was absolutely beautiful. Shame on the city of Winnipeg

mntwister- Please see the Winnipeg listings at http://www.cinematour.com for Capitol pictures when it was condemned.

Here's the exact link of pictures I took in 2001: http://www.cinematour.com/tour/ca/3021.html

Enjoy.

Sad to see what happened to the Cap at the end. Here and there in those pictures you can see a little of the splendor that it once was, as well as the mangled remodel job that Famous Players inflicted upon it in converting it to two screens. It's unfortunate that no shots of the original main entrance, marquee, vertical sign, foyer and staircase on Portage Av. have surfaced. It matched the grandeur of Lamb's auditorium design. Even the older Donald St facade, marquee and vertical sign, while never as grand as the Portage Av entrance, looked better than the replacement seen in the picture above.

Originally, Alexander Pantages was lured away by Famous Players to handle the live entertainment bookings for the Capitol and closed his Pantages theatre (now the Pantages Playhouse). That theatre came under city ownership for back taxes and has been operated continuously by city agencies since 1923.

Those were very exclusive pictures I posted. I had to sign a waiver, and wear a hard hat and face mask.

The pictures are from 2001. The building had already been condemned. Even city councillors were not allowed in at that time.

In other words it was a done deal. The city had "an offer they couldn't refuse" for the property and allowed the theatre to fall into a serious state of decay. That way there would be little argument for its preservation. Demolition was speedy and without any fanfare whatsoever as I recall.

They caught me by surprise with that too, walking past the newspapers in 7-11 one morning.

I was on site during the final few days of demolition and taped a good portion of the destruction. I did have the oppertunity to enter the building earlier but I choose not to since I didn't have the right safety gear handy. (mould issues) however now I wish I had taken the vid camera in for a few shots..
I'm going to transfer the video to DVD; any of you are welcome to have a copy if your interested.
It's pretty sad, but interesting how the auditorium doesn't look too bad once exposed in the daylight.

burningdust- I would love to get a copy of that. E-mail me at grandcameo@hotmail.com please!

And thank-you for your comment! I really don't think the building looked as bad as "they" all were saying. It was really just false drywall ceilings that collapsed.

grandcameo:
No problem, yes it really was sadly amusing how the city officials presented such a "show" on and near the destruction of the Capitol.
Interesting how the stories seemed to change from there being a huge "flood" to the entire building being infested with mould. The media was quite restricted as well.. As Sam mentioned, obviously it was "an offer they couldn't refuse"..

I really just want to know why Winnipeg has the Historical Building's list if a building can be "voted" off of it? That's a rediculous loophole that defeats the whole purpose of even having a list.

I hope my photo's kind of show that it really wasn't as bad as they had said. Sure, some quickly-done renovations in the seventies gave way to gravity when the building was without heat and did the freeze-thaw cycle... But we just moved onto an abandoned horse ranch to fix up, and the office ceiling in one of the barns came crashing to the floor. Are we going to tear down this beautiful building? NO! We're going to put a new roof on it (tin/metal due to the high wind out here ripping off shingles like nothing) and we're going to erect a new ceiling. Case open, case closed.

I am eagerly awaiting that DVD, and I will, as always, update this forum.

Hello there i see that some of the same people tour this page as does the Met,, takening a suggestion ( a good one at that) to post my photo pages for some of winnipegs theatres, of which i have three listed, The Met, The capital, and the Colony, these insider photos can be viewed at this link, http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/poolnut1ool/my_photos
hope you enjoy look at the Met postings for infor regarding these photos, thanks for the suggestion sam,, as for some inside information on the capital, i had worked in this place for a few nites as exta staff, when i was in there after it closed Greg Agnew and myself took it upon ourselves to look it over well, he is a great sorce of information on winnipeg history, we had moved around the capital and had found underneath the stage the old band shell, somewhere i have photos and will post them when there located, but under there we had recovered i think at least 5 music sheet stands, as well as many documents regarding Famous Players records which were left over at the Met in the office, The Cap was near the end the Head office for Famous players in manitoba, upstairs we had also found a old combonation sink, oven, stove mini electric applience which looked like it would have been from the 50s, one of the old projection stands were also in the walk way as well, but somewhere i do have other photos of the Cap, so stay tuned, Ken

I can't wait to see more of your pictures of the Capitol. I think it was much nier than the met, even after it was split, although, the Met has a beautiful facade.

If only the Capitol's guts could be in the Met's shell.

And, don't chastise me, but I love the Met too, its just that I think the Capitol was much, much more beautiful and I think they went more for saving the Met because it was never split. And I can't help but wonder what happened to the Cap's chandelier (anyone have pictures of it?) or why the Met was never hacked up?

Heres a link to three excellent interior photos of the Capitol. ere

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ext504/2094217830/in/set-1258490/

This theatre reminds me a lot of the Palace in Hamilton, which was also designed by Thomas Lamb.

Those photos show the Capitol as I remember it, not the hacked up horror after twinning. By 1978 (the year of the photos) all traces of the orchestra pit and organ are gone (except for the organ grilles) along with the large central chandelier hanging from the dome. Could the chandelier have been removed as long ago as the 50's when the Cinemascope screen was installed?

Here is an April 1960 ad from the Winnipeg Free Press:
http://tinyurl.com/3gvb3h

I had just seen "The Two Jakes" at the Capitol 2 (which was the original balcony of the old single seat auditorium.) The crowd was sparse. I watched some of the credits while the handful of other patrons filed out. Whatever the movie was downstairs had already let out. As I got to the door on Donald, the usher, a young kid, said to me "Congratulations Sir - You are the last customer in the Capitol theatre. We're closing the doors tonight." And so they did - although the building stood empty for several years after that.

Here is a 1970 photo.