Palace Theater

The Palace Theatre is located at 209 S. El Paso Street and when it was a movie theatre it seated 809 people.

The Palace Theater was actually the Palace nightclub in the 90s before it was reopened as Club Xscape sometime later. The balcony is still up and has been renovated. The dance area is where the stage and screen once were. Since a one-screen movie theater would never be able to stay in business these days I'm glad that the building is still in use and in good condition.

I was stationed at Fort Bliss in 1961 and 1962. There were two very nice post theaters (with 25 cents admission for recent films, four single feature program changes a week) but the bonehead commanding officer decreed that us GIs wear uniforms or coats and ties to attend them so most of us boycotted those post theaters and went downtown or to El Paso's many drive in theaters for our movie fix. The Palace was pretty run down (only the Crawford was worse!) but it was clean and they had some interesting double feature programs for very low prices. I spent quite a few afternoons and evenings there. I remember seeing Hitchcock's "Psycho" for the first time there as well as a reissue of "Red River", "Around the World in 80 Days" (with Spanish subtitles) and a bunch of ancient grind house fodder like "Drums in the Deep South", "Tulsa" and a Bowery Boys marathon (four features on one program). Often the programming was more interesting to me than that of the first run downtown houses (the Plaza, Capri and State). I'm glad the building at least is still standing.

Club Xscape closed down a few months ago and the building was sold and it now ANOTHER club. It is now called The Zone. The building is in very good condition last I saw and looks to remain standing.

Added to the National Register of Historical Places in 1980

Palace Theatre ** (added 1980 - Building - #80004109)
209 S. El Paso St., El Paso
Historic Significance: Architecture/Engineering
Architect, builder, or engineer: Trost & Trost
Architectural Style: Other
Area of Significance: Architecture
Period of Significance: 1900-1924
Owner: Private
Historic Function: Recreation And Culture
Historic Sub-function: Theater
Current Function: Recreation And Culture
Current Sub-function: Theater

I passed by the old Palace on Monday. It's no longer called The Zone anymore. Now it's some club called Blu. That's the fourth club to open there in about ten years. I bet this one doesn't last another year.

This is a photo of an Alhambra Theater in El Paso. The date on the photo is 1910 and the location given is Santa Fe Street.

A Reuter theater organ opus 129 size 3/12 was installed in the Palace Theater in 1924.

Club Blu closed a few months ago. I can't brag about my prediction since it was obvious to anyone who knows the history of most downtown clubs. I drove by the old theater 4 days ago and took a picture. Unfortunately I have nowhere to post it, but it does look nice except for the big yellow sign advertising the vacant building as FOR LEASE.

This building is for sale. Asking price is $1,500,000. Details are here.

The year given for this photo is 1980.

Henry Trost, was the architect of the Palace Theatre. Between 1903 and his death on September 19, 1933, his firm designed hundreds of buildings in the El Paso area and in other Southwestern cities including Albuquerque, Phoenix, Tucson and San Angelo, Texas. He had a studio with living quarters for his students adjacent to his house in the Sunset Heights neighborhood of El Paso.
Next door to the Palace in the basement there used to be a bowling alley. I would go there to bowl "duck pins" which are smaller than regular bowling pins and the ball is smaller. They also sold sandwiches...hand-cut salami was my favorite. This was in the 50's.