Monroe Theater

The site is now the home of the Xerox Center and the first floor contains a Sharper Image store.

The Monroe played double features, changed weekly. From the late 50's to 1960, would often show "B" horror films. "FRANKENSTEINS DAUGHTER"plus "MISSILE TO THE MOON"; "THE WASP WOMAN" plus "BEAST FROM HAUNTED CAVE"; "THE GIANT GILA MONSTER" plus "THE KILLER SHREWS". Starting about 1961, went to an "ADULTS ONLY" policy,showing soft core sex films, along with some offbeat,lurid, and obscure films that few~if any~other theatres would play.For example, Sal Mineo in "WHO KILLED TEDDY BEAR" ,Mamie Van Doren and Mickey Rooney in "PRIVATE LIVES OF ADAM & EVE",and Arch Hall Jr. in "THE SADIST". Admission was cheap...65cents to noon 90 cents thereafter.The place always seemed crowded...guys (like me) looking for cheap thrills, I guess. By the 1970's, patronage was down, due to other Loop theatres showing adult fare like Russ Meyers VIXEN. Last movie I saw there was the X rated spoof "FLESH GORDON" about 1973. A huge rat could be seen running around the aisles. The Monroe closed a year or two later.

Actually the Monroe stayed in business as a porno house until early 1982. It was demoloished not long after it closed.

I believe this July 1940 Library of Congress image is of the Monroe.

Some 1953 views of the Monroe and several other loop theatres are available at Real Chicago: Chicago in the Fifties.

The site was previously the Columbia theater, which was destroyed by fire. The Inter-Ocean building was built on the site, and in 1919, Architects Postle & Fisher prepared plans to remodel a theater into the building. Chicago Tribune, Jan 8, 1919.

Here is a photo of the building being washed down, probably as part of being remodeled as a theater. It is here identifed as Morrison Theater, 1920, so it probably had not opened yet. This also gives you a good idea of how sooty the loop got at that time, and the effectiveness of terra cotta in staying bright.

I recall that the Monroe's name was in unusual but eye-catching Old English type in its daily Chicago Tribune ad listings.

Here is a profile from the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency's HAARGIS system. It includes a small picture.

Here is a postcard view of the building pre-remodeling

This 1928 ad suggests that Fox Films may have sub-leased the Monroe as a showcase for its new Movietone process. Note that the soundtrack to "Street Angel" featured music performed by the renowned symphony orchestra of NYC's Roxy Theatre:
www.i8.photobucket.com/albums/a18/Warrengwhiz/chimonroe.jpg

An article from the Chicago Tribune dated 7/25/76 talks about raids on male prostitutes, both gay and straight, and an undercover officer, Tony Lobue, leading a raid of "a disorderly house" (the Monroe Theater). I am guessing the Monroe may have turned to gay porn by this time. The article reads, in part:

"That 'house' was the Monroe theater, 57 W. Monroe St., where Lobue observed homosexual acts throughout the theater, and all he had to do was loiter in the washroom to be mistaken for a prostitute. A man tried to solicit him to perform a sexual act for $15, Lobue said.
'While my partner detained several men in the washroom, I went to the ticket taker and complained, as a citizen, about what was going on. He shrugged and said, 'So?''.
Based upon that conversation, Lobue said, he was able to arrest the ticket taker, Booker Brown, 39, of 6512 S. King Dr., and charge him with keeping a disorderly house."

Bryan: The Monroe was never a gay porn theatre. The adult films were all soft core and straight. I think the theatre was too close to City Hall to play the hard core stuff. I'm not surprised by the article you posted. In the 60s, I went there often.As a teenager, I loved the off beat and wild, daring (for the time)films.Not many theatres played "CONFESSIONS OF AN OPIUM EATER", "ANGEL, ANGEL DOWN WE GO", but the Monroe did. But didn't like using the washroom. Down a VERY narrow staircase(across the aisle next to the concession stand)and making two right turns, you got to the mens room. Very similar to the washroom at the Logan, only smaller.Black and white tiles,three or four urinals,and a very low ceiling.Guys hanging around, leaning against the wall, many smoking. CLAUSTROPHOBIA! More than a few times I was surrounded- literally- and stared at. Guess this went on til the theatre closed. By the way, I was wrong in my first post... I did see "FLESH GORDON", but not in 1973, but 1979. I mixed up the release year with the year I saw it at the Monroe. In 1979, Jane Byrne was elected mayor. In one of her early press conferences, she took a question from a woman who complained about the filthy conditions of some of the downtown movie theatres. Within a day or two, action was taken! The State-Lake, Oriental(a dead mouse was found on a staircase), and the Monroe(and perhaps a few others)were closed by the city.By a week or two, they all reopened; the Monroe featuring "FLESH GORDON". But that big rat was there...as big as a cat. I never went back. One more memory of the Monroe(on a lighter note): the titles of the double features, when seen on the marquee, would sometimes cause one to do a double take,and smile. Jack Mabley, a columnist at the old Chicago Daily News(or was it Chicago Today?)wrote about passing the Monroe and seeing on the marquee: "SOMETHING'S HAPPENING" "INSIDE A GIRL'S DORMITORY".Well, I guess any number of things would-could be happening inside! My own experience...outside the theatre, looking at the posters and the stills of "CANNIBAL GIRLS" plus "RAW MEAT".

This is an ad for a Barbees Loop Theater showing "Madame X". Probably the 1920 version of the film.

For what it's worth, several web pages give the completion date of the Xerox Center as 1980--meaning that the Monroe would have been gone some time before then.

A 1/23/75 dated article from the Chicago Tribune with the headline "6 Loop Theaters Shut; fire code cited" lists the Monroe as one of the six theaters. The article mentions it was playing "two X-rated films", "Flesh Gordon" and "Pleasure Palace".
The article states in part, "The violations cited by the city include allegedly faulty electrical switches and flamable materials stored in open boxes". The article also says that at that time, it was the largest crackdown against movie houses in the city's history. Also noted was the fact all of the theaters were playing X-rated, violent, or "blaxploitation" movies.
The other five theaters closed were the State Lake, the McVickers, the Michael Todd, the Cinestage, and the Today.

Bryan...guess I was mistaken again. I didn't see "FLESH GORDON" in 1973 or 1979, but in late January 1975. That means there were two crackdowns of downtown movie theatres in the 70s. I'm sure in 1979- Spring or Summer- Mayor Jane Byrne ordered a number of theatres closed (perhaps not the Monroe) but for sure the Oriental and the State-Lake, because of a rodent problem. I remember a quote from a city inspector re: the Oriental's filthy conditions: when a dead mouse was found on a staircase, he said (I'm paraphrasing) "Gee, they don't even bother to sweep the stairs". To RickB: I suspect you're right; highly doubtful the Monroe lasted into 1981 or early 82. On Wed. April 14, 1976, the Monroe was playing "BLAZING STEWARDESSES" plus "SWITCHBLADE SISTERS". After that , the Monroe disappeared from the movie listings (at least in the Sun-Times; not sure of the Tribune). It may have stayed open a while longer...maybe even to 1978-79. But I know that even in 1974-75, business was way down; a once crowded and clean theatre(1958 through 1969 when I went) was dirty and not well patronized. Perhaps the arrests Bryan mentioned in his post of 3-4-07 also contibuted to the Monroe's demise, whenever it occured. One more memory of the Monroe: there was NEVER an intermission; ALWAYS something on the screen. The theatre sold hot dogs. In between the double features a colorful ad for the hot dogs played. A voice said "YUM....YUM... IT'S A MEAL IN ITSELF" as a bright red hot dog (with eyes and a mouth)slid into a bun, splashed mustard and relish on itself, and said something like "enjoy a treat...have one now" or something like that. Those were the days when you could buy a ticket at ,say, 11a.m. and stay to 5p.m. or 7p.m. if you so desired. Continuous performances, food, and sexy, unusual movies encouraged a few people to watch the movies more than once. The films would generally start at 9a.m. and run to midnight.

The photo of the Monroe's box office that BWChicago linked to in his post of 6/24/05 was printed on the back page of the 7/29/07 Chicago Tribune Magazine with the headline, "Birth of the cool", and the caption (in part):

"WHO KNOWS WHAT movie is playing? Who cares? The theater is "NEWLY AIR-CONDITIONED"! Theaters were logical places to introduce the public to the wonders of air conditioning in the 1920s and '30s; on a hot day, nobody wanted to buy tickets to share a steamy, windowless room with a few hundred other sweaty people for two hours...

The Monroe was by the 1970s the ultimate grind house - because of union rules, they needed to open at 9 am like other downtown theatres. They usually ran double features (New World, Crown, other indie exploitation distributors). They worked their schedule backward from the evening, and it usually meant that when they opened their doors at 9, they began in the middle of the first movie!

"they began in the middle of the first movie!" if that isn't the most interesting and craziest thing I ever heard of!!


"They showed the old movie theater, and half of it was gone." Scott Ward

This is from Boxoffice magazine, July 1957:

CHICAGO-According to James Jovan, owner and operator of the Monroe, even oldtime showmen who think they have all the answers for the type of films that go over with moviegoers have a struggle in meeting public taste. After running a series of old and new films, with a wide range of subject matter, his experiment with "Bride of the Monster" and "Fire Maidens from Outer Space" made the box office jingle louder than it has in many weeks.

The Monroe played many horror/monster movies from 1957 to sometime in 1960. It must have been a success- here is more proof: From the Chicago Sun Times movie listings, Thursday June 6, 1957- HELD OVER! 2nd SCARY WEEK! NIGHTMARE THRILLS BEYOND BELIEF! "HALF HUMAN" plus "MONSTER FROM GREEN HELL". 2 NEW FIRST RUN HITS MONROE NEVER OVER 87c. The Monroe almost always changed their program weekly... on Thursdays in the late 50s;Fridays from the early 60s through the 1970s. The wild and unusual titles, the cheap admission, and the posters and MANY stills that adorned the outside of the theatre undoubtedly helped the box office!

Gone by early 1982 sounds right.
I walked up Monroe St. from State to Wacker, every evening from Sept.`82-March`83 for work at the old USG building. And I would have remembered a closed or boarded up theatre along my route, had it still been standing.

There was however along Monroe St., one of those old multi-level indoor parking garages, built to look from the outside like every other office building in the 1920's.
The entrance & exit driveway doors were arched. And the upper floors had textured chicken-wire glass windows, to mask from the street that it housed cars. I believe it had an auto elevator inside too.

Sometimes I would come up early from the subway near the Chicago Theatre, and zig zag my way S/W past all the other theatres that were still standing in late `82.

Something like the Hotel La Salle garage that was at Washington and Wells? http://www.preservationchicago.org/risk/lasalle.html

Yes!, exactly. But with much less obvious parking signage. I remember the one on Monroe had just small neon arrows for In & Out. Hikers took the cars from patrons once inside.

On Tuesday, Jan.20, 1959, the Monroe had the Chicago premiere of "PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE." The co- feature was "TIME LOCK." From the fairly large ad display in the Sun Times: 2 SCIENCE-FICTION THRILLERS Flying saucers endanger us all with their...PLAN 9 from OUTER SPACE BELA LUGOSI VAMPIRA ALL NEW Plus- A CITY PITTED AGAINST 6 HOURS OF OXYGEN! TIME LOCK.