Capri Theatre

Joe Vogel on March 14, 2009 at 8:42 pm

The Princess Theatre was designed by the Nashville architecture firm Marr & Holman.

This house was either opened or reopened in 1948. The October 6, 1945, issue of Boxoffice said that J.C. Tune had hired Marr & Holman to prepare plans for a complete rebuilding of his Princess Theatre at Shelbyville.

Then the March 2, 1946 issue of Boxoffice had carried the following notice: “Last rites were held in Shelbyville, Tenn. for J.C. Tune, who operated the Princess there.”

And then Boxoffice Magazine’s issue of November 13, 1948, carried a brief announcement that the new Princess Theatre in Shelbyville had recently opened after seven months of construction. The seating capacity was given as 800. The owner-manager of the house was named J.T. Tune.

A J.M. Tune is briefly mentioned as the operator of the Princess and of the 41 Drive-In at Shelbyville, in the March 24, 1958, issue of Boxoffice.

The Tune family’s operation of the Princess came to an end by 1968, according to an item in the January 22 issue of Boxoffice that year. It said that Morton Tune had sold the house to Fred H. Massey, president of Masco, operators of the Belcourt Cinema in Nashville. Massey planned an extensive remodeling of the Princess, with the plans to be done by the original architectural firm, Marr & Holman.

I can’t find any references to the Princess in Boxoffice, or anywhere else on the Internet, earlier than 1945, so I have no idea how long the place was around before the 1940s rebuilding, but if it needed a rebuilding then I’d guess it was already pretty old.

lostmemory on May 5, 2009 at 12:10 pm

Chuck….the second photo is from 1984. This is another 1982 photo.

lostmemory on May 6, 2009 at 4:05 am

Maybe their wrong and it’s actually from 1983. :)

Chuck1231 on December 27, 2009 at 1:38 am

2009 photo of the Capri courtesy lumierefl.

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TLSLOEWS on November 11, 2010 at 1:01 pm

Thanks for the photos.