Cinestage Theatre

The Selwyn Theatre was designed in 1922 by C. Howard Crane (who also designed the adjacent Harris Theatre) for theatrical producers Sam Harris and Edgar Selwyn. It was done in English Georgian style, whereas Crane designed the Harris in Italian Renaissance style. Among those to appear on stage at the Selwyn and Harris Theatres included Ethel Barrymore, Charles Laughton, Helen Hayes, and Mae West.

Mike Todd, of Todd-AO sound system fame, purchased the former Selwyn Theatre, after it closed as a legitimate playhouse, and converted it into the first permanent Todd-AO showplace in Chicago, known as the Cinestage (Todd also acquired the Harris, which was renamed for Todd himself). In fact, the entire stage was removed for the transformation to Todd-AO.

The theater was also known unofficially as owner Mike Todd’s laboratory, where he experimented with many different aspects of Todd-AO. The theater also used the legendary Smell-O-Vision process and the Smell-O-Vision machine was still in the basement when the building was demolished.

After the road show days, Great States (later Plitt) ran the Cinestage as an adult theater and a flat screen was installed in front of the original Todd-AO strip screen for this purpose. Pornographic films were shown at the Cinestage for about ten years.

Following this, M&R Theaters tried unsuccessfully to revive the Cinestage, but this attempt was short-lived and the buildings were ultimately abandoned. Interestingly, the building was owned by Todd’s widow, Liz Taylor at the time. The city finally bought it from the actress, with plans to build a performing arts center on the same location.

Just before its demise, Cinema Treasures contributor Mark Gulbrandsen snuck into the theater and he reports it was in pretty poor shape overall. The strip screen was still in place, as was the flat screen that was installed to cover it. The projection booth was empty and only slight remnants of the Norelco projectors were to be found.

Thankfully, at least the elegant facade of the building and its next door neighbor, the Michael Todd, were salvaged and restored and now compose the majority of the Dearborn Street facade of the new Goodman Theatre complex, which built its new home on the site of the old Cinestage and Michael Todd Theatres, as well as the demolished Woods Theatre.

Recent comments (view all 35 comments)

Ret. AKC (NAC) CCC Bob Jensen on September 20, 2010 at 3:45 am

Chicago’s CINERAMA Theaters

Palace

Opera House

McVickers

Cinestage

Edens

btkrefft on April 11, 2011 at 12:12 am

A 1987 view as the Dearborn Cinemas can be seen here.

Mike Rogers on April 11, 2011 at 12:57 am

Sorta surprized to see a 10 week run on “ICE STATION ZEBRA”,while I liked the movie, i always assumed it was one of those one week runs and it gone films.Of course it is Chicago,and was probably only playing at the Cinestage.

CSWalczak on April 11, 2011 at 1:23 am

Considering it was a reserved seat, Cinerama showing, actually ten weeks was a rather short run. It was the only film I ever saw there.

btkrefft on April 15, 2011 at 9:02 pm

A 1943 view of the Selwyn Theatre can be seen here.

figaro14 on October 13, 2011 at 7:02 pm

I saw the original 70mm Cinerama showing of 2001 A Space Odyssey at the Cinestage in 1968. It was a reserved seat showing and souvenier program books were sold. I still have my program book along with several Chicago Tribune Cinestage ad clippings. Does anyone have any interior photos of the Cinestage? I remember the design being very clean and simple, and not an extremely large looking space, compared to the sister Michael Todd next door.

JudithK on November 23, 2011 at 11:45 pm

The Art Institute of Chicago is featuring “Bertrand Goldberg: Architecture of Invention”. It will be in place until January 15, 2012. The Cinestage is mentioned in it; evidently Michael Todd and Bertrand Goldberg were friends and collaborators. Goldberg had a hand in the redesign of the interior of the theatre when it re-opened in the 1950s. Todd and Goldberg were working on establishing a chain of motion picture theatres called Cinestage; this endeavor never occurred due to the death of Michael Todd. Along with figaro14, I am interested in photographs of the interior of the Cinestage along with anyone’s memories of the theatre building.

CSWalczak on November 24, 2011 at 12:27 am

Ken McIntyre posted an interior picture of the Cinestage on May 13, 2009 at 12:30 am (see earlier comments). My recollection is that it little changed during its days as a Cinerama house, except for the installation of an orchestra level projection booth. Except for a screen with a shallower curve compared to the original Cinerama installations at the Palace and McVickers theaters in Chicago, I thought was a terrific Cinerama house

This is an updated link to a picture of the shredded Cinerama strip screen at the Cinestage:

http://home.earthlink.net/~stevekraus/cinestage.html

mondojustin on November 24, 2011 at 2:28 am

Hello I’m currently working on a book about the film 2001: A Space Odyssey and am looking for photos and programs/newspaper clippings etc from each city in which the film premiered in originally in 1968. If you saw the film in it’s initial run in the theater have a good memory of your experience, I’d love to interview you about seeing it. To date I have interviewed over 20 people that have worked on the film, and several close members in the Kubrick camp as well. If you can help please email me at

Broan on December 27, 2011 at 6:14 am

http://chsmedia.org/media/hb/04/HB20393a.jpg http://chsmedia.org/media/hb/04/HB20393b.jpg http://chsmedia.org/media/hb/04/HB20393c.jpg http://chsmedia.org/media/hb/04/HB20393d.jpg