Shaker Square Cinemas
13116 Shaker Square,
Cleveland,
OH
44120
13116 Shaker Square,
Cleveland,
OH
44120
5 people
favorited this theater
Located in historic Shaker Square on the SW quadrant, the Colony Theater was opened by Warner Bros. Circuit Management Corp. on December 28, 1937 with 1,523 seats. Designed in an Art Modern style by noted theatre architect John Eberson.
Now known as the Shaker Square Cinemas, it has been renovated, now operates with a mix of first-run Hollywood fare, foreign and independent films.
Contributed by
Joseph Ruffner
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Recent comments (view all 33 comments)
Here’s a recent exterior picture showing that the entrance has changed very little since the theater was known as the Colony:
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According to the weblink in the second comment at top, the Shaker Square was renovated in 1999.
Geez,Chuck.I don’t know if even IMPRESSIVE is the right word.what a Theatre!
This opened as Colony on December 27th, 1937
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I worked this theater as part time Assistant Manager of The Colony in 1950. It was a beautiful place to work. Most of my time was spent at the Uptown Theater on St. Clair Ave. in Cleveland. hehrman28
Three photos of the Shaker Square Cinemas can be seen here, on the web site of Mesbur+Smith Architects, the Toronto firm responsible for the 1999 renovations.
The auditorium had been carved into five screens in 1983, and the original lobby had been destroyed by a fire at some point. When Cleveland Cinemas took control of the house in 1999, the earlier multiplexing was torn out and replaced with a new six-screen configuration with stadium seating, and John Eberson’s original Art Moderne lobby design was restored.
Joe, I don’t think that the Colony was split into 5 theaters until 1992. I have a memory of seeing the restored 1989 version in the full Colony auditorium in 70mm complete with the full score. (overture, intermission, and exit music) Needless to say…it was a spectacular cinema experience.
Oops.. of Lawrence of Arabia that is…
radarKW is correct. The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History provides this page about the Colony Theatre, and gives January, 1992, as the time of its reopening as a 5-screen house. I’m not sure what my source was for the claim of 1983 for the multiplexing, but it might have been the Mesbur+Smith page which is now gone. Or it could have been a typo. Spell check, alas, never finds mistakes in numbers.
My grandmother said she and my grandfather went there when they were dating, which would have been in the late 30s. She said they’d sit in the balcony. I asked her (teasingly) what she was doing in the balcony, and she said “smooching!”