Calo Theatre
5404 N. Clark Street,
Chicago,
IL
60640
5404 N. Clark Street,
Chicago,
IL
60640
8 people
favorited this theater
Opened in 1915 for the Ascher Brothers circuit, the Calo, which originally sat 880, is located in Chicago’s Andersonville neighborhood on Clark Street near Balmoral Avenue.
In the early 90s, the historic Calo, with its elaborate white terra-cotta facade, became the home of the Griffin Theatre Company, which put almost $100,000 into renovating and restoring the former movie house into a legitimate theater, the seating decreased to just 135 in its main auditorium.
In the summer of 2004, the Griffin left the Calo Theatre due to rising upkeep and renovation costs, in search of a new home elsewhere in the city.
The Calo was acquired by Brian Posen in 2005, with the intention of converting the theater into a three-auditorium venue for local theatre groups to rent, much like Lakeview’s Theatre Building, however, those plans never came to fruition. Instead, the Calo has was reopened as a resale shop.
Contributed by
Bryan Krefft
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Recent comments (view all 57 comments)
Thanks for posting that BW. It’s nice to know that even in it’s current thrift store use, they returned the entrance area to a little more as/like original.
Here is a 1982 photo:
http://tinyurl.com/dyumdu
Maybe I missed it somewhere on these postings, but what was ‘Reflections Theater’ when it inhabited the Calo? Was it an adult theater at some point?
This is not exactly a photo, but the Calo Theatre recently made a cameo appearance in my webcomic, Multiplex: http://www.multiplexcomic.com/archive.php?name=376
(The next strip, #377, shows a bit of the interior, as well.)
A nice picture: View link
So, WHY don’t they refurbish all those lights???
They should do something about that plaster so that no on e gets hurt.
Great interior photos posted by supercharger96.
Front looks so small.
Teddy’s comment above is almost correct. Reflections Theater, founded by Michael Ryczek, was in the Calo for several years (80s/90s). I was on the advisory board, did the graphics for the programs and marketing, ran a children’s theater program there for a time, and ran lighting too—as well as anything else that no one else had time to do. We were a happy group, but not terribly business-minded sadly. The theatre’s triumph was probably a fine production of Lanford Wilson’s Talley Trilogy.