Rhodes Theater
544 E. 79th Street,
Chicago,
IL
60619
544 E. 79th Street,
Chicago,
IL
60619
2 people
favorited this theater
This late Rapp & Rapp designed movie house, done in Art Moderne style in 1937, was located in the Chatham neighborhood, at the intersection of 79th Street and Rhodes Avenue.
For most of the 30s and 40s (and into the 50s), the Rhodes was operated by the Warner Brothers (later Stanley-Warner) chain. From the mid-60s into the 70s, it was part of the Brotman & Sherman Theaters chain, which also acquired other former Warner houses such as the Avalon (New Regal), Capitol, and Met Theaters.
The Rhodes was open into the 80s, but, unfortunately, was demolished after it closed.
Contributed by
Bryan Krefft
Want to be emailed when a new comment is posted about this theater?
Just login to your account and subscribe to this theater
Recent comments (view all 21 comments)
Address was 538 E. 79th in the 1960 Chicago yellow pages.
Here are some 1983 photos:
http://tinyurl.com/co4jf9
http://tinyurl.com/d8wkjn
http://tinyurl.com/dba755
This theater was part of the Brotman & Sherman chain for a while but they ran it down taking everything they could out of it and not putting anything back. Typical of the time.
I grew up in the shadow of the Rhodes—used to play softball in its parking lot, age 10-12. I recently made a video about it and put it on YouTube. You may enjoy it.
[url]=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYXjSsbS4_M][/url]
Sorry, that url didn’t become a normal link. I’ll post it as regular characters; you may have to cut and paste.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYXjSsbS4_M
1983 R rated and PG rated Double feature? hopefully, they got the kids out.
This opened on November 19th, 1937. Grand opening ad in photo section.
Auditorium pictured in lower left corner of this 1938 trade article: Boxoffice
And automatic curtain controls described here: Boxoffice
They showed a lot of martial arts movies in the 80’s. I lived in the area then, movies were $1.