Northgate Theaters
1000 N. Rohlwing Road,
Lombard,
IL
60148
1000 N. Rohlwing Road,
Lombard,
IL
60148
1 person
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This short-lived theater opened in 1993 with six screens. It was a second-run venue. In its last two years of being open, it was showing first-run features, but that didn’t stop the theater from closing. The theater kept losing money because of the location it was in.
This theater was located in the Northgate Shopping Center just down the street from the defunct Villa Park Cinema. In 2001, the theater closed and was transformed into a nightclub, which has itself since been shuttered.
Contributed by
Aaron wood
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Recent comments (view all 11 comments)
You could also smoke in the lobby, I haven’t seen that
since the 1980’s.
I show the address for the Northgate Theatres as 1000 North Rohlwing Rd., Lombard, Il.
Very short-lived theaters. It was a nice “strip-mall” type of theater. I saw two films here: Dennis the Menace and Wolf. I’m surprised they didn’t last that long.
The nightclub is closed. The building is vacant. It sits right next to the Harlem Furniture corporate offices.
Does anybody know why this theatre closed? It seems like it was successful. What a waste of an almost-new building (though not as wasteful as the huge Loews 20 North Versailles, which closed after only one year).
Also, was this theatre part of a chain, or was it independent?
Saw a few movies at the Northgate, “The Client”, “Timecop”, “Tomorrow Never Dies”, etc. The admission was $1.00 before 6pm, $1.50 after 6pm. In 1999 it briefly had shown first-run movies before going back to second-run before it closed. The Northgate had very good business. Every time I went it was always crowded. It was part of the Value Theaters chain.
I’ve always felt this place killed itself with the attempt to go first-run.
I remember it always being crowded during its initial phase as a second-run theatre, but it went completely DEAD when they attempted to go first-run (although I did see a few films there during that time and their presentation was very nice – good projectionists), and then it was still pretty empty when they attempted to ‘recover’ and go back to second-run (even lowering the prices to $1.00, all shows, every day).
I could be wrong, but it seems like they had a good thing and then ruined it by trying to change things and were never able to bounce back. A shame – it was a nice place.
This place was apparantly very similar to the Harlem Corners Cinema. Same architect? Both were operated by Value Theatres.
The Bricktown, the Northgate, and the Rolling Meadows are probably Chicagoland’s shortest-lived multi-plexes (11 years for the Bricktown, 8 years for the Northgate, and 7 for the Rolling Meadows.
Anything happening with this place?
i loved this theater!! I could actually see movies without breaking my piggy bank. I didn’t care that it was second-run movies. I had a wonderful time, and was sorry to see it go.
I agree with ‘malicedoom’ that the first run change up was a bad move.