Sottile Theatre
44 George Street,
Charleston,
SC
29424
44 George Street,
Charleston,
SC
29424
1 person
favorited this theater
Probably the most popular and modern movie theatre on King Street in Charleston, SC during the 1960’s and 1970’s. Built in 1927 with 1,800 seats, the Gloria Theatre must have been renovated in the late-1950’s or early 1960’s as I recall loving their comfortable, padded rocking seats and modern decor.
My fondest memories of the Gloria: Seeing Elvis Presley in “GI Blues” three times in on day and the “shocking” premiere of “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”. The Gloria Theatre closed as a movie theatre in 1975.
Today, this wonderful theatre is currently owned by the College of Charleston and used by their Theatre Department, known as the Sottile Theatre.
Hopefully, by adding the name to this site, many other fans of the Gloria Theatre will share their memories and facts about this wonderful theatre. I also hope others will share their thoughts on another Charleston theatre (the Ashley) that was one of the few theatres not located in downtown Charleston, but across the river in St. Andrews Parish.
Contributed by
Chuck Cromer
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Recent comments (view all 19 comments)
The name of this theater should be updated to the Sottile Theatre. 785 seats.
This is what the Sottile Theater looks like.
According to Bowers' “Encyclopedia of Automatic Musical Instruments” page 551, “Albert Sottile” bought a Reproduco organ made by the Operators Piano Co.
Also, the “Palace” and “Lincoln” theatres in Charleston also had Reproducos. I could not find a page for those theatres, so I am including this info here for the time being.
The Lincoln was torn down in the 1980s. It was a theater for blacks in the Jim Crow era. It was a tiny place, relatively speaking. I never went inside, though. It had been abandoned for years.
The Gloria was the big, nice theater of downtown Charleston during the 1970s, when I went there regularly. It had long red curtains down the sides of the auditorium, probably hiding whatever was underneath. The stars in the ceiling are still there, from what I hear. It’s a bigger theater than the Riviera, so there is something wrong about the seating capacity; it had to have been more than seven hundred. That may not include the smoking gallery, which had been closed for years.
This is a 2009 photo.
Another photo is here.
Here is an August 2009 photo.
MUST HAVE JUST BEEN HIT BY A TRUCK……..
I’ve seen a few theater photos that showed their marquee having a close encounter of the wrong kind with a truck. I’m surprised that there isn’t a code requiring the marquee to be a certain distance from the street. Other than the dent in the marquee, this looks like a nice theater.
Miller Signs fabricated the new marquee per the June 2011 issue of “Signs of the Times.” No date is given.