Mason Theatre

Here is a 1901 photo from the USC archive
http://tinyurl.com/kl9kp

Interior renovation, 1941. The girls do not appear to be working too hard:
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Here is a rather melodramatic picture from the LA Library:

http://jpg1.lapl.org/pics27/00033423.jpg

A photo by Arnold Hylen, circa 1950:

View link

One more, apparently towards the end:

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Here is a view of the interior in 1955, shortly before demolition, courtesy of the LA Library:

http://jpg1.lapl.org/pics27/00033426.jpg

The Mason Theater is indeed the same as the Mason Opera House. Opened in 1903, it was designed by Chicago architects Marshall and Wilson, working with Los Angeles architect John Parkinson. (Benjamin Marshall designed several Chicago theaters, including the ill-fated Iroquois, which opened the same year as the Mason.) The Mason was the first big theater on Broadway, and immediately became the prime venue for the most prestigious shows and soloists visiting Los Angeles. In its first years, it hosted such stars of the day as Lillie Langtry, Adelina Patti and Helen Modjeska.

The theater was sufficiently successful that it was able to finance a major renovation in 1924, carried out by the firm of Meyer and Holler, which enhanced the already lavish appointments of the house. One newspaper of the day reported the new style of the theater to be “Pompayan,” but its interior style was in fact the sort of eclectic renaissance-beaux arts classicism which was soon to be displaced in fashion by more modern styles. The exterior of the theater retained the rather simple facade of an ordinary early 20th century commercial block, but the interiors were as opulent as anything in the city.

The new competition for the Mason at that time included David Belasco’s new theater on Hill Street and the brand new Biltmore Theater on Fifth Street, adjacent to the Biltmore Hotel. Other legitimate theaters were opening in outlying districts, especially Hollywood, where the thriving theater district included the Hollywood Playhouse, the Vine Street Theater, the Music Box, and the El Capitan. The business district of Los Angeles was shifting south and west, and the Mason’s neighborhood was becoming unfashionable, and no amount of decoration could change that fact. In the depression years, the theater began showing movies, though stage plays were mounted at least as late as 1941.

It was about that time that the theater came into the hands of Francisco Fouce, who established it as the leading venue for both Mexican films and Mexican Vaudeville in the city. By 1945, the Mason Theater was presenting stars of the Mexican stage to capacity audiences, and the foyer was lined with posters of the likes of Dolores Del Rio and Cantinflas. Themid-1940s to the mid-1950s were a second golden age for the Mason, which might have continued for years, had the block on which it stood not been targeted for demolition to accommodate the expanding dead zone of government buildings in the project that came to be called (with what I am sure was unintentional irony) the Civic Center. The real center of the city fled away, and the lively entertainments that had filled the Mason fled with it. The Mason has now been gone for almost as many years as it stood, and the street from which it was taken remains what it then became- as dull as a bureaucrat’s dreams.

When I worked for Francisco Fouce in the 1950s, the Mason was part of his stable of Mexican film venues. The booth was at the back of the upper balcony, which was closed to the public, and accessible from Spring Street, but apparently not from the Main Street side. The then regular projectionist told me that when the theatre was built, this feature separated the top balcony with its very cheap seats from the more elegant and upscale lower balcony and mezzanine with their more upscale clientele.

I was told that the theatre was built as the Mason Opera House and its iron proscenium support beam was fabricated in the east and came to LA via sailing ship. Even if this is not true, it makes a wonderful tale…

I’ve forgotten tha amperage of the lamps, but I do recall that they had water-cooled jaws. The water cooling apparatus looked not unlike today’s equipment for water-cooled gates.

The Mason had three seating levels, the main auditorium, a balcony on the mezzanine level, and a balcony above that. The inside was rather plain looking. Demolished in 1955 to be replaced with a state building.