Sandburg Theatre
1204 N. Dearborn Street,
Chicago,
IL
60610
1204 N. Dearborn Street,
Chicago,
IL
60610
5 people
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A correction must be made. The M&R Sandburg Theatre closed in April, 1983. The last movie to play there was LA NUIT DE VARENNES featuring Harvey Keitel, speaking French. I worked there as an usher from August, 1982 until April, 1983. While I was a film student at Columbia College, I shot a short black and white silent 16mm film about a day in the life of the Sandburg. I filmed it in January, 1983. If I could ever get this film transferred to video I will try to get it on the web somewhere so you all can see it. Please be patient, it may take a while. —Tim O'Neill
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David – My pleasure. I know how fun it can be to peruse a list like this and have many memories come flashing back. I was never in the Playboy (or subsequent theaters) but wish I had had a chance to.
Thanks JRS40 for your last post. I must have forgot to again click on the notify me box.
Again I persued your film list and realized how many more films I’d seen at the Playboy than first thought.
I even remember buying a Sha Na Na album around the corner at Downtown Records & Tapes on State, after seeing “Let The Good Times Roll”.
Also saw Python’s “ANFSCD”, “Bang the Drum Slowly”, Sailor Who Fell From Grace With the Sea", “King of Hearts” and the Marx Bros. stuff.
Not as many after it became the Chelex, but some. Thanks again.
David,
I have an article by the late Gene Siskel that says the owners of the Chelex were going to continue on with the double feature midnight shows because they were still profitable up to the very end under the Playboy ownership but for some reason the owners never followed through. From what I have read the Chelex owners were terrible businessmen which is indicative of the fact that they only owned it for 7 months. Too bad because that might have helped them keep their heads afloat.
Also, apparently, the first owners of the Sandburg were not very good either. They were hurting for business so badly the theater was closed for several months in 1978 and when it was open they played second and third rate fare. Siskel said in reviewing a movie called “The First Nudie Musical” that he had to wear gloves while taking notes because the owners wouldn’t heat the theater. New owners came in around 1979 and turned it into a first rate art house for the last few years of its existence playing films such as “The Last Metro” and “My Dinner With Andre.”
Wow, thanks for posting the movies list from the Playboy. I’d truly forgotten how many features I’d seen there in the `70’s. I think I may have even seen “Georgy Girl” there with my parents before that. Many memories there, especially the midnight double features. Which though they are not listed as such, often included some of the main features that are, in those double bills.
Maybe they had good turnouts for the films initially, and brought back the popular ones for inclusion in the midnight sets. Some 2nd run films as well. For instance I don’t see the 3 & 4 Musketeers listed, but know they played as a midnight double bill shortly after the 2nd one came out.
The Playboy must have done their Chaplin Festival after the long success the Carnegie had with theirs.
I’m not sure if The Chelex maintained any midnight showings after it was no longer the Playboy.
The sad part is given the never ending nightlife nearby, I’d bet a tiny theatre would still fly there. The constant foot traffic was always better at Dearborn & Division, than around the Village Theatre.
Here is a listing of movies played at the Surf/Playboy/Chelex/Sandburg from 1964-1977.
SURF THEATER
01/03/64 – NO MY DARLING DAUGHTER
01/17/65 – PURLIE VICTORIOUS
02/21/64 – HALLELUJAH THE HILLS
03/20/64 – WUTHERING HEIGHTS
04/03/64 – AND SUDDENLY IT’S MURDER
04/17/64 – POINT OF ORDER
05/08/64 – MY NAME IS IVAN
05/22/64 – THE GRAND OLYMPICS
06/05/64 – THE GUEST
06/19/64 – RING OF TREASON
07/03/64 – A PAIR OF BRIEFS
07/17/64 – DAMN THE DEFIANT
PLAYBOY
09/29/64 – NOTHING BUT THE BEST
11/05/64 – THE GIRL WITH GREEN EYES
12/18/64 – A HARD DAY’S NIGHT
12/31/64 – LET’S TALK ABOUT MEN
01/29/65 – WORLD WITHOUT SUN
03/05/65 – BANANA PEEL
03/26/65 – SWEET BIRD OF YOUTH
04/02/65 – THE ROSE TATTOO
04/09/65 – NIGHT OF THE IGUANA plus THE ROMAN SPRING OF MRS STONE
04/14/65 – DIARY OF A CHAMBERMAID
05/05/65 – WILD SEED
05/28/65 – THE LOVE GODDESSES
06/09/65 – CIRCLE OF LOVE
07/09/65 – FILM FESTIVAL – CLASSIC MOVIE CHANGED NIGHTLY
10/15/65 – THE UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG
11/23/65 – TO DIE IN MADRID
01/12/66 – KWAIDAN
02/11/66 – OTHELLO
02/21/66 – THE SQUARE ROOT OF ZERO
03/02/66 – THE MOMENT OF TRUTH
03/30/66 – THE SLEEPING CAR MURDER
05/11/66 – KING AND COUNTRY
06/25/66 – SHAKESPEARE WALLAH
06/10/66 – PHAEDRA plus BLACK ORPHEUS
06/17/66 – MORGAN
09/14/66 – LE BONHEUR
10/07/66 – THE SHAMELESS OLD LADY
11/11/66 – THE 3RD ANNUAL CHICAGO FILM FESTIVAL
11/16/66 – GEORGY GIRL
06/09/67 – ENDLESS SUMMER
08/18/67 – LOVES OF A BLONDE
09/15/67 – MY SISTER, MY LOVE
10/27/67 – PRIVELEDGE
11/22/67 – THE BIRDS, THE BEES AND THE ITALIANS
12/21/67 – ELVIRA MADIGAN
06/27/68 – PETULIA
08/23/68 – BELLE DE JOUR
10/16/68 – HOT MILLIONS
11/15/68 – THE 4TH ANNUAL CHICAGO FILM FESTIVAL
11/23/68 – HOT MILLIONS
12/06/68 – BLOW UP
12/20/68 – THE FIXER
02/28/69 – THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER
05/23/69 – CAN HERONYMOUS MERKIN EVER FORGET MERCY HUMPE AND FIND TRUE HAPPINESS?
08/01/69 – THE LOVES OF ISADORA
09/19/69 – I AM CURIOUS YELLOW
05/20/70 – START THE REVOLUTION WITHOUT ME
06/26/70 – RIDER ON THE RAIN
08/19/70 – JOE
01/20/71 – PERFECT FRIDAY
02/12/71 – FOOLS
03/05/71 – INVESTIGATION OF A CITIZEN ABOVE SUSPICION
04/28/71 – BED AND BOARD
05/26/71 – THE CONFORMIST
07/07/71 – SUMMER TREE
07/21/71 – DRIVE, HE SAID
08/13/71 – CLAIRE’S KNEE
09/01/71 – JOHNNY GOT HIS GUN
10/20/71 – MILLHOUSE
11/03/71 – DESPERATE CHARACTERS
11/19/71 – IT ONLY HAPPENS TO OTHERS
11/26/71 – FIRST LOVE
12/17/71 – THE GO-BETWEEN
01/26/72 – EL TOPO
02/27/72 – WR: MYSTERIES OF THE ORGANISM
03/29/72 – MACBETH
05/19/72 – WITHOUT APPARENT MOTIVE
06/07/72 – THE POSSESSION OF JOEL DELANEY
06/30/72 – THE GREEN WALL
08/11/72 – THE GREAT DICTATOR
08/18/72 – A NIGHT AT THE OPERA plus A DAY AT THE RACES
08/25/72 – MASH plus PATTON
09/20/72 – MARJOE
10/20/72 – BAD COMPANY
10/17/72 – AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT
12/22/72 – TWO ENGLISH GIRLS
01/19/73 – PLAY IT AS IT LAYS
02/08/73 – CRIES AND WHISPERS
04/04/73 – CESAR AND ROSALIE
04/18/73 – TEN FROM YOUR SHOW OF SHOWS
05/25/73 – STATE OF SIEGE
07/06/73 – THE MATTEI AFFAIR
07/20/73 – LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL
07/27/73 – A NIGHT IN CASABLANCA plus LOVE HAPPY
08/03/73 – THE HARDER THEY COME
08/24/73 – JIMI PLAYS BERKLEY plus SCRUGGS
08/31/73 – THE NAKED APE
09/21/73 – BANG THE DRUM SLOWLY
10/17/73 – LE LOVE SHOP
11/23/73 – TRIPLE ECHO
12/20/73 – THE GRAND BOUFFE
01/11/74 – THE FRENCH CONSPIRACY
01/18/74 – THE BETTY BOOP SCANDALS OF 1974
02/01/74 – A NIGHT IN CASABLANCA plus LOVE HAPPY
02/06/74 – DAY FOR NIGHT
03/22/74 – HAPPY NEW YEAR
04/11/74 – I.F. STONE’S WEEKLY plus LENNY BRUCE
05/03/74 – THE MOTHER AND THE WHORE
06/14/74 – THE MIRAGES
07/03/74 – WEDDING IN BLOOD
07/24/74 – KING OF HEARTS
09/06/74 – LOVE AND ANARCHY
09/20/74 – A FREE WOMAN
10/04/74 – THE SEDUCTION OF MIMI
10/25/74 – AMARCORD
12/25/74 – THE LITTLE PRINCE
01/17/75 – MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS
04/18/75 – AND NOW MY LOVE
05/23/75 – THE DAY OF THE LOCUST
06/27/75 – JACQUELINE SUSANN’S ONCE IS NOT ENOUGH
07/25/75 – THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES (1939)
08/22/75 – FAREWELL, MY LOVELY
10/10/75 – KING OF HEARTS
10/17/75 – THREE DAYS OF THE CONDOR
12/25/75 – HUSTLE
02/06/76 – CHARLIE CHAPLIN FILM FESTIVAL
02/27/76 – GIVE EM HELL HARRY
03/12/76 – HAROLD AND MAUDE plus ROMEO AND JULIET
03/19/76 – THE LOVES AND TIMES OF SCARAMOUCHE
03/26/76 – A BOY AND HIS DOG
04/09/76 – THE BAD NEWS BEARS
05/19/76 – JIMI HENDRIX PLAYS RAINBOW BRIDGE
05/28/76 – THE SAILOR WHO FELL FROM GRACE WITH THE SEA
07/23/76 – FUTUREWORLD
08/27/76 – MURDER BY DEATH
09/24/76 – CUL-DE-SAC plus DIARY OF FORBIDDEN DREAMS
10/01/76 – THE PRODUCERS plus MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL
CHELEX
10/08/76 – THE LAST AFFAIR
10/22/76 – IDI AMIN DADA
11/10/76 – SALESMAN plus GREY GARDENS
11/19/76 – ROD STEWART AND FACES
12/03/76 – SPECIAL SECTION
12/10/76 – A CLOCKWORK ORANGE
12/24/76 – JIMI PLAYS BERKELEY plus LADIES & GENTLEMEN THE ROLLING STONES
12/31/76 – LUMIERE
01/14/77 – ENGLAND MADE ME
01/21/77 – THE LAST TYCOON
02/11/77 – SAINT L'ARTISTE
02/18/77 – IS THERE SEX AFTER DEATH?
02/25/77 – FACE TO FACE
03/04/77 – THIEVES
03/18/77 – NEVER A DULL MOMENT plus THREE CABALLEROS
03/25/77 – THE SONG REMAINS THE SAME
04/01/77 – TAXI DRIVER plus SHAMPOO
04/15/77 – THE CASSANDRA CROSSING plus A TOUCH OF CLASS
04/22/77 – THE PINK PANTHER STRIKES AGAIN plus NORMAN IS THAT YOU?
04/29/77 – YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN
05/20/77 – A STAR IS BORN (1976)
SANDBURG
06/03/77 – SILVER STREAK
06/10/77 – HOUSE BY THE LAKE plus RUBY
06/17/77 – ISLANDS IN TEH STREAM plus SMALL CHANGE
06/24/77 – BLACK SUNDAY
07/01/77 – THE LATE SHOW plus PROVIDENCE
07/08/77 – ROCKY
07/22/77 – THE STING
07/29/77 – JABBERWOCKY
08/12/77 – MURDER BY DEATH plus ANNIE HALL
08/19/77 – BLACK AND WHITE IN COLOR
09/16/77 – IN THE REALM OF THE SENSES
09/23/77 – SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT
10/07/77 – OUTRAGEOUS
10/14/77 – CINDERELLA (X-rated)
10/21/77 – YOU LIGHT UP MY LIFE
11/04/77 – HARLAN COUNTY U.S.A.
11/18/77 – KENTUCKY FRIED MOVIE plus MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL
11/25/77 – THE STORY OF JOANNA plus NEW YORK CITY WOMAN
12/02/77 – ROLLING THUNDER plus TAXI DRIVER
12/16/77 – THEATER CLOSED FOR REMODELING
A friend of our family Jerry Dukor RIP, was one of the Playboy’s manager’s during the run of the Playboy produced “The Naked Ape”. They had a live chimp in a tuxedo in the lobby, in and out of the arms of it’s equally attired handler. I want to say that Johnny Crawford the film’s star,(also of “The Rifleman” & song “Cindy’s Birthday” fame), may have been there also. But I can’t remember. It was quite an affair with mobile spotlights out front, etc. Hefner lived a block and a half away too. I remember the afore mentioned Playboy carpeting well.
Being a pre-teen, and about as close to it as the chimp was at times.
The midnight double bills were legendary. Tandems of Python films, “War of the Worlds” with “Day the Earth Stood Still”. Both the Three & Four Musketeers Oliver Reed films,(originally filmed as one), etc.
We were teens and they’d let us ino virtually anything because we were neighborhood regulars. Something that would come back to haunt us come drinking age.
The last two films I saw there were “Mad Max” & the Chicago made “Stony Island”. Siskel was actually at the “Stony Island” showing I was at, even though it was by then a few years old. He was a true film buff and greatly missed.
The pizza place lost in the “fire”, along with Ting-A-Ling was called Chester’s Pizza. The corner restaurant long after the theatre entrance was moved to Dearborn, was called the Copper Top. With some of the dining tables adorned in copper.
The current Walgreens is still active 24 hours. With ironically an Edwardo’s Pizza behind the Walgreens now on the Dearborn side, instead of Division St.(The Walgreens was since slightly enlarged, and ate up half of the Edwardos space.)
Since Cary Grant was at the Walgreen’s grand opening, I wonder if he knew he was only a diagonal block away from the Ambassador East Hotel. Where he’d shot some exteriors for “North By Northwest”. One famous still were he’s hiding behind a nearby building. dave
The 1934 remodeling was by Pereira & Pereira
Bill Horberg does a terrific job of reviewing the history of the Sandburg as well as conveying the flavor of the theatre during his and Albert’s tenure (both are now very successful producers).
One major error though – the theatre’s lease, when they went back to college, was taken over by the company I worked for, M&R Theatres, so I was able to continue booking the theatre, albeit now as a first run specialized one.
During that period, we competed with two other single screen specialized theatres – the Cinema (Oscar Brotman, which I had previously booked) and the Biograph. Building on the good will that Bill & Albert had created in reviving the theatre, we had a successful fun of a couple of years, with as stated above the remarkable success of My Dinner With Andre as a standout (although I recall that Diva was our biggest hit).
The site had been vulnerable to redevelopment for years; at M&R, knowing this, we in late 1983 opened the two-screen Fine Arts on South Michigan. The site indeed did become a Walgreens, and in a cruel twist of irony, its opening included an appearance by Cary Grant, who doubtless did not realize that just recently some of his old films had been playing there.
My partner Albert Berger and I re-opened the Sandburg Theatre as a repertory house showing double features of classic films on May 22, 1979. Our opening week was a festival of Alfred Hitchcock movies. Although home video was starting to appear back then, most of these films could not be seen at that time except on television. We leased the theatre from famous Chicago real estate mogul Arthur Rubloff, who had developed much of the Magnificent Mile among other properties. The theatre was shuttered when we took it over and in very poor shape. It still had the bunny logo design carpeting from the days when it operated as The Playboy, and a marquee with disco style lighting. We put in a new silver screen, but I remember that we had no ability to adjust the drapes or masking in the theatre except manually, and as we screened old films of different aspect ratios from 1:1:33 to VistaVision to Cinemascope, we were always have to run down between films to open or shut the drapes or raise or lower this huge 35 foot wide bunting. We were just kids out of college and knew very little about the business of exhibition. We were helped by a man named Robert Taylor who ran the Village Theatre on Clark Street and North Avenue at that time. And a young executive named Tom Brueggemann who worked for a large theatre chain, M & R Amusements, and helped us book our movies and deal with the distributors. In 1982 we ran our last show, and for a short time the lease on our theatre was taken over by Larry Edwards, who was the proprietor of The Biograph Theatre on Lincoln, famous as the location of the killing of John Dillinger after he attended a screening there. In somewhat typical Chicago style, what happened to the Sandburg was that the site was coveted by developers. Our theatre and an adjacent building (the home of the old Ting-A-Ling ice cream and candy store) were all occupied by tenants who had month to month leases, except for one tenant, I believe it was a small pizza parlor, who had a long term lease. Sure enough, that business mysteriously caught fire one night, and in the wake of that incident, all of the tenants were given notice, and the building was torn down. As someone posted, a Walgreens was built on the site. But what they didn’t write was the true ironic detail that Cary Grant, a family friend of heiress Betty Walgreen, came to dedicate the opening of that particular Walgreens, right there on the site of the old Surf/Playboy/Sandburg cinema where so many patrons had enjoyed his films.
Per John Sanchez’s comment above, I just looked up THE LAST AFFAIR on www.imdb.com and not much is known about that movie. Except that Betty Thomas of HILL STREET BLUES fame was in it.;
Anybody know where I can find a photo of the Playboy/Sandburg? I vaguely remember this from my youth.
Listed in the Film Daily Yearbook, 1950 edition as the Surf Theatre with a seating capacity of 650.
The Surf was sold in September, 1964. The theater closed briefly and then re-opened as the Playboy on September 29, 1964 with a film called “Nothing But The Best.” The Playboy then sold in 1976 and its final booking was a double feature of “The Producers” and “Monty Python and the Holy Grail.” When the theater re-opened as the Chelex on October 8, 1976 the first feature was “The Last Affair” which was produced by one of the owners of the Chelex. Roger Ebert, in his review, claimed this was the only way the movie could ever be shown in a theater. The Chelex was basically a second run double feature house that lasted barely 7 months. When the theater re-opened for the last time on June 3, 1977 it was re-named the Sandburg. The opening feature was a third run showing of “Silver Streak.” The theater continued to be a second and third run house for much of its first year and then the owners wisely dabbled with art films and soon the Sandburg became one of the top exclusive art houses in the city up until its closing.
The Playboy opened in the late 60’s and, while popular, was never as popular as owners hoped. Like its name the Playboy was run by top management from the magazine who knew little about the film business. They preferred not to shell out a lot of money for an exclusive first run film in favor of “safer” product. I can remember in an article that the manager lamented the fact that they lost out on a successful run of “American Graffiti” to instead play a film called “Naked Ape” which happened to be a Playboy production. Every weekend the Playboy played midnight double features that proved very popular. Finally in 1976 the Playboy turned to first runs (though not exclusive) to try to keep up. I can remember them playing films such as “The Bad News Bears”, “Murder by Death”, and “The Sailor Who Fell From Grace with the Sea” but the Playboy continued losing money and finally closed in 1977. It was reopened a few months later under new ownership as The Chelex, possibly the worst name ever for a theater. I can remember its first attraction was a film that happened to be made by one of the owners. The new owners knew nothing about running a theater. The late Gene Siskel once reviewed a film at the Chelex in the dead of winter and complained he had to wear gloves in the auditorium. The new owners also foolishly did not continue the double feature midnight movies. In late 1978 the Chelex closed and would re-open in its final incarnation as the Sandburg in 1979. The Sandburg became a first class art house like the Playboy once was. It’s most noted booking was “My Dinner with Andre” which ran for several months. The theater closed for good in 1982 and was torn down soon after. A Walgreens is in that location now.