El Capitan Theatre
6838 Hollywood Boulevard,
Los Angeles,
CA
90028
6838 Hollywood Boulevard,
Los Angeles,
CA
90028
95 people
favorited this theater
Showing 201 - 225 of 318 comments
First of all let me say that I take offense to the statements that the 60’s renovations to the theater were gaudy & in bad taste,that was the style for those times.My father Sully Altieri was the managing director at that time for Statewide theaters.and let me tell you they dumped a ton of money into that place.It was a wreck when they took it over.From what I remember and I have the pictures and letters to prove it,all the studios wanted their premiers at the Paramount.While the latest restoration is beautiful,that is a sign of our times “Retro”.
El Capitan is one of the few large, single-screen venues showing “Meet The Robinsons” in digital 3-D. Has anyone seen it there? Has anyone been able to determine if they are showing it using two projectors to improve the light output on the screen? (There were some reports that Disney screened “Chicken Little” and “The Nightmare Before Christmas” there and in some other large-screen, major-market theatres using the dual-projection technique.)
Oh, and if any readers missed it in the news report posted last week, here is a link to the theatres throughout the U.S. and Canada showing “Meet The Robinsons” in 3-D:
View link
We just returned from a trip to Los Angeles. Caught the opening of the latest Disney 3-D feature, Meet the Robinsons, at the El Capitan theatre. We had not been inside before and we were totally awed with what we experienced. The El Capitan is not a huge movie palace but impressive nonetheless. The movie wasn’t that great but the pre-film organ concert was a wonderful treat.
Here’s an aerial view of the Theater, “Stich” is on the marquee….
View link
Now that’s more like it…
Based on the context of Simon’s post, I figure he meant to type “terrific” instead of “horrific”.
Simon, why do you call the El Cap’s restoration “horrific?”
As a new “cast member” of the El Capitan, I’m truly proud to work in a real movie palace and enjoy the hubub of guests excitedly listening to a magnificent pipe organ and oohing and ahhing as the grand curtain rises for a live stage show and movie.
My Santa Ana next door neighbor and dear friend is JOSEPH MUSIL, who was one of the instrumental key figures behind the El Capitan’s horrific restoration (also the CREST and FINE ARTS) of which is on display at his American Museum of Theatrical Design, downtown.
One of the best seats is DD107 in the balcony which has a brass plaque which aptly reads: “Joe, your dream came true."
What a tallented man… What an awesome theater… Long may they reign as giants in the world of showbusiness!
Bruce, you are so correct. I had the pleasure of seeing a movie in the El Capitan some years back, just after Disney renovated it, and it is truly a sight to behold.
As you said, there are so many abandoned, or unused theaters on Hollywood Blvd. A shame some of the other studios didn’t think like Disney did.
Thank goodness we still have the Chinese Tehater (which I also had the pleasure of seeing a movie in), and the Pantages (which I was never in, but I think it’s in pretty good shape too). I don’t know if they still show movies at the Pantages, or if it’s just for live shows now.
The store front is the same as it has always been in the many different bussiness’s that were there trough the years. The back part of the theatre was turned into bathrooms for the handicapped as well as seats for the handicapped which removed some rows of seating in the back of the auditorium. I saw many movies here through the years of being the Paramount,Loew’s,Cinema and El Capitan. Disney has done a great job of making the El Capitan there flagship theatre for Disney product through the years. Its to bad the other major studios didn’t due the same with the other theatres on the Boulevard. The El Capitan is run like the deluxe houses of yesteryear.brucec
Can someone please talk about this theatre’s lobby and the changes it went through? One previous post refers to it as “spacious” though it is now very small, and it has obviously been enlarged in the renovation – the back wall of the theatre is clearly not original. I’ve often wondered if the store space in front was always as big as it is now. I remember seeing a televised premiere for DOCTOR FAUSTUS with Elizabeth Taylor at this theatre and from what I recall seeing I imagine that the current lobby was outside another set of doors right where the Concession stand ends. That would mean that the theatre interior went to the back wall and there was a cross aisle where the back wall is now. The seats may have gone back a couple more rows with a partial wall divider behind them… Anyone have specific info on this?
Pictures from this December 1965 premiere are on display in the upper floor gallery of the El Capitan:
View link
Just posted a new one here:
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Forgot this one:
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I recently posted more LA ads on the following pages:
/theaters/1/
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The LA Times is in the microfilm collection at the New York Public Library – Main Branch. I assumed only New York papers would be there, and they have all of them, but it was a pleasant surprise to see they carried LA as well. And it’s a self-service system, which is a big timesaver if you want to look at a lot of different dates. I’ll be going back for more very soon.
Good question, haineshisway. I’ve been looking for exactly these LA newspaper pages myself, and I suspect many others are too. I haven’t come across any online.
Bill, where are you finding these LA newspaper movie sections? Online? I have quite a few LA newspaper movie sections from the 50s and 60s (the actual newspapers) but I’m always looking for more.
From the Los Angeles Times, December 1961: a rare, non-Hitchcock instance of a director starring in the ad for his own movie:
View link
The magazine is in my files at home, but it dates from around 1942 from that major remodel.
Could you give me details of the magazine article so I can try to find it?
I have a magazine that has an article that shows pictures of the complete remodel job that they did to the Paramount during that time. That was the best waterfall curtain in the city.
Photos of virtually every major theatre in America are at the Theatre Historical Society of America, and they can be reached via their web site: www.historictheatres.org where on their front page is the link ARCHIVE; the fee to search for and copy their photos is given there.
Thanks for the photo of the Paramount exterior. Does anyone know of a photo of the auditorium from the 1950s. It was extremely beautiful, and that magnificent screen curtain raising and lowering was in its way even more dramatic than the El Capitan’s now. The end of “Vertigo” could never be as devastating at any other theatre as it was at the Hollywood Paramount in 1958.
That’s what I’M talkin' about. :–)