The Olympic was recently bought and is trying to reopen as a live theatre venue under the name Concordia. It will be a mainly Hispanic theatre, but the new owners are looking for shows to book.
The destruction of the Berwyn Theatre was a major loss to the area. I met my husband there in 1981 when my boyfriend at the time was an usher. There was a fire in 1980 or 1981 that was on the stage and destroyed the screen and some of the stage. It was repaired and the theatre reopened with no problems. A year or two latter, a large fire occured in a restaruant below the apartments. This fire gutted the restaruant and many of the apartments. It was then that the theatre closed. The apartment block was rehabbed and many of us who worked or hung out at the theatre helped get the theatre ready to open. (without pay) Something went wrong with the permits and they were pulled with the result that the theatre was not allowed to reopen. It was vandalized again and sold.
The new owners repainted and tried to reopen the theatre, but were not successful. It was during this time that the apartment / store section was demolished. I do not know why. In 1989, the marquee was removed. A few years after that, the rest of the building was demolished and the area turned into a TIF by the City of Berwyn.
There were rumors that the city wanted the building torn down, but they were never proven. The last time I was inside, there was NO fire damage to the “house”. The only part of the building that had been fire damaged was the apartment/store block- but that had been reparied. The theatre itself was intact, except for a few spots where mops and film had been set on fire and obviously went out before they could cause any damage. The large mirrors in the lobby and most of the bathroom fixtures had also been broken. As for the remodeling that the previous post refers to, it was unfoutunate, but not un-repairable. Frescos could be seen where paint was flaking off in the lobby, and if one looked closly at the plaster work in the theatre, one could see it was just buried under countless layers of paint. If one looked closly enough, one could actually see where cobwebs had been painted over!
The Olympic was recently bought and is trying to reopen as a live theatre venue under the name Concordia. It will be a mainly Hispanic theatre, but the new owners are looking for shows to book.
The destruction of the Berwyn Theatre was a major loss to the area. I met my husband there in 1981 when my boyfriend at the time was an usher. There was a fire in 1980 or 1981 that was on the stage and destroyed the screen and some of the stage. It was repaired and the theatre reopened with no problems. A year or two latter, a large fire occured in a restaruant below the apartments. This fire gutted the restaruant and many of the apartments. It was then that the theatre closed. The apartment block was rehabbed and many of us who worked or hung out at the theatre helped get the theatre ready to open. (without pay) Something went wrong with the permits and they were pulled with the result that the theatre was not allowed to reopen. It was vandalized again and sold.
The new owners repainted and tried to reopen the theatre, but were not successful. It was during this time that the apartment / store section was demolished. I do not know why. In 1989, the marquee was removed. A few years after that, the rest of the building was demolished and the area turned into a TIF by the City of Berwyn.
There were rumors that the city wanted the building torn down, but they were never proven. The last time I was inside, there was NO fire damage to the “house”. The only part of the building that had been fire damaged was the apartment/store block- but that had been reparied. The theatre itself was intact, except for a few spots where mops and film had been set on fire and obviously went out before they could cause any damage. The large mirrors in the lobby and most of the bathroom fixtures had also been broken. As for the remodeling that the previous post refers to, it was unfoutunate, but not un-repairable. Frescos could be seen where paint was flaking off in the lobby, and if one looked closly at the plaster work in the theatre, one could see it was just buried under countless layers of paint. If one looked closly enough, one could actually see where cobwebs had been painted over!