Studio 97 Theater
9711 Lyndale Avenue S.,
Minneapolis,
MN
55420
9711 Lyndale Avenue S.,
Minneapolis,
MN
55420
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Kobs, and Bloomington are correct for first owner and location. According to building permit records, some work was done in 1959 and it said Paul Mans was the owner at that time. More work done in 1966-67 and the name change to Studio 97 occurred in Aug. 1967. Opened in Sept. 1950 and closed July 20, 1986. Demolished a few months later. Engler tried running repertory double bills around 1984-86; mostly a second run theatre in later years.
I remember the theater. As kid’s we would get a ride to the theater, from Richfield. Small place, but we watched Saturday matinees mainly about monsters. Believe it or not,the ticket price for admission was 9 cents.
I went to that theater many many times as a kid. When I was very little, I lived in a house near the railroad tracks north of the theater, across from, believe it or not, the feed and grain store. I have great memories of the place. I remember seeing some kind of Sinbad the sailor movie and being frightened when they encountered a cyclops (hey I was a kid). I think the last movie I saw there, when it was Studio 97 was a Russ Meyer film called “beneath the Valley of the Ultra Vixens”. I also remember Jimmy’s Lemon Tree and the delicious “Lemon Picker” burger. And yeah, the popcorn at Oxboro was the best movie theater popcorn I ever had.
By the way…it was in the late 60’s early 70’s that I worked there, it was across the street from Freeway Ford and the restaurant next door at the time was called Jimmy’s Lemon Tree.
I worked at Studio 97 many, many years ago and remember going to see movies when it was Oxboro. We made the best popcorn bar none and people stopped in just for the popcorn. Start the Revolution With Me with Gene Wilder & Donald Sutherland played there for years…I knew every word in the script. It had a seperate little room in the back of the theatre for woman with crying kids… you could go in there and still see & hear the movie but other people couldn’t hear you or your kids. Had a blast working there – great first job for a kid – Mr Kirschbaum was the manager before the Englers took over. Another movie that ran there forever was Night of the Living Dead…oh the memories lol.
Pretty simple looking theatre thanks for the picture,northstar 16.
Various issues of Boxoffice place the Studio 97 Theatre in Bloomington, Oxboro, and Anoka. The January 28, 1974, issue has an item saying that the Engler Brothers circuit had gotten approval from the Anoka City Council to show “mild” X-rated movies at the Studio 97 Theatre. To add more confusion, a Boxoffice item of November 28, 1953, gives the location of the Oxboro Theatre as Richfield. Somebody at Boxoffice was geographically challenged.
A brief item in Boxoffice of October 21, 1950, announcing the recent opening of the Oxboro Theatre gave the address as 9711 Lyndale Avenue. Boxoffice spells the original owner’s name as Otto Kobs. A September 23, 1950, Boxoffice item gave the Oxboro’s seating capacity as 424.
TJO – “ceiling was quite high” – are your memories perhaps those of a child? The auditorium part of the building was a barrel roof on about an 8 foot wall. The roof had the appearance of a large quonset hut on top of concrete block walls. The lobby area on the front of the building added to the illusion of a much larger structure with its two story mansard-like facade. You are correct, there was no balcony and it was a very basic decor. — The whole area was redeveloped by the city when the new “Community State Bank” was built and the Strip mall to the south. We lost the theater, Jimmy’s Lemon Tree, and a few other neighborhood mainstays…in the name of
progress.
Oxboro Theatre was originally built by Mary and Otto Cob. They ran the theatre for many years, but eventually sold to the Paul Mans. Mans son Richard ran the theatre. I think the Mans sold the theatre to the Englers who changed the name to Studio 97. Otto and Mary Cob went on to build and run the Flying Cloud Drive In Theatre. Dick
I miss that whole block with Pontillo’s next door to Studio 97(now Davanni’s and located where Bridgeman’s was). First movie I remember seeing at Studio 97 was “Young Frankenstein”.
The interior of the theater was similar to many in the mid-1970’s. The first four feet of the wall, closest to the floor, was painted a flat black. The remaining wall was pleated fabric in very bright colors of red, orange, and gold. The fabric was pleated to resemble drapes and stapled at the top and bottom to wood strips. There was track spotlights focused on the fabric on both sides of the house. The lights were black cylinder type, with the spots connected to a dimmer system in the booth. I don’t remember any balcony and the ceiling was quite high. They ran first run movies after the Engler family took over the theater. In the 1980’s, they ran many indie films with extended runs, while the Landmark chain was still doing retro repertory programing.
I was one of the many young children that went to the Oxboro for the saturday matinees in the 50’s. The theater was opened in the early 50’s and I believe closed in the 80’s, I don’t know for sure about the latter, since I had moved away from Bloomington. The price of admission was 9 cents for kids. The popcorn was 5 and 10 cents, they had soft ice cream cones for 10 cents. Candy was the same price that you would pay in the stores. The evening movies were always first run, and I went many times with my older brother. I graduated from Bloomington High School in 1958, so you see I have a good memory of the theater because I took my first love there in 1953.
I recently mentioned this theater to my folks, who verified that Studio 97 was called the Oxboro in the 1960s, and said it had always been a first-run theater with interesting films. The building may have been somewhat unremarkable, but it was a favorite theater of theirs because of what played there. Here’s a look at it: View link
They also recalled that it was either the first or one of the first theaters in the Minneapolis area to show Milos Forman’s Amadeus, which came out in 1984, so it was still showing first-run films in the mid-80s. They didn’t recall when or if the “Oxboro” marquee was taken down when it became Studio 97.
Rather than trust my somewhat unreliable memory, I found a photo in the bloomington.org gallery of the Oxboro Theater in 1966 (picture no. 7/19). That would fit with it being renamed Studio 97 in the 70s. “Stagecoach & Psychopath” is on the marquee in the photo. No address is given, however. Someone out there must know if the Oxboro and Studio 97 were indeed different phases in the history of the same theater.
Random fact: Studio 97 held the Twin Cities exclusive of “My Brilliant Career” starring Judy Davis when the movie premiered in May of 1980. Odd for a theater no one remembers.
How long ago was that?
I have a vague recollection of a theater with glass doors on 97th and Lyndale called the “Oxboro.” I wonder if this was an earlier name for the same theater?