Kapahulu Theatre

I was sooo fortunate to have gone to this ol theater back in the mid 70’s to see “The Drowning Pool” w/ my mom…..
Me thinks the theater folded was the location it was at…
And the popularity of Beta & VHS

Ok guys, here is as best as I can remember.
I do not recall the Kapiolani ever being operated by Royal; Consolidated ran it the whole time I was in Hawaii. However, there was a previous independent owner from Japan, possibly Nippon, which may have sold the theatre to Consolidated. Chuck, you mentioned the theatre was picked up by Consolidated in 1986, however Royal had sold all of its interests by then. I still remember Consolidated running “Star Wars” there, day and date with the Cinerama in 1977. I also recall in 1982 when the Royal theatre closed, we took the main gold waterfall stage curtain and installed it at the Kapiolani, the Royal had a second Blue traveler title curtain which we donated to a local school.
When Royal Development Company (Royal Theatres) began to dissolve in or around 1981, it’s two
Drive-ins, Waialie and Royal Sunset, were closed, the Queen was leased to a guy by the name of Mr. Yu who operated it as a porno house, Mr. Yu desperately wanted the King twin as well, but Royal’s Herman Rosen would not allow it. The Royal was closed and demolished in 1982, I drove Royal Theatres CEO, Herman Rosen, by the theatre as the first wrecking ball hit the building, he wanted to be there when the theatre he loved so much took it’s last dying breath. The Marina Twins, which by the way did not open in the 50s but in 1974, was built and operated by Royal, it was originally going to be called the Ilikai Twin, but problems with the corporation operating the Ilikai Hotel caused the name change. The Marina Twin was eventually taken over by Consolidated in the mid-late 1980s.
Royal’s other theater, the Kings Alley in Waikiki, was operated for a short time by Consolidated until it closed. Royal also built the Jerry Lewis twin in Kaneohe during 1972 and ran it a while before leasing it to an independent owner who changed the name to the Kaneohe Twin.
If you want more specific info on any of this let me know and I will try and recall what I can. I wore a lot of hats in those days, very little went on in the theatres in Hawaii that I was not involved with.

Consolidated and Royal always had a great professional relationship.
The CEOs were friendly rivals, if a Royal theatre went down, Consolidated was always there to help get it back up and running.
There were no booking wars, the movies were played based on studio.
Royal had exclusive rights to all Paramount, Disney and Avco Embassy releases and Consolidated played the rest. Now and again a popular film would cross over from Consolidated to Royal to play a second run. An example of that was the re-make of “A Star Is Born” which had a long run at Consolidated’s Waikiki#3 and then moved over to Royal’s Marina Twin. Both played the film in 35mm four track stereo.

One article states Feb. 19, 1980 was the last night they had shown a film. Not sure of the title.