Queen Theatre

rivest266 on February 4, 2024 at 4:50 pm

Still boarded up by the googlemoble passed it by in 2022.

Erich Friend on September 16, 2011 at 1:43 pm

This theatre has been purchased and is undergoing planning for refurbishment and operation as The Queen Theatre. www.queentheatre.org

Joe Vogel on November 17, 2009 at 1:13 am

This house was called the Queen before it was the Lamar. Unless the original name was later restored (I can’t find any evidence that it was), the page should be renamed. Boxoffice of August 25, 1951, had this information in an item about the installation of an air conditioning and heating system in the Lamar: “It’s the first major work on the house since it opened in October of 1946. Operated years ago as the Queen Theatre and later as the Cole, the Lamar has served three generations of Richmond moviegoers.”

The Queen in Richmond is mentioned in Motion Picture Times of June 17, 1930, when H.A. Kruger sold his half interest in the house to his partner, Mart Cole. The pair had opened the house in 1928. Cole still owned the Lamar in 1951. The Cole circuit also opened a 256-seat house called the Dixie at Richmond in 1950.

I’ve found items about the October, 1946, opening of the Cole Theatre, but have found no indication that it was an entirely new building or that anything untoward had happened to the original Queen Theatre building. It appears to have been an extensive remodeling, but I can’t be positive. If the Queen burned, I can’t find anything about it in Boxoffice, and I can’t believe that Boxoffice would have passed up an opportunity to report a major theater fire. I’ve also been unable to find the date of the name change to Lamar Theatre.