Arvin Theatre
Arvin,
CA
93203
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The Arvin Theatre was opened in 1937 with 500 seats. It was designed by architect Clifford A. Balch. It was destroyed by fire in July 1939 (although the theatre is still listed as open in 1941 and 1943 editions of Film Daly Yearbook). A replacement Arvin Theatre was built to the plans of architect Clifford A. Balch which opened in 1941 with 654-seats.
In 1949 a 874-seat Rancho Theatre was opened at a different location, designed by architect William Glenn Balch and Louis Bryan (It has its own page on Cinema Treasures).
Contributed by
Ken Roe
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Recent comments (view all 3 comments)
Anyone have an address, more info, or photos?
Boxoffice, Jan. 6, 1940: “Dick Lemucchi has opened the Arvin, a 650-seat house, on the site of a theatre burned to the ground some time ago.”
By the time the Rancho Theatre was being built in 1949, the Arvin Theatre was operated by James Banducci, according to an item in Boxoffice of January 15, 1949. At that time the new house that opened later in 1949 as the Rancho Theatre was to be called the Arvin, and the Boxoffice item about the proposed $175,000 house said that Banducci was “…owner of the River Theatre in Bakersfield and the present Arvin Theatre.”
The second paragraph of the current description is thus erroneous. The rebuilt Arvin opened in late 1939 or early 1940, as noted in the Boxoffice item cited by Michael Kilgore in the previous comment. The attribution to the architects is probably wrong also, as sources indicate that Clifford Balch was responsible for the original 1937 design and the 1939 rebuilding of the Arvin Theatre. William Balch and Louis Bryan did design the Rancho Theatre, opened in 1949.