The Historic Downtown is the heart of Los Angeles and the home of an unparalleled collection of early 20th Century commercial architecture. Bordered by 3rd and 9th Streets and Main and Broadway, the district encompasses 24 blocks of stunning Beaux Arts, Art Deco, and revival-style buildings in a vibrant urban setting more common to New York City.
Broadway is the backbone of the Historic Downtown. In 1931, Broadway was the West Coast equivalent of New York's Great White Way. With an unprecedented 12 major theaters, the famed Broadway district contained the highest concentration of movie palaces in the world. It was the city's most popular gathering place, home to movie premieres, ticker-tape parades and shopping at the region's top department stores.
A few of these magnificent theaters have been restored and while not used for every day movie showings, many are used as film sets for current movies, TV and commercials and a couple are also available for special events. Below is a glimpse into the wonderful world of the movie palaces.
ORPHEUM THEATRE
842 South Broadway
With its grand French flair, the 1926 Orpheum Theatre mimics the Paris Opera in its style. Polished brass doors, lush brocade drapery, silk wall panels, marble pilasters, enormous chandeliers and bare-breasted bronze women on the lighting fixtures demonstrate its rich flamboyance. Every corner of the theatre, from its auditorium to its lobby from its downstairs lounge to its upstairs foyer is an elaborate and alluring environment. And its exterior, with a bright colorful marquee, exudes energy and excitement. The Orpheum also still houses the last of the great theater organs on Broadway - a three-manual Wurlitzer installed in 1928.
The Orpheum is the fourth and final home of the famed Orpheum vaudeville circuit in Los Angeles. Throughout the years, the Orpheum hosted some of the greatest entertainers in show business including Eddie Cantor, Sophie Tucker, Will Rogers, Jack Benny, Sally Rand and Lena Horne. It also helped launch the careers of stars such as Judy Garland, George Burns, Nat King Cole and Sammy Davis, Jr. Between acts, Jack Benny courted his future wife (Mary Livingstone), a sales girl at the May Co. department store across the street.
MILLION DOLLAR THEATRE
307 S. Broadway
Drenched in the Churrigueresque ornamentation common to 18th-century Mexican cathedrals, the Million Dollar Theater gives the impression of an elaborate house of worship. Thickly sculpted, oversized terra cotta medallions, swags, columns and a huge scalloped arch characterize the façade. Where saints and cherubs would reign on churches, sit whimsical images of the Wild West, like Bison heads, Texas longhorn skulls, allegorical figures of the arts and a frolicking girl who dangles her leg over the doorway. Within, a dark richly carved coffered ceiling, magnificent and intricate organ grilles and dramatic proscenium engulf the auditorium and arouse awe.
Impresario Sid Grauman's famed chain of movie theaters began with the operation of the Million Dollar, reputedly named for the combined value of its land, theatre and office building. Opened in 1918, Grauman offered movie-goers an innovation called the prologue-a live costumed stage review presented prior to the feature film. Often the prologues centered on a theme similar to the film or included live appearances by film stars, such as Gloria Swanson, Rudolph Valentino and the young Judy Garland. In the 40s, the live entertainment evolved to include famous jazz and big band acts such as Billie Holiday, Artie Shaw, and Lionel Hampton. As early as the 1950s, the Million Dollar became the first theater on Broadway to feature Spanish-language variety shows, including headline acts from Mexico City.
LOS ANGELES THEATRE
612 South Broadway
Built in 1931, the lavish Los Angeles Theatre recalls the glories of the French Baroque and France's "Sun King," Louis XIV. Its majestic six-story main lobby overwhelms audiences with a three-tiered fountain in a hall of mirrors, crystal chandeliers, a grand sweeping stairway, and gold-gilt sunbursts. And that's just the lobby. The Baroque auditorium teems with golden angels, cherubs, and flowery swags. From the rich restaurant space to the glass-ceiling ballroom, from the marble-lined ladies room to the circus-motif playroom, the amenities of the Los Angeles give theatergoers a full entertainment experience.
Entrepreneur and film exhibitor, H.L. Gumbiner constructed the Los Angeles Theatre in the midst of the Depression at an estimated cost of more than $1 million. Intent on exceeding existing standards of extravagance, he hired architect S. Charles Lee, who became the City's most prolific theater architect. Lee believed that "the show starts on the sidewalk" and he designed every element of the building to lure the patron inside. Completed in less than six months, the Theater opened with the premiere of City Lights, the landmark film of Charlie Chaplin, who helped cover the cost of finishing the building when Gumbiner ran short of funds.
DOWNTOWN PALACE THEATRE
630 South Broadway
The intimate scale of the Palace Theatre in concert with its elegant French details compares to a 17th-century European opera house. With garland-draped columns, a color scheme of pale pastels, wall murals depicting pastoral scenes, and ceiling murals of whimsical girls, this 1911 theatre offers an unusually charming and graceful setting. As an early vaudeville house, built without amplified sound, it is designed so that no seat is further than 80 feet from the stage. While the interior is French, the exterior is loosely styled after a Florentine Renaissance palazzo, with multicolored terra cotta swags, flowers, fairies and theatrical masks illustrating the spirit of entertainment.
Built in 1911 as the third home of the Orpheum vaudeville circuit in Los Angeles (and originally known as the Orpheum), the Palace is now the oldest remaining original Orpheum theater in the country. The greatest singers, dancers, comedians, acrobats, and animal acts in vaudeville performed here for fifteen years, until the Orpheum moved to its fourth and final location at 842 S. Broadway.
While Broadway boomed as Los Angeles' shopping and entertainment center, Spring Street, just to the east, grew into the Wall Street of the West. The premier location for the City's banks and brokerage firms in the early 20th Century, it features the largest collection of Beaux-Arts buildings remaining in the United States.
Today, both of these remarkable historic environments (Broadway Theater and Commercial District and Spring Street Financial District) are listed on the National Register of Historic Places, giving testament to their integrity and prominence.
