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The Voice of Business,
Industry & the Professions Since 1942
North Carolina's largest
business group proudly serves as the state chamber of commerce
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Tar Heel Travels
Movie
Palaces
Refurbished and reborn,
old theaters are a hot ticket
in many downtowns
By Renee Wright
It was a moment
right out of the movies. Boxoffice documentary king and best-selling author
Michael Moore strode down one end of the hall in Durham’s Carolina Theatre
just as Ken Burns, director of PBS’ “Civil War,” “Baseball,” and “Jazz,”
emerged from the other end. The two passed with a brief handshake on the way
to panels discussing their work at the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival
held each April at the Durham theatre
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The Carolina Theatre in Durham
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A special moment, but one not unique in North Carolina. All across the
state, movie palaces of the past are coming back to life, providing a
vibrant heart for downtown revitalization in cities and towns.
Academy award-winning director Martin Scorsese will attend the Full Frame
Documentary Festival this April. He serves on the festival board along with
Frank Capra Jr., Ken Burns and Ross McElwee.
Ron Howard attended the Asheville Film Festival in 2004 as it honored his
father, actor Rance Howard. The Fine Arts Theatre, with its glass brick art
deco façade, provides a fine setting for the annual festival.
Sissy Spacek handed out awards during her appearance at last year’s RiverRun
Film Festival, produced by the N.C. School of the Arts in Winston-Salem. The
Stevens Center, formerly a Carolina Theatre, now restored to its 1929
Neo-classical beauty, hosts the RiverRun festival, as well as hundreds of
other events each year.
In the late 1920s a string of opulent movie palaces stretched across North
Carolina, many bearing the name Carolina Theatre, others the name of the
film studio, Paramount. Equipped with the latest technical advances, pipe
organs capable of a wide range of sound effects, a stage for live acts, some
were even air conditioned, a novelty then.
Some Carolina Theatres did not fare well through the years. Chapel Hill’s
lost its ornate lobby to a GAP store, although it continues as an art movie
house.
Charlotte’s Carolina Theatre, once most ornate of all, still stands, but in
a dilapidated condition. Today its ghostly remains stand on one of downtown
Charlotte’s most desirable blocks, next to the Mint Museum of Craft + Design
and the new art deco Hearst Tower.
Greensboro can boast the least changed of all the Carolina Theatres in the
state, retaining its Greek Revival exterior, its marble Italian Renaissance
interior and even its original Robert Morton Theatre Pipe Organ, one of only
two in state. The 1927 “Showplace of the Carolinas” provides an important
spur to downtown Greensboro’s revitalization, offering a wide variety of
entertainment including the Eastern Music Festival, the Piedmont Jazz &
Blues Festival, and the Carolina Film & Video Festival.
These revitalized theaters exert enormous economic impact on downtown
revitalization. According to Reyn Bowman, president of the Durham Convention
& Visitors Bureau, a recent CVB study revealed the Carolina Theatre in
Durham generates direct spending of more than $3.2 million annually.
Including spending by theatre visitors elsewhere in the community, the total
economic impact tops $12 million.
In Kannapolis, the Gem, an art deco palace adorned with phoenix birds, lives
up to its name. Locals today call it the Crown Jewel of Downtown, and movie
fans travel miles to enjoy first run films at discount prices.
In Mt. Airy, the hometown of actor Andy Griffith, the historic Downtown
Theatre shows discount movies five nights a week, adding an important
component to the town’s booming tourism industry.
The Alamance Arts Council reopened the 1928 Paramount Theater in 1998 to
provide a focal point for downtown Burlington. Lumberton, Salisbury,
Lexington, Hamlet, Goldsboro, Southern Pines, Wilson and Sanford turned
their old vaudeville and movie houses into centers for performing arts.
Other theaters across the state found different uses. In Columbia, on the
Albemarle-Pamlico Sound peninsula, the Partnership for the Sounds renovated
the 1938 Columbia Theater as an environmental and cultural history museum
for Tyrrell County.
In Elizabeth City, Bryan and Emily Edge converted the 1946 Love State
Theater into the Carolina Theatre and Grille, a dinner theater showing first
run films.
In other towns, the attempt to save historic theaters continues. Shelby and
Washington associations are raising funds to restore their downtown
theaters. In Spruce Pine, Bill Hudson and partner Davis Godwin are
renovating the Carolina Theatre there, once home to the weekly radio show
“Carolina Barn Dance,” an early rival to Nashville’s Grand Ole Opry.
“I remember seeing Tex Ritter and his horse on this stage,” Hudson recalls.
“I’ve got a lot of memories about this place, and I want to bring it back.”
For more information on North Carolina theatres and film festivals, visit:
www.carolinatheatre.org
(for Durham),
www.carolinatheatre.com
(for Greensboro),
www.ashevillefilmfestival.com
www.RiverRunFilm.com
(for Winston-Salem)
www.carolinatheater.org
(for Charlotte).
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