The opulent Hollywood Theater was the third and last of the “movie cathedrals” to open on 7th Street’s Show Row, joining the Worth and the Palace on April 17, 1930.
The Hollywood Theater building was built as an annex to the 1929 Electric Building. Both buildings were designed by Wyatt C. Hedrick in the then-popular art deco style. And both were financed by Houston capitalist Jesse Jones, who in the late 1920s went on a building binge—the Great Depression be hanged!—in a four-block area of downtown Fort Worth. His Fort Worth Properties Corporation built the Electric Building and Hollywood Theater, the Medical Arts Building (1927), the Worth Hotel and Theater (1927), and The Fair Building (1930, now home of the Star-Telegram).
Satellite photo shows the locations of the four buildings built by Jones from 1927 through 1930. Two of the four survive.
This ad by the gas company in the November 27, 1927 Star-Telegram congratulated Jones on his first two Fort Worth buildings: the Medical Arts Building and the Worth Hotel and Theater.
President Roosevelt in 1933 would appoint Jones chairman of the federal Reconstruction Finance Corporation, making Jones so powerful that he was sometimes called “the fourth branch of government.” Jones also later was secretary of commerce.
The Worth Hotel and the Medical Arts Building in 1940. (W. D. Smith photos from Fort Worth in Pictures.)
Also on November 27, 1927 Jones announced plans to build the Electric Building between the Medical Arts Building and the Worth Hotel. Fort Worth Power & Light would be the primary tenant, but FWP&L would soon become “Texas Electric Service Company.”
On February 18, 1929 the Dallas Morning News announced that Jones would add a theater to the Electric Building, which was still under construction. Note that “the old Southwestern Hospital building” stood on the site of the theater.
Southwestern Hospital had opened in 1907 as the sanitarium of Dr. Clay Johnson of Chase Court. The Electric Building was built on the site of St. Paul’s Methodist Episcopal Church.
On April 13 the Star-Telegram printed a two-page spread on the opening of the “palace of enchantment.”
This ad in the April 16 Press by Fort Worth Properties congratulated its new Hollywood Theater but features a sketch of Fort Worth Properties’ The Fair building.
The April 16 Press reported that the opening of the theater would be illuminated by floodlights and documented on film. The new theater would be christened with a bottle of water from Lake Worth. The article pointed out that the theater’s first movie, Flight, was “all-talking” and described the interior of the theater. The theater cost $250,000 ($3.5 million today).
This ad in the April 17 Press used the word sound three times. The Hollywood boasted that it was Fort Worth’s first theater designed to show only talkies.
The April 18 Star-Telegram described the opening ceremony as a “swank society night performance” attended by “five hundred invited guests, many of them in evening clothes.”
Also on April 18 Press columnist Jack Gordon described the opening of “Fort Worth’s newest movie cathedral” “in the best Hollywood premiere fashion.” The Plaza Theater he mentioned was at 110 East 10th Street. The Majestic was at 1101 Commerce Street.
Accompanying Gordon’s column was this “where to go” guide to local theaters. The Majestic and Hippodrome (1106 Main) were still presenting live performances. Note that in 1930 the Poly Theater was on Avenue F (Rosedale today) where the Varsity Theater would later be. (“2006” should be “3006.”)
Show Row by day: the Hollywood, Worth, and, out of view on East 7th at Commerce Street, the Palace.
Show Row by night at Christmas 1952. (Photo from University of Texas at Arlington Libraries.)
This postcard shows the Hollywood Theater as the northern annex. To the left of the theater can be seen First Christian Church and the 1914 Chamber of Commerce Auditorium.
By 1940 the Worth, Hollywood, Palace, and Majestic, along with the Bowie, Tivoli, Varsity, and Parkway, were theaters of the Interstate chain. (W. D. Smith photo in Fort Worth in Pictures.)
The Electric Building and Hollywood Theater annex today.
The 1970s were not kind to Show Row. In October 1976 Majestic Theatres, the company that had leased the Hollywood Theater for three years, announced that it had lost its lease and would close the theater, which was then showing “films appealing predominately to black audiences.”
The Hollywood closed at the end of October.
With the closing of the Hollywood Theater, Show Row went dark after thirty-one years.
But unlike the Worth (1927-1971) and Palace (1919-1974), the Hollywood building still stands, now converted into apartments. But the theater’s stage, canopy, foyer, hallway, lobby space, balcony stairs, auditorium doors, and six hundred seats of the auditorium survive. Now and then there is talk of bringing the theater back to life.
Some views of some of the surviving opulence that was the Hollywood Theater:
The entrance on West 7th Street.
Details of the foyer.
Hallway from the foyer to the lobby.
Hallway ceiling light fixture.
Ceiling of the theater lobby.
Stairs lead from the lobby to the balconies, some of which survives.
Lobby ceiling detail.
On the left are the stairs leading to the balconies; beyond are the doors from the lobby to the auditorium.
Auditorium doors.
Lobby wall detail.
The Hollywood Theater is now a drive-in theater. Well, in a way. The lower level of the auditorium is now a parking garage for tenants. Below are details of the ceiling of the Hollywood Theater auditorium/parking garage:
(Thanks to the staff of the Historic Electric Building for access.)
We have enjoyed this post and pix every time we see them. There is so much left of this place, but so much expensive stuff to fix. Will these pix remain lovely “Ruin porn” forever?
Oh, well, ruins do inspire poets. What rhymes with “Detroit,” “ghosts,” “Fort Worth,” “Popcorn scent? I could go on and on.
Thank you, Sally and Tom. It is indeed a hidden treasure that should be given a second life.
Who did you have to contact in order to get access to the staff of the Historic Electric Building?
I was escorted by a woman of the building management staff, but I do not recall her name. (817) 877-0433
These pictures are priceless, thank you for sharing, this is the downtown Fort Worth I remember with joy.
You are very welcome, Ms. Wortham.
I worked in the Hollywood as usher and projectionist.
Hello,
Where can I find pictures of the inside of the theater, from when it was live.
Mohamed, the UTA Library has the photo archives of the Star-Telegram and commercial photographer W. D. Smith. Maybe there are some photos of the Hollywood there. I have not seen any.
Actually the auditorium is still mostly intact. Only the lower level seating was removed to make the parking garage. It’s honestly quite breath taking in the auditorium.
New owners are going to try to lease what’s left of the theatre. See the listing on line. It includes some great pictures. I was lucky to see all the pics when I was talking with the owners rep. Let’s hope the city and public steps up and supports it and make something happen.
Half of the theatre is still there, just sealed off. No lights, dust, critters, etc. I need to pressure my friend to get me in. He’s seen it and says it’s amazing and sad.
Any photos of the sealed off areas? I saw some on another site years ago but I cannot find them. Thanks
Logan, the areas I was escorted through by management are not normally open to the public (except the tenant parking garage). If more exists, I was not told about it.
Just saw this, wow! I love all the old downtown theatres. I have 8×10 photos of the Hollywood, Worth, and Palace. I would love to find interior photos of these theatres. I have a friend that says he can get me inside of what remains of the Hollywood. He’s a procrastinator! The mezzanine, balcony, and part of the screen area are still there. Love the post!
Thanks, Logan. Yeah, several of my photos of what remains of the interior of the Hollywood are at the bottom of the post.
To everyone surprise the Hollywood theater is still there it was just walled up. I walked through it today and took pics. It’s amazing. The stage and balcony.
Yeah, I got a tour last year and took those photos of what remains.
Can you share the photos?
Good work, Mike. Thanks for your work in keeping the record straight. There are elements in this dump, I mean cess pool, I mean city, that would delete this from history. Tear it down, put up something fast and cheap. Then tax, tax, tax. Of course, my good buddy DR. J. FRANK NORRIS was against movies, ice cream, etc., anything that might cut into his offering take.
Thanks, Earl. Kids today would not believe the kind of movie theaters we attended. If we tried to describe such places to kids, they’d think we were talking about cathedrals.
Do you know if any of the theatre signage was saved? Are there museums for that sort of thing?
The staff of the Historic Electric Building is too young to remember the theater and did not know much about its history or disposition of its relics.
Thanks Mike, I had not realized it was two separate entrances (7th and 6th). Still a shame nobody has done anything with the foyer/lobby of the old movie house. Vaguely remember it. Why go downtown when you could walk to the Poly, right?
It’s a complicated building/buildings with doors on three sides. I can’t recall that we could hear the movies through the wall in the Star-Telegram building.
I don’t think I started going to the downtown theaters until I started driving and dating. Until then it was walking to the Poly Theater for me.
Hi Mike. Excuse my ignorance, but those pictures at the end of you article, are the lobby of the old Hollywood theatre right? The confusion is that I thought the theatre itself was now a parking garage for the Historic Electric Building apartments. So I guess the parking is everything but the old lobby, which as you stated is showing its age. You ought to show those pictures to the Bass brothers and shame them.
The foyer, hall, lobby, and balcony stairs of the theater remain fairly unchanged. The auditorium of the theater–where you sat to watch the movie–is now a parking garage. Because the theater had such a high ceiling they were able to add a second floor for parking, with some of the original auditorium ceiling ornamentation remaining on the top floor of the parking garage. The foyer is on West 7th. The parking garage entrance is on West 6th. That long hall leads from the foyer on West 7th through the tall part of the building to the short annex behind the tall part. So, people live in the Electric Building but park in the attached theater annex.