Theater
| Orpheum Theatre and Site | |
| U.S. National Register of Historic Places | |
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| Location: | 405 Main St., Dubuque, Iowa |
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| Coordinates: | 42°29′52″N 90°39′55″W / 42.49778°N 90.66528°W / 42.49778; -90.66528Coordinates: 42°29′52″N 90°39′55″W / 42.49778°N 90.66528°W / 42.49778; -90.66528 |
| Built: | 1910 |
| Architect: | Rapp and Rapp |
| Governing body: | Local |
| NRHP Reference#: | 72000474 |
| Added to NRHP: | November 14, 1972 |
The Five Flags Theater was constructed as the Majestic Theater in 1910, replacing a theatre originally built in 1864, that was destroyed by fire that year. It had been purchased then renovated by local prominent businessman Harker Brentnal Spensley, Sr. and his partner, C. H. Eighmey. The rebuilt theater was designed by George L. Rapp, who eventually became one of the nation's premier theater architects. It was converted to a movie house in 1920 and renamed 'Spensley Theater' in 1929. Constructed in a Renaissance Revival style with French influences, it was later renamed the RKO Orpheum and used to show movies. Eventually, it fell into disrepair and was slated for demolition during urban renewal in 1969.
A committee made up of concerned citizens began a fund drive to save the theater, which was incorporated in the Five Flags Center project in 1972. Restoration was begun in 1975, and the theater was reopened in 1976 as the Five Flags Theater. It is currently the home of the Dubuque Symphony Orchestra, high school musicals, and occasional concerts and ballet productions.
Read more about this topic: Five Flags Center
Famous quotes containing the word theater:
“Will TV kill the theater? If the programs I have seen, save for “Kukla, Fran and Ollie,” the ball games and the fights, are any criterion, the theater need not wake up in a cold sweat.”
—Tallulah Bankhead (1903–1968)
“The theater needs continual reminders that there is nothing more debasing than the work of those who do well what is not worth doing at all.”
—Gore Vidal (b. 1925)
“The primary function of a theater is not to please itself, or even to please its audience. It is to serve talent.”
—Robert Brustein (b. 1927)