United Artists Theatre

[Gistok]

LOL at 56packman [[who was there when the Michigan Theatre was gutted, and the fixtures of the UA and lobby fixtures of the obscure Downtown RKO Theatre were sold off)... I think that one unique theatre experience like that is enough...

MIRepublic... you know I'd probably explode if I tried fighting the urge to post something. [[I just like to add new stuff each time I post about it.)

Sorry Huggybear... no SimDetroit.... just old Movie Palace books and Preservation Wayne touring notes.

Detroit500... the Nederlander folks only have performances at the Fisher. They used to also have some of their larger shows at the Masonic Temple Theatre. But the Masonic folks were not happy, because the Nederlander shows there were few and far between...

The Fox shows are handled by Olympia Entertainment, the Ilitch entertainment subsidiary, and with Mike Ilitch paying off the mountain of overdue utility bills of the Masonic Temple [[thus saving the entire complex from closing), they now do the bookings for the 4404 seat Masonic Temple Theatre, as well as the bookings for the Masonic's 1585 seat Scottish Rite Theatre..

As for the question of whether or not a restored 2000+ seat United Artists Theatre is needed? That is a good question. With the demise of the 1800 seat Madison several years back, and the recent razing of the 1700 seat Adams Theatre, there are now no longer any other unrestored movie palaces left in the Theatre District [[well there's the 900 seat National Theatre, but that's a smaller venue and is located farther away near the financial district, and the 4050 seat Michigan would cost an unrealistic $50-$75 million to restore).

Right now there is no need for an additional theatre. But it would be myopic to think that perhaps there may not be a need in the future for a 2,000 seat venue, should the entertainment district ever expand.

Cincinnati, Philadelphia and Baltimore made the mistake many years ago of destroying every one of their downtown movie palaces. And when the need arose for some performance venue, there were none to "harvest". So those cities had to build anew... which is very expensive.

One of the things that the Detroit United Artists has going in its' favor is its absolutely phenomenal acoustics. C. Howard Crane said "if an auditorium was pleasing to the eye, then it would be pleasing to the ear as well." He developed great accoustics in his 1919 Orchestra Hall, and 1922 Capitol Theatre [[now Detroit Opera House). By 1928 his acoustic magic was perfected with the UA.

Acoustics are more often than not problematic in new performance venues. The NYC Philharmonic moved out of Avery Fisher Hall [[at Lincoln Center) and into the old Carnegie Hall, because of mediocre acoustics. Even the NYC Metropolitan Opera House [[also at 1966 built Lincoln Center) is certain death for small voices.

On the otherhand... entertainment venues [[with the exception of symphonic and operatic venues) really don't need to be acoustically perfect, due to the advances of sound amplification. But if no use is found currently for this venue, then it should be mothballed for possible future use. Because it would be a shame to destroy this beauty, especially when both artistically and acoustically it was one of a kind, and could realistically never be recreated.

If one were to make a list of the best Detroit movie palaces [[according to movie palace architectural critics), the top 4 would likely be the Fox [[1st), followed [[in no particular order) by the Michigan, old [[pre-1961) Fisher and the United Artists.