| Keith-Albee Theatre | |||||||||||||||||
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"The Keith Albee" | |||||||||||||||||
 The Keith-Albee Theatre in 2015 | |||||||||||||||||
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| General information | |||||||||||||||||
| Type | Performing Arts Center | ||||||||||||||||
| Address | 925 4th Ave | ||||||||||||||||
| Town or city | Huntington, West Virginia | ||||||||||||||||
| Country | USA | ||||||||||||||||
| Named for | Keith-Albee-Orpheum | ||||||||||||||||
| Opened | 1928 | ||||||||||||||||
| Design and construction | |||||||||||||||||
| Architect(s) | Thomas W. Lamb | ||||||||||||||||
| Website | |||||||||||||||||
| Official Website | |||||||||||||||||
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The Keith-Albee Theatre is a performing arts center in downtown Huntington, West Virginia, United States.
At the time of its construction, the Keith Albee Theatre, named after Keith-Albee-Orpheum, was thought to be the second largest theater in the United States. [2] The theater, built by brothers A. B. and S. J. Hyman from Huntington, opened to the public on May 7, 1928.. [3]
The new theater was built under the guidance of vaudeville moguls B. F. Keith and Edward Albee and soon became a key venue in their esteemed Keith-Albee circuit, a premier vaudeville tour along the East Coast of the United States. The Keith-Albee Theatre was designed by the renowned Scottish-born architect Thomas W. Lamb, who created approximately 150 theaters around the globe.
Seating approximately 3,000 patrons, the Keith-Albee exemplified the opulence and grandeur of the 1920s with a Mexican Baroque design style. Intricate plasterwork, chandeliers, and balconies created an atmosphere of sophistication, along with cosmetic rooms, smoking rooms, and fireplaces in men’s and women’s restrooms adjoining the main lobby.
The Keith-Albee cost $2 million USD to construct in 1928 and was dubbed a “temple of amusement” by the Herald-Dispatch. [4] The opening day performance on May 8, 1928, featured performer Rae Samuels, nicknamed the “Blue Streak of Vaudeville.” [5]
The Keith-Albee originally was equipped with a Wurlitzer organ to accompany live performances and motion pictures. The organ was said to be capable of creating almost any sound effect needed for the silent films shown in the theater. The organ was removed and sold in the 1950s after live musical accompaniment had lost some of its appeal. Following an effort by Huntington native Robert Edmunds and his Huntington Theatre Organ Project, a 1927 Wurlitzer organ was purchased and reinstalled in the Keith-Albee in 2001. [6]
In the 1960s and 1970s, the Keith-Albee and the Hyman family began to feel the impact of competition from the growing television and motion picture industries. Faced with significant competition from surround-sound multiplexes, the Hymans divided Keith-Albee's main auditorium into three movie theaters. Two smaller theaters were constructed in the east and west sections of the main auditorium. A fourth theater was later added in a street-facing retail space and has since become a screening room. [3]
In celebration of its 50th anniversary in 1978, the Keith-Albee featured a recreation of a vaudeville show starring singer Rudy Vallee. Ten years later in 1988, the theater hosted a pre-opening screening of the movie Rain Man . Star Dustin Hoffman, Barry Levinson and Mark Johnson attended the event.
On December 12, 2006, the Keith-Albee hosted the premiere of the feature film We Are Marshall, with actors Matthew McConaughey and Matthew Fox, plus director Joseph McGinty Nichol (known as McG) attending. [7] The theatre appears in the movie. Later that year in 2006, the Keith-Albee ended its run as a functioning movie theater and, after almost 80 years of ownership, the Hyman family donated it to the Marshall University Foundation, which in turn passed it over to the newly formed Keith-Albee Performing Arts Center Foundation (KAPAC).
The Alabama Theatre is a movie palace in Birmingham, Alabama. It was built in 1927 by Paramount's Publix Theatres chain as its flagship theater for the southeastern region of the United States. Seating 2,500 people at the time, it was the largest in the Birmingham theater district. The district was once home to many large theaters and movie palaces that featured vaudeville, performing arts, nickelodeons and Hollywood films. Built to show silent films, the Alabama still features its original Wurlitzer theater organ. The Alabama Theatre and Lyric Theatre are the district's only remaining theaters, and as of 2024, both are in operation.
Thomas White Lamb was a Scottish-born, American architect. He was one of the foremost designers of theaters and cinemas of the 20th century.
The Bay Theatre is a single-screen movie theater in Seal Beach, California, United States. It is best known for its screenings of foreign and independent films, and for its revival screenings. The Bay Theatre is also home to a Wurlitzer organ, which is used for concerts and silent film screenings.
The Keith-Albee-Orpheum Corporation was the owner of a chain of vaudeville and motion picture theatres. It was formed by the merger of the holdings of Benjamin Franklin Keith and Edward Franklin Albee II and Martin Beck's Orpheum Circuit.
The Paramount Theatre is a 2,807-seat performing arts venue located at 9th Avenue and Pine Street in the downtown core of Seattle, Washington, United States. The theater originally opened on March 1, 1928, as the Seattle Theatre, with 3,000 seats. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 9, 1974, and has also been designated a City of Seattle landmark.
The Gillioz Theatre is a historic theater located at Springfield, Missouri, United States. It was built by M. E. Gillioz of Monett, Missouri. Mr. Gillioz was in the business of building bridges, and the theater was built with steel and concrete. Wood was only used for handrails, doors, and doorframes. The original cost of the building was $300,000. Renovation costs totaled approximately $1.9 million.
The Count Basie Center for the Arts, originally Count Basie Theatre, is a landmarked performing arts center in Red Bank, New Jersey.
The Colonial Theatre is located in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, at 227 Bridge Street. Built in 1903, the "Colonial Opera House" became a preeminent venue for movies, traveling shows and live entertainment throughout the 20th century. The three-screen venue consists of the original 658-seat ‘vaudeville house’ and two newer additional theatres in the adjacent National Bank of Phoenixville building (c.1925).
An atmospheric theatre is a type of movie palace design which was popular in the late 1920s. Atmospheric theatres were designed and decorated to evoke the feeling of a particular time and place for patrons, through the use of projectors, architectural elements and ornamentation that evoked a sense of being outdoors. This was intended to make the patron a more active participant in the setting.
The Robert Morton Organ Company was an American producer of theater pipe organs and church organs, located in Van Nuys, California. Robert Morton was the number two volume producer of theatre organs, building approximately half as many organs as the industry leader Wurlitzer. The name Robert Morton was derived not from any person in the company, but rather from the name of company president Harold J. Werner's son, Robert Morton Werner.
Rosa Rio was the stage name of American concert pianist Elizabeth Raub, who also provided scores and arrangement for theater, radio, television and film productions later becoming a teacher of music and voice. She started her career as a theatre performer before becoming a silent film accompanist, after which she became a leading organist on network radio and television for soap operas and dramas. In 1993 she reprised her film accompaniment career in Florida, providing the scores for early productions, some of which she had accompanied some 80 years earlier, on their release to cinema.
The Palace Theatre is a 2,695-seat restored movie palace located at 34 W. Broad Street in Columbus, Ohio. It was designed and built in 1926 by the American architect Thomas W. Lamb as part of the American Insurance Union Citadel. Today the theater functions as a multi-use performing arts venue. It is owned and operated by The Columbus Association for the Performing Arts. The Palace Theater's "house" is considered separate from LeVeque Tower, while the marquee and lobby are part of the LeVeque complex.
The Boston Opera House, also known as the Citizens Bank Opera House, is a performing arts and esports venue located at 539 Washington St. in Boston, Massachusetts. It was originally built as the B.F. Keith Memorial Theatre, a movie palace in the Keith-Albee chain. The chain became part of RKO when it was established just before the theater opened on October 29, 1928, and it was also known as the RKO Keith's Theater. After operating for more than 50 years as a movie theater, it was rededicated in 1980 as a home for the Opera Company of Boston, which performed there until the opera company closed down in 1990 due to financial problems. The theater was reopened in 2004 after a major restoration, and it currently serves as the home of the Boston Ballet and also hosts touring Broadway shows.
The RKO Keith's Theater was an RKO Pictures movie theater at 135-35 Northern Boulevard in the Flushing neighborhood of Queens in New York City. It was designed by architect Thomas W. Lamb and built in 1928. While the RKO Keith's had a plain three-story facade, its interior was elaborately designed in a Spanish Baroque Revival style. The theater had a square ticket lobby and an oval grand foyer, which led to the double-level auditorium. The auditorium was designed as an atmospheric theater with a blue ceiling and gilded-plaster decorations; it contained 2,974 seats across two levels. There were also four lounges and a mezzanine promenade.
B.F. Keith's Theatre (1894–1928) in Boston, Massachusetts, was a vaudeville playhouse run by B.F. Keith. It sat across from Boston Common in the city's theatre district, with an entrance on Tremont Street and another on Washington Street. Personnel included Keith, E.F. Albee and H.E. Gustin. Virgilio Tojetti painted some of the interior decorations. In 1939, the theater was converted to a movie theater named the Normandie.
The San Gabriel Mission Playhouse is a historic performing arts venue located in the Mission District of the city of San Gabriel, California, United States.
The Orpheum Circuit was a chain of vaudeville and movie theaters. It was founded in 1886, and operated through 1927 when it was merged into the Keith-Albee-Orpheum corporation, ultimately becoming part of the Radio-Keith-Orpheum (RKO) corporation.
The Stavros Niarchos Foundation Parkway, or simply the Parkway, is a movie theater located at 5 West North Avenue in Baltimore, Maryland. The Parkway is open as of May 3, 2017, and is the new permanent home of MdFF. The Maryland Film Festival, a 5-day annual festival created and operated by MdFF, is housed in and around the Parkway and throughout the Station North Arts and Entertainment District.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Huntington, West Virginia, USA.
The Neptune Theatre, formerly known as U-Neptune Theatre, is a performing arts venue in the University District neighborhood of Seattle, Washington, United States. Opened in 1921, the 1,000 capacity venue hosts a variety of events, including dance and music performances, film screenings, and arts education. It was primarily used for screening classic films prior to a 2011 renovation. In 2014, the theater and building were designated a Seattle landmark.
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