Located between McGill College and Metcalfe on Sainte-Catherine Street West, the Capitol, the Cinéma de Paris, the Loews, the Palace and the Pigalle (Strand) were notable witnesses of Montreal nightlife.
Rue Sainte-Catherine in the evening in 1972.
Heritage Montreal, Personal collection of Dinu Bumbaru
Since the construction of Ouimetoscope in 1906, around sixty performance halls have been established in Montreal. However, only a few have reached us.
“Too many theaters from the 1910s, 1920s or 1930s have unfortunately disappeared,” recalls Dinu Bumbaru, director of policies at Héritage Montréal. Already in 1973, barely founded, the organization Sauvons Montréal deplored the disappearance of the Strand and the Capitol, two huge cinemas with careful decor on Sainte-Catherine Street. »
Demonstration for the preservation of the Capitol on October 11, 1973. The Capitol, the Pigalle, as well as all the buildings on the south side of Sainte-Catherine Street, between McGill College and Metcalfe, were demolished in December 1973, with the exception of the restaurant Dunn’s and Cinéma de Paris. The Capitol site is today occupied by an office building, the current Rogers Tower.
BAnQ digital: La Presse, October 13, 1973, Corrected pages p.A3 – Photo by Michel Gravel
Closed, abandoned or demolished? The fate of these emblematic places of entertainment has aroused a lot of attention and concern among the Montreal population, as well as among organizations specializing in cultural dissemination and heritage.
This mobilization also led to some more positive achievements.
In 1977, the old Granada in the Maisonneuve district was transformed for the use of the performing arts and became the Denise-Pelletier theater.
In 1987, the sale of the Outremont theater to a developer who wanted to install offices, shops and a restaurant-cabaret there generated strong reactions. The local population is mobilizing for its preservation with the support of Héritage Montréal and Sauvons Montréal.
The theater was cited as a historic monument by the City of Outremont the same year, a first protection relating to its exterior architecture, then classified by the government of Quebec, which protects the interior. It was eventually acquired by the municipality and regained its vocation as a place of broadcasting after renovations carried out in the 2000s.
• Also read: The Rialto is 100 years old! A theater saved by passion for heritage
First studies
In 1988, a first study was published on historic Montreal theaters and cinemas by art historian Jocelyne Martineau, specially commissioned by the Quebec Ministry of Cultural Affairs and the City of Montreal.
The following year, Héritage Montréal organized a symposium on the preservation of historic cinemas at the Rialto. Informed by the experience of other North American cities, this meeting will lead to a study on the potential for revitalizing several old movie theaters, particularly for cultural purposes.
The initiative has concrete results. The Montreal Architectural Heritage Real Estate Company (SIMPA) launched a call for proposals in 1989 to revitalize the former Corona Theater (Beanfield today) in Little Burgundy.
Several of these former theaters and cinemas were listed and protected along with their interiors in the 1990s. Despite this, their fate remains largely in the hands of the owners.
From abandonment to revitalization?
Abandonment is sometimes fatal to this heritage, as shown by the cases of the York and the Seville in the city center, demolished in 2001 and 2010.
In Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, an arson attack damaged the Snowdon, owned by the City of Montreal, in 2016, while it was vacant. Subsequently sold, the real estate project finalized in 2022 maintains the appearance of the facade streamline modern with its emblematic sign.
Spared by the fire, the metal letters of the original sign were thrown away. “We found them on an online sales platform,” remembers Anthony Plagnes Payá, head of communications at Héritage Montréal. Of the whole lot, there were only a few letters left like the T and the H.”
Still in the same neighborhood, Fabienne Colas
Great Sex, in 2021. Subsequently vacant, the entrance to the former theater has hosted a branch of a chain of grilled chicken restaurants since March 2024.
Hope remains for some of them. A popular lingerie retailer on rue Saint-Hubert, owner of (1922), carried out in 2024 the restoration of the facade and the decor of the performance hall created by Emmanuel Briffa. The same goes for the Rivoli, whose badly deteriorated facade is currently being restored.
Examples to follow
Experience shows that in the case of old theaters, the best reconversion, if possible, is to keep their function as a venue.
Thanks to a use close to the original vocation, the Beanfield, Château, Denise-Pelletier, Olympia, Outremont and Rialto, for example, retain their heritage qualities.
Listed in 2012, the Imperial is also a fine example of restoration and requalification from the 1990s. Recently closed, it should soon undertake, with the support of governments and the City of Montreal, major rehabilitation work with ambitious projects. upgrade its equipment.
“The recent events in September linked to the closure of the former Théâtre des Variétés (1921) which became Théâtre La Tulipe nevertheless show the great precariousness of these cultural heritage places,” comments Mr. Bumbaru.
“Let us hope that the upcoming update of the Urban Plan and the City’s Cultural Policy, as well as the adoption in October of a strategy on Montreal’s nightlife, will support the maintenance, restoration and revitalization of these places of culture and entertainment, in the city center and in the districts of the metropolis,” he concludes.
In 2024, the artist Agaboum chose the Théâtre La Tulipe for the creation of the “carte blanche” of the Poster your heritage campaign (5th edition) of the Heritage Montreal Emerging Committee.
Agaboum x Héritage Montréal
Small cinemas: big opportunities
While we often hear about large commercial multi-screen complexes, several original experiences also mark the revival of neighborhood cinemas.
At the turn of the 2000s, cinema adopted a model close to the social economy. Run by a non-profit organization, it is now associated with the Parc and Museum cinemas and all three share common services provided by the same team.
Other initiatives, some of which are located in heritage buildings, show that this type of place is part of the current vitality of our neighborhoods, by offering original film programming that is difficult to see elsewhere. Think of the , the Vu Station in Rivière-des-Prairies or the Public Cinema at Casa Italia.
Let’s get out of Montreal!
An exemplary restoration in San Diego, California, USA.
Panoramic view of the Jacobs Music Center recently restored between 2020 and 2024.
Photo by Richard Barnes, courtesy of the San Diego Symphony Orchestra
Inaugurated on September 28, 2024, the new room of the Jacobs Music Center is a remarkable restoration of the San Diego Fox Theater. The former movie theater from the 1920s is now one of the most beautiful amphitheaters in North America.
Work of architects W. Templeton Johnson and William Day of the firm Weeks and Day, the luxurious palace is rococo with Spanish baroque and French renaissance influences. Like the Rialto, the building was originally designed to accommodate several functions: an imposing 3,000-seat cinema, shops and offices.
Opened with great fanfare a week after the stock market crash of 1929, the Fox Theater in San Diego was then the largest cinema on the West Coast. Very quickly, he became Walt Disney’s favorite for screening the premieres of his films. A prestigious Robert Morton organ was installed in 1932 to animate silent films. Discarded with the arrival of talking cinema in the mid-1930s, the organ was restored in 1967 thanks to the intervention of San Diego Theatre Organ Group.
Downgraded with the arrival of television and despite an adaptation to the performing arts in 1977, the theater was finally closed and handed over to the city of San Diego at the end of the 1970s.
In 1984, the building was sold to the San Diego Symphony Orchestra alongside a real estate project to develop the area. Renovated, the theater reopened its doors to the symphony orchestra public in 1985.
Made possible thanks to a generous donation of 120 million from Joan and Irwin Jacobs, the recent work of the architectural firm HGA was dedicated to highlighting the historic character of the premises, increasing the acoustic capacities of the spaces and the comfort and public accessibility.
To learn about a successful revitalization of a former Montreal theater, consult the Héritage Montréal article on the Rialto on the Journal’s website.
To find out more
on the Rialto in newspaper archives, Montréal Concert Poster Archives (2024)
d’Héritage Montréal “The Beaubien cinema in three stages” (2023)
Article by Yves Desjardins taken from
on “Heritage buildings” relating in particular to the Regent and the Rialto [p. 138 à 144] (2023)
master’s degree (Urban Studies, UQAM), “The requalification of heritage at the neighborhood level in Montreal: the old theater-cinemas and the case of the Rialto theater” by Giulia Verticchio (2020)
from Héritage Montréal on the history of Montreal cinemas (2020)
by Ezio Carosielli on the Rialto presented for Operation Patrimoine, Héritage Montréal and Ville de Montréal (2019)
of the Memory of Mile End/Mémoires des Montréalais (MEM) on the history of the Rialto, (2018)
of Heritage Montreal of InspirAction on the Rialto (2017)
by Pierre Pageau. Cinemas in Quebec1896-2008. Quebec, Les Éditions GID. (2009)
Rapport
Stores, cinemas.
Directory of traditional architecture on the territory of the urban community of Montreal: commercial architecture III, Montreal, CUM, Territorial Planning Service, 413 p. (1985)
