Beverly Theater

• Mary Tiegreen Wow! What a beautiful building! I remember so many afternoons there. Sat through Bye Bye Birdie twice with my friend Tracy Davis.

  February 6 at 12:30am · Like · 1
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  Darlynne Davis Vrechek LOVED this theater, sitting in the balcony.

  February 6 at 1:48am · Like · 2
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  Karen Holck Ketterman We always sat in the balcony in the middle 1st row. My step father was asst manager. We got in early with free green rivers and black cherry cola and popcorn.

  February 6 at 3:03am · Like · 2
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  Karen Holck Ketterman It is odd seeing the old ticket booth where I was a cashier.

  February 6 at 5:13am · Like · 2
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  Lee Kelly The first movie I "remember" seeing there was Shane with Alan Ladd.

  July 28 at 4:34pm · Like
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  Annette Rozmin Song of Bernadette.

  July 28 at 6:10pm · Like · 1
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  Mary Jane Cole I would eat popcorn and candy then go to the ice cream shop and have a sundae! I think it was called Le Bon Ton.

  4 hours ago · Like
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  Paula Eyvonne Hamilton Since we didn't have a car, we more often went where a bus could take us, like the Lyric in Blue Island or Evergreen Plaza theater.

  4 hours ago · Like
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  Kristine Lang They always had buses that ran down 95th St

  4 hours ago via mobile · Like
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  Paula Eyvonne Hamilton That would have been three bus transfers for us - Mom would usually not let us do that many!

The Beverly Theatre was located on 95th Street in the Beverly neighborhood of Chicago and opened on June 4, 1935. Adjoining the movie house was an ice cream parlor, called the Bon Bon.

Operated originally by James Coston, who was head of Warner Brothers Midwest, it was part of the Warner Bros. circuit up until the early-1950’s, when the Costons took it over completely, along with other former Warner houses (the Jeffery and Rhodes Theatres). The family continued to run the theater until its closure.

The Beverly Theatre dubbed itself the “Home of the Single Feature” in an age when most other theaters were showing double features plus added shorts. The theatre had a curved screen, four-track magnetic surround sound and was one of the few theatres to have “Perspecta Sound” installed for the screening of Disney’s “Fantasia” in 1940. During the mid-1960’s, the theatre had a 56 week-long run of “The Sound of Music”. It was closed in September 1976, still drawing full houses, with a double feature of “Mother Jugs and Speed” and “Sparkle” being the last films shown at the Beverly Theatre.

The former theatre has housed a church for many years now.

Many thanks to Nick Coston for his valuable information on this theatre!

Beverly Theater Oil Painting

Nick Coston shared Scott Hoffman's photo on Facebook.

Nice, aye?

Bet you have never seen a water color of the Beverly Theatre. (not the best as this is a picture of a picture) Painted by my brother in law.

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If you have photos or stories to share please email them to morganparkhigh@gmail.com and we will post them to this blog. Old time photos and stories or current ones will be fine.