Avalon Theatre, established as the Sunnyside Theatre in 1912, is the oldest operating
movie theater
A movie theater (American English), cinema (British English), or cinema hall ( Indian English), also known as a movie house, picture house, the movies, the pictures, picture theater, the silver screen, the big screen, or simply theater is a ...
in
Portland
Portland most commonly refers to:
* Portland, Oregon, the largest city in the state of Oregon, in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States
* Portland, Maine, the largest city in the state of Maine, in the New England region of the northeas ...
,
Oregon
Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...
, and is believed to be the state's oldest theater and the first with more than one screen.
History
Located at the intersection of Southeast Belmont Street and 35th Avenue in the city's
Sunnyside neighborhood, the location of the Avalon Theatre had been formerly used as a
mortuary and later a
brothel
A brothel, bordello, ranch, or whorehouse is a place where people engage in sexual activity with prostitutes. However, for legal or cultural reasons, establishments often describe themselves as massage parlors, bars, strip clubs, body rub par ...
before being converted into a theatre in 1912, operating as the Sunnyside Theatre.
Known for showing second-run films on two screens and for low prices, the theater has an
Art Deco
Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...
design but Avalon's main feature is its classic nickel
arcade, which was established in conjunction with the theatre in 1925.
The establishment is operated by McKee Enterprises, who own the Wunderland arcade company which operates at the theatre.
[ John McKee purchased the Avalon in 1964, and became the first cinema in Portland to operate with multiple screens.
In 2008, '' Portland Monthly'' named the Avalon the "Best Way to Stretch a Dollar" on their "Best of the City" list.]
See also
* Belmont, Portland, Oregon
The Belmont Area is a retail and residential district running along SE Belmont St. in the inner Southeast section of Portland, Oregon, Portland, Oregon in a parallel fashion to the Hawthorne, Portland, Oregon, Hawthorne District, 6 blocks to the ...
References
External links
www.wunderlandgames.com
{{Theatres in Portland, Oregon
1912 establishments in Oregon
Art Deco architecture in Oregon
Sunnyside, Portland, Oregon
Theatres completed in 1912
Theatres in Portland, Oregon