The Villa Theatre is a now-closed movie theater in

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, located at 3092 S. Highland Drive. The theatre was open from December 23, 1949 to February 18, 2003. It now serves as a location for Adib's Rug Gallery.

History

The Villa first opened on December 23, 1949, after being built by then-owners Joseph L. Lawrence and David K. Edwards—the first feature shown was ''

Prince of Foxes ''Prince of Foxes'' is a 1947 historical novel by Samuel Shellabarger, following the adventures of the fictional Andrea Orsini, a captain in the service of Cesare Borgia during his conquest of the Romagna. Plot introduction Andrea Zoppo, an Ita ...

''. The theater had 1300 seats and was built using a

stadium seating Stadium seating or theater seating is a characteristic seating arrangement that is most commonly associated with Performing arts, performing-arts venues, and derives its name from stadiums, which typically use this arrangement. Description In s ...

design that utilized rising seating on a steep incline. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, The Villa was known for being the first Salt Lake City Theater to show new widescreen formats, including

CinemaScope CinemaScope is an anamorphic lens series used, from 1953 to 1967, and less often later, for shooting widescreen films that, crucially, could be screened in theatres using existing equipment, albeit with a lens adapter. Its creation in 1953 by ...

, Technirama-70, and

Cinerama Cinerama is a widescreen process that originally projected images simultaneously from three synchronized 35mm projectors onto a huge, deeply curved screen, subtending 146° of arc. The trademarked process was marketed by the Cinerama corporati ...

. In 1958, the theater became famous for showing a 10-month-long run of South Pacific, drawing Patrons from as far as Idaho and Nevada.History of the Villa
In 1960,

Cinemiracle Cinemiracle was a widescreen cinema format competing with Cinerama developed in the 1950s. It was ultimately unsuccessful, with only a single film produced and released in the format. Like Cinerama it used 3 cameras to capture a 2.59:1 image. Cine ...

, a large, curved screen was installed, reducing the number of seats by approximately 300. A year later,

was installed, which used three projectors instead of one. This was used until 1964, when the system was replaced by a new version that used one projector and

70 mm film 70 mm film (or 65 mm film) is a wide high-resolution film gauge for motion picture photography, with a negative area nearly 3.5 times as large as the standard 35 mm motion picture film format. As used in cameras, the film is wid ...

. There was an expected expansion to the Villa in 1977 by

Mann Theatres Mann Theatres was a movie theater chain that predominantly operated in the western United States, with a heavy concentration of theaters in Southern California. Its motto was "Where Hollywood goes to the movies". History The Mann Theatres chai ...

, though the project was eventually scrapped. In 1981, the Villa was the only theater in Salt Lake City to offer the new Steven Spielberg film "Raiders of the Lost Ark". The Villa was acquired by

Carmike Cinemas Carmike Cinemas was a motion picture exhibitor headquartered in Columbus, Georgia. As of March 2016, the company had 276 theaters with 2,954 screens in 41 states, and was the fourth largest movie theater chain in the United States. The company b ...

in 1993. Repairs were started in 1995 and in 1996 a large renovation closed the theater shortly while the famous neon sign was restored, repairs were made to the auditorium's seat and carpets, and a

Dolby Digital Dolby Digital, originally synonymous with Dolby AC-3, is the name for what has now become a family of audio compression technologies developed by Dolby Laboratories. Formerly named Dolby Stereo Digital until 1995, the audio compression is lossy ...

sound system was installed. In 1998 Carmike Cinemas began a building spree across the Salt Lake Valley, erecting five new multiplexes. This sudden expansion lead to the ultimate demise of many first run theaters built before 1998 in the area. The only theaters left following the expansion were the Carmike 12, Holladay Centre 6, and 5 Star Cinemas. Soon, Carmike Cinemas began to fail financially as a result of building too many multiplexes. In the fall of 2000 Carmike Cinemas entered bankruptcy and The Villa was put up for sale, with a 2.4 million dollar asking price. A sale to Eddie Simatov, owner of the Simatov Oriental Rug Gallery, fell through in 2001, and Carmike Cinemas was forced to hold onto the location. In 2001,

USA Today ''USA Today'' (stylized in all uppercase) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth on September 15, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headquarters in Tysons, Virgini ...

named the Villa Theater on a list of ten great classic theaters in the United States. This decision was criticized by some who said that the theater was run down and undeserving of the acknowledgment. Carmike Cinemas responded by cleaning up and repairing the theater, even taking out an advertisement for the Villa hyping the summer's blockbuster hit Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones. Even as ticket sales increased at the Villa during 2002, the financial improvement was not enough to take the theater off the market. Carmike considered simplifying or replacing the theater's neon sign, which was expensive to maintain and made maintaining a profit extremely difficult.

Wal-Mart Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores from the United States, headquarter ...

looked into the possibility of turning the Villa into a

Neighborhood Market Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores from the United States, headquarter ...

. Instead,

Harmons Harmons Grocery Company, doing business as Harmons Neighborhood Grocer, is an upscale supermarket chain located within the state of Utah, United States, with 19 stores throughout the Wasatch Front and in the St. George area. Description In a ...

Grocery, which operates a grocery store near the Villa Theater, bought the property. Harmons offered to let Carmike Cinemas lease the theater, but they declined.Wal-Mart and the Villa
/ref> The last movie to show at the Villa Theatre was '' The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers'' on 18 February 2003. Despite it being a weekday and the film's considerable length, it drew a large crowd for the theater's final showing. Carmike Cinemas repaired the neon on the theater's sign and marquee during the Villa's last week of operation so that it would be in perfect condition for closing night.

Current uses

After the theater officially shut its doors,

started a sale of the theater to a buyer who wanted to turn it into Club Villa, a night club with a high-tech dance floor. Harmons seemed more interested in turning the largest profit, focusing on the historic legacy of the theatre. Harmons received many offers to turn the Villa back into a movie theater, though they did not accept any of these. Though the deal to the night club group seemed almost certain, it eventually fell through. In 2004 the Villa became a rug gallery with a sale of the theater to Dr. Hamid Adib, owner of Adib's Rug Gallery. Adib wanted to create a museum-like atmosphere, where people could enjoy the fine craftsmanship and elegant beauty of Persian and Oriental rugs and at the same time relive the history of the Villa.

References

External links

History of The Villa

Cinema Treasures Page

A list of news articles about the Villa

{{Coord, 40, 42, 14, N, 111, 51, 09, W, format=dms, display=title, type:landmark_region:US-UT Buildings and structures in Salt Lake City Cinemas and movie theaters in Utah Theatres completed in 1949 1949 establishments in Utah

History

Current uses

See also

References

External links