The Saenger Theatre is a historic

theater Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors to present experiences of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The performers may communi ...

and contributing building to the

Lower Dauphin Street Historic District The Lower Dauphin Street Historic District is a historic district in the city of Mobile, Alabama, United States. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on February 9, 1979. The district encompasses all of Dauphin Street fr ...

Mobile, Alabama Mobile ( , ) is a city and the county seat of Mobile County, Alabama, United States. The population was 187,041 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. After a successful vote to annex areas west of the city limits in July 2023, Mobil ...

. It was dedicated in January 1927. The Saenger Theatre is a Mobile landmark, known for its architecture and ties to local cultural history. The theater has been completely renovated in recent years with an upgraded electrical system, VIP facilities, new stage rigging and sound system. It is the official home of the Mobile Symphony Orchestra and also serves as the venue for movie festivals, concerts, lectures and special events.

History

When ''The Saenger'' opened on January 19, 1927, it was the sixty-first Saenger theatre of a chain founded by the Saenger brothers, Julian and Abe of

Shreveport Shreveport ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Louisiana. It is the List of municipalities in Louisiana, third-most populous city in Louisiana after New Orleans and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Baton Rouge. The bulk of Shreveport is in Caddo Parish, Lo ...

. The Saengers were

pharmacist A pharmacist, also known as a chemist in English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English, is a healthcare professional who is knowledgeable about preparation, mechanism of action, clinical usage and legislation of medications in ...

s when they purchased their first theater in

in 1911. They eventually owned 320 theaters located throughout the

South South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both west and east. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþa ...

Costa Rica Costa Rica, officially the Republic of Costa Rica, is a country in Central America. It borders Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the northeast, Panama to the southeast, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, as well as Maritime bo ...

Cuba Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...

Jamaica Jamaica is an island country in the Caribbean Sea and the West Indies. At , it is the third-largest island—after Cuba and Hispaniola—of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean. Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, west of Hispaniola (the is ...

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

Panama Panama, officially the Republic of Panama, is a country in Latin America at the southern end of Central America, bordering South America. It is bordered by Costa Rica to the west, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north, and ...

and

Puerto Rico ; abbreviated PR), officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, is a Government of Puerto Rico, self-governing Caribbean Geography of Puerto Rico, archipelago and island organized as an Territories of the United States, unincorporated territo ...

. The Saenger Theatre in Mobile took a year to construct at a cost of about 500,000 dollars. Designed by renowned

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs, and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

, Emile Weil, the Saenger featured the following: three-color auditorium lighting, a two-manual, ten-rank Robert Morton

theater organ A theatre organ (also known as a theater organ, or, especially in the United Kingdom, a cinema organ) is a type of pipe organ developed to accompany silent films from the 1900s to the 1920s. Theatre organs have horseshoe-shaped arrangements of ...

, full stage facilities to accommodate large road shows including stage and wardrobe traps, four floors of dressing rooms, musicians' and chorus rooms and 2,615 seats. Around 1950, the seats on the floor were replaced and respaced, reducing the seating capacity to about 2,200. Seating capacity today is 1,921. The Saenger Theatre's decoration was described as, "the motif of a French palace of the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) is a Periodization, period of history and a European cultural movement covering the 15th and 16th centuries. It marked the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and was characterized by an effort to revive and sur ...

." It was inspired by classical

Greek mythology Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the Ancient Greece, ancient Greeks, and a genre of ancient Greek folklore, today absorbed alongside Roman mythology into the broader designation of classical mythology. These stories conc ...

and Mobile's coastal location.

Poseidon Poseidon (; ) is one of the twelve Olympians in ancient Greek religion and mythology, presiding over the sea, storms, earthquakes and horses.Burkert 1985pp. 136–139 He was the protector of seafarers and the guardian of many Hellenic cit ...

is cast above the front entrance and the interior plaster ornamentation includes:

Dionysus In ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, myth, Dionysus (; ) is the god of wine-making, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, festivity, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, and theatre. He was also known as Bacchus ( or ; ...

above the proscenium, Maenads encircling the chandelier in the lounge, Pan beneath the organ grilles and various stylized

seahorse A seahorse (also written ''sea-horse'' and ''sea horse'') is any of 46 species of small marine Osteichthyes, bony fish in the genus ''Hippocampus''. The genus name comes from the Ancient Greek (), itself from () meaning "horse" and () meanin ...

s, shells and fish throughout the theater. The color scheme of the interior was primarily sea-green with maroon and gold trim. The ceilings featured a variety of ''

trompe-l'œil ; ; ) is an artistic term for the highly realistic optical illusion of three-dimensional space and objects on a Two-dimensional space, two-dimensional surface. , which is most often associated with painting, tricks the viewer into perceiving p ...

'' decoration. The building was designed in a continental style, intended to resemble European opera houses. The theater's opera boxes that were located beneath the organ grilles were later removed to improve sight-lines when the larger

Cinemascope CinemaScope is an anamorphic format, 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 cr ...

movie screen was installed. Other outstanding architectural features of the original building included: the tilted arcade, grand marble staircase, ornate lamps, chandeliers, statuary and door frames, a mezzanine and promenade. There were lavish furnishings in the men's "Stage Room" and the ladies' "At the Sign of the Lipstick" lounge, which included draperies and carpets with the name of the theater woven into the fabric. At the dedication ceremonies, then Mayor Harry T. Hartwell and State Senator John Craft were joined by J.L. Bedsole, then President of the Mobile Chamber of Commerce, in addressing the large crowd gathered for the occasion. Mrs. W.G. Ward, a representative of the

United Daughters of the Confederacy The United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC) is an American neo-Confederate hereditary association for female descendants of Confederate Civil War soldiers engaging in the commemoration of these ancestors, the funding of monuments to them, a ...

, presented a portrait of General

Robert E. Lee Robert Edward Lee (January 19, 1807 – October 12, 1870) was a general officers in the Confederate States Army, Confederate general during the American Civil War, who was appointed the General in Chief of the Armies of the Confederate ...

for the theater's foyer, as the dedication date was the General's 119th birthday. Through the years, the Saenger provided Mobilians with outstanding theatrical entertainment on the live stage and motion picture screen. The Saenger hosted

silent movie ''Silent Movie'' is a 1976 American satirical silent comedy film co-written, directed by and starring Mel Brooks, released by 20th Century Fox in summer 1976. The ensemble cast includes Dom DeLuise, Marty Feldman, Bernadette Peters, and S ...

vaudeville Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment which began in France in the middle of the 19th century. A ''vaudeville'' was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a drama ...

shows, movies, dramatic and musical productions and was the setting for the first America's Junior Miss pageant. However—as was the case with many of these grand movie palaces—ownership changes, high maintenance costs and various other issues rendered many of these beautiful buildings nationwide, "

white elephant A white elephant is a possession that its owner cannot dispose of without extreme difficulty, and whose cost, particularly that of maintenance, is out of proportion to its usefulness. In modern usage, it is a metaphor used to describe an object, ...

s". In fact, many were demolished to make way for parking lots and general urban development.

Restoration

In early 1970, owners

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Broadcasting * Aliw Broadcasting Corporation, Philippine broadcast company * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial American ...

Paramount Paramount (from the word ''paramount'' meaning "above all others") may refer to: Entertainment and music companies * Paramount Global, also known simply as Paramount, an American mass media company formerly known as ViacomCBS. **Paramount Picture ...

closed the Mobile Saenger and removed the projection equipment and prepared to demolish the site. On the eve of demolition, the

University of South Alabama The University of South Alabama (USA) is a public research university in Mobile, Alabama, United States. It was created by the Alabama Legislature in May 1963 and replaced existing extension programs operated in Mobile by the University of Alaba ...

bought the Saenger and saved it from destruction. It was partially renovated and reopened as a performing arts center called the USA Saenger Theatre. On October 1, 1999, the City of Mobile purchased the Saenger from the University of South Alabama. A new non-profit organization, called the Center for the Living Arts, Inc., was formed early in the year 2000 to operate the Saenger. The Center for the Living Arts, with donations from the community, restored the historic Mobile Saenger at a cost of about six million dollars. Active in the renovation was businessman Massey Palmer Bedsole Jr., and his wife, former

State Senator A state senator is a member of a State legislature (United States), state's senate in the bicameral legislature of 49 U.S. states, or a member of the unicameral Nebraska Legislature. History There are typically fewer state senators than there ...

Ann Bedsole of Mobile. The Saenger Theatre of Mobile now functions as downtown Mobile's premiere live music concert venue and performing arts center and is the official home of the Mobile Symphony Orchestra. The Saenger features the annual "Summer Movie Series" and presents numerous concerts, lectures and special events.

Oak View Group Oak View Group, LLC (OVG) is an American professional sports and commercial real estate company based in Denver. It manages several sports venues, including Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle, which was constructed under the company's supervision. ...

oversees operations of the historic Saenger Theatre on behalf of the City of Mobile.

References

External links

Mobile Saenger Theatre
{{Authority control History of Mobile, Alabama Movie palaces Saenger theatres Cultural institutions in Mobile, Alabama Buildings and structures in Mobile, Alabama Emile Weil buildings Vaudeville theaters Historic district contributing properties in Alabama National Register of Historic Places in Mobile, Alabama Theatres on the National Register of Historic Places in Alabama 1927 establishments in Alabama Cinemas and movie theaters in Alabama Theatres completed in 1927

History

Restoration

See also

References

External links