Bijou Theatre (Knoxville)
Encyclopedia
The Bijou Theatre is a theater located in Knoxville, Tennessee
, USA. Built in 1909 as an addition to the Lamar House Hotel, the theater has at various times served as performance venue of both traditional theatre
and vaudeville
, a second-run moviehouse, a commencement stage for the city's African-American high school, and a pornographic movie theater. The Lamar House Hotel, in which the theater was constructed, was originally built in 1817, and modified in the 1850s. The building and theater were added to the National Register of Historic Places
in 1975.
The Lamar House Hotel was built by Irish
immigrant Thomas Humes (1767–1816) and his descendants, and quickly developed into a gathering place for Knoxville's wealthy. In 1819, Andrew Jackson
became the first of five presidents to lodge at the hotel, and in the 1850s, local businessmen purchased and expanded the building into a lavish 250-room complex. During the Civil War
, the Union Army used the hotel as a hospital for its war wounded, among them General William P. Sanders
, who died at the hotel in 1863. Following the war, the hotel became the center of Knoxville's Gilded Age
extravagance, hosting lavish masquerade ball
s for the city's elite.
In 1909, the rear wing of the building was replaced by the Bijou Theatre structure, entered through a new lobby cut through the hotel building from Gay Street
. The theater opened on March 8, 1909, and over the next four decades would host performers such as the Marx Brothers
, Dizzy Gillespie
, John Philip Sousa
, the Ballet Russe, Ethel Barrymore
, Alfred Lunt
and Lynn Fontanne
, and John Cullum
. After a period of decline in the 1960s and early 1970s, local preservationists purchased the building and renovated the theater.
, from which the rear theater section and the building's front corner wings are accessed (the south corner wing is occupied by a restaurant, The Bistro). From the foyer, the rear entrance opens into a bar, with passageways to the left and right leading to the theater's orchestra floor, and stairways to the left and right accessing the theater's balconies and the original building's second floor (now offices for the theater).
The building's facade was probably designed in the Georgian
style, but its original appearance was extensively altered in the 1850s. Many of these alterations resulted from the macadam
izing of Gay Street in 1854. The grading
of the street during this period exposed the hotel's cellar, which was subsequently converted into the main entrance.
The theater has a capacity of approximately 700, with two balcony levels. There are two loggia levels and three box
levels on each side of the building. The stage is 35 feet (10.7 m) deep and 69 feet (21 m) wide. The theater is decorated with notable Classical Revival elements, which include Corinthian columns supporting the box levels, reclining muse
pediments above the top box levels, and grape-and-vine motifs adorning the front of the boxes and balconies.
in 1791. Thomas Humes, who operated a nearby store on Gay Street, purchased parts of the lot in 1801 and 1805. In 1816, Humes began building the three-story structure on the lot that he planned to operate as a tavern
and hotel, but died before the building was completed. Humes's widow, Margaret Russell Cowan, continued construction, however, and the "Knoxville Hotel" opened sometime around July 1817.
The hotel was initially managed by a local tavern owner named Archibald Rhea, and was advertised as the largest in East Tennessee. The three-story hotel featured 13 rooms, a bar, dining room, and ballroom, and had its own granary
and stables. Throughout much of the 1820s and 1830s, the hotel was managed by a local hotelier named Joseph Jackson, and developed into a popular gathering place for the city's elite. Humes's children sold the hotel in 1837 to John Pickett and William Belden, who rechristened it the "City Hotel." During this period, each room in the hotel contained two feather beds, a table and chairs, and a washstand and looking glass. The hotel also had its own library, a lounge with a piano, and a dining room that served meals on silver plates and china
.
purchased the hotel, and closed it in order to carry out renovations. Churchwell added a 100 feet (30.5 m) by 35 feet (10.7 m) ell overlooking Cumberland Street, expanding the hotel's capacity to 250, and then added a second ell to the first to serve as the hotel's kitchen and dining room. The hotel reopened under the name "Coleman House" in 1854, but in 1856 it was renamed "Lamar House" after investor Gazaway Bugg Lamar. That same year, Churchwell was forced to sell the hotel to William H. Sneed to cover bank debts.
In the months leading up to the Civil War, the Lamar House was favored by the city's secessionist
leaders (Sneed himself was a staunch secessionist). District Attorney J. C. Ramsey, who ruthlessly prosecuted the city's Unionists during the war, listed the hotel as his business address. In October 1860, ex-Congressman John H. Crozier delivered a pro-secession speech in front of the hotel in which he called the city's pro-Union newspaperman, Parson Brownlow
, a "coward." During the Confederate Army's occupation of Knoxville (1861–1863), Confederate officers boarded at the Lamar House.
When the Union Army took control of Knoxville in September 1863, the Lamar House was converted into a hospital. General William P. Sanders died in the hotel's bridal suite from wounds suffered during the Knoxville Campaign
on November 19, 1863. His death was kept secret throughout the two-week Siege of Knoxville for fear it would demoralize Union soldiers. After the war, Parson Brownlow filed a lawsuit against Sneed and other ex-Confederates, demanding their property be confiscated. By 1866, however, Sneed had regained control of the hotel.
s were held regularly in the hotel's ballroom, with cigars, imported wines, and oysters served. Frequent attendees included author Frances Hodgson Burnett
(whose brother worked as a bartender at the hotel) and artist Lloyd Branson
. President Rutherford B. Hayes
stayed at the hotel during his visit to Knoxville in September 1877. General James Holt Clanton
died at the Lamar House on September 27, 1871, after being wounded in a shootout with attorney David Nelson.
In the 1890s, Knoxville's business focus shifted to the Southern Railroad area toward the north end of Gay Street, and the Lamar Hotel began to decline. Sneed's heirs sold the hotel in 1895, and over the next decade, the hotel shifted through six different owners and various new names before being purchased by the Auditorium Company for the construction of the Bijou in 1908. The hotel was known as "Hotel Le Conte" from 1930 until the 1950s, and was called "Hotel Lamarr" in the 1960s. By 1969, the hotel had become notorious for prostitution, and the city ordered it closed.
to move sets.
On March 8, 1909, the theater's opening night production of George Cohan's Little Johnny Jones
was viewed by a sold-out audience. Traditional theater played a major role in the Bijou's early success, with performances that included Mr. Green's Reception, which starred the Marx Brothers. Between 1914 and 1921, B. F. Keith's
company managed the Bijou, and vaudeville
became the theater's primary attraction. While African-Americans were only allowed in the theater's gallery (now the upper balcony) on main performance nights, Knoxville Colored High School used the theater for commencement ceremonies in the 1910s, and Knoxville College
performed plays at the theater.
Performers at the Bijou during the 1920s included John Philip Sousa and his band, Anna Pavlova and the Ballet Russe, and magician Harry Blackstone
. In 1935, Kincy Theaters purchased the Bijou for use as a second-run moviehouse (the Tennessee Theatre
, which opened in 1928, was Knoxville's first-run moviehouse). Live performances continued, however, among them Dorothy Gish
in Life with Father
in 1941, Lunt and Fontanne in Robert Sherwood's There Shall Be No Night
in 1941, and Ethel Barrymore in Emlyn Williams
's The Corn Is Green
in 1943. The Knoxville Symphony Orchestra
used the Bijou for its performances between 1936 and 1941.
and the award of a federal grant, another renovation followed, repairing water damage, renovating the theater seats, and upgrading the stage with modern lighting, sound, and fly equipment
.
The grand reopening of the Bijou Theatre in 2006 featured the premiere of the documentary "Bijou Theatre: Gem of the South," by DoubleJay Creative. The film premiered before a live audience and was simulcast on the local NBC affiliate, WBIR TV10. It won a Silver Telly Award, the award organization’s highest honor, and received a nomination for a regional Emmy Award from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. The Historic Tennessee Theatre Foundation now operates the facility.
Knoxville, Tennessee
Founded in 1786, Knoxville is the third-largest city in the U.S. state of Tennessee, U.S.A., behind Memphis and Nashville, and is the county seat of Knox County. It is the largest city in East Tennessee, and the second-largest city in the Appalachia region...
, USA. Built in 1909 as an addition to the Lamar House Hotel, the theater has at various times served as performance venue of both traditional theatre
Theatre
Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...
and vaudeville
Vaudeville
Vaudeville was a theatrical genre of variety entertainment in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. Each performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill...
, a second-run moviehouse, a commencement stage for the city's African-American high school, and a pornographic movie theater. The Lamar House Hotel, in which the theater was constructed, was originally built in 1817, and modified in the 1850s. The building and theater were added to the National Register of Historic Places
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...
in 1975.
The Lamar House Hotel was built by Irish
Irish people
The Irish people are an ethnic group who originate in Ireland, an island in northwestern Europe. Ireland has been populated for around 9,000 years , with the Irish people's earliest ancestors recorded having legends of being descended from groups such as the Nemedians, Fomorians, Fir Bolg, Tuatha...
immigrant Thomas Humes (1767–1816) and his descendants, and quickly developed into a gathering place for Knoxville's wealthy. In 1819, Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson was the seventh President of the United States . Based in frontier Tennessee, Jackson was a politician and army general who defeated the Creek Indians at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend , and the British at the Battle of New Orleans...
became the first of five presidents to lodge at the hotel, and in the 1850s, local businessmen purchased and expanded the building into a lavish 250-room complex. During the Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
, the Union Army used the hotel as a hospital for its war wounded, among them General William P. Sanders
William P. Sanders
William Price Sanders was an officer in the Union Army in the American Civil War, who died at the Siege of Knoxville.-Birth and early years:...
, who died at the hotel in 1863. Following the war, the hotel became the center of Knoxville's Gilded Age
Gilded Age
In United States history, the Gilded Age refers to the era of rapid economic and population growth in the United States during the post–Civil War and post-Reconstruction eras of the late 19th century. The term "Gilded Age" was coined by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner in their book The Gilded...
extravagance, hosting lavish masquerade ball
Masquerade ball
A masquerade ball is an event which the participants attend in costume wearing a mask. - History :...
s for the city's elite.
In 1909, the rear wing of the building was replaced by the Bijou Theatre structure, entered through a new lobby cut through the hotel building from Gay Street
Gay Street (Knoxville)
Gay Street is a street in Knoxville, Tennessee, USA, that traverses the heart of the city's downtown area. Since its development in the 1790s, Gay Street has served as the city's principal financial and commercial thoroughfare, and has played a primary role in the city's historical and cultural...
. The theater opened on March 8, 1909, and over the next four decades would host performers such as the Marx Brothers
Marx Brothers
The Marx Brothers were an American family comedy act, originally from New York City, that enjoyed success in Vaudeville, Broadway, and motion pictures from the early 1900s to around 1950...
, Dizzy Gillespie
Dizzy Gillespie
John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie was an American jazz trumpet player, bandleader, singer, and composer dubbed "the sound of surprise".Together with Charlie Parker, he was a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz...
, John Philip Sousa
John Philip Sousa
John Philip Sousa was an American composer and conductor of the late Romantic era, known particularly for American military and patriotic marches. Because of his mastery of march composition, he is known as "The March King" or the "American March King" due to his British counterpart Kenneth J....
, the Ballet Russe, Ethel Barrymore
Ethel Barrymore
Ethel Barrymore was an American actress and a member of the Barrymore family of actors.-Early life:Ethel Barrymore was born Ethel Mae Blythe in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the second child of the actors Maurice Barrymore and Georgiana Drew...
, Alfred Lunt
Alfred Lunt
Alfred Lunt was an American stage director and actor, often identified for a long-time professional partnership with his wife, actress Lynn Fontanne...
and Lynn Fontanne
Lynn Fontanne
Lynn Fontanne was a British actress and major stage star in the United States for over 40 years. She teamed with her husband Alfred Lunt.She lived in the United States for more than 60 years but never relinquished her British citizenship. Lunt and Fontanne shared a special Tony Award in 1970...
, and John Cullum
John Cullum
John Cullum is an American actor and singer. He has appeared in many stage musicals and dramas, including On the Twentieth Century and Shenandoah , winning the Tony Awards for Best Leading Actor in a Musical for each...
. After a period of decline in the 1960s and early 1970s, local preservationists purchased the building and renovated the theater.
Design
The Bijou Theatre building consists of two parts— the original hotel section, completed in 1817, and the rear theater section, built in 1909. The main entrance opens into a foyerFoyer
A foyer or lobby is a large, vast room or complex of rooms adjacent to the auditorium...
, from which the rear theater section and the building's front corner wings are accessed (the south corner wing is occupied by a restaurant, The Bistro). From the foyer, the rear entrance opens into a bar, with passageways to the left and right leading to the theater's orchestra floor, and stairways to the left and right accessing the theater's balconies and the original building's second floor (now offices for the theater).
The building's facade was probably designed in the Georgian
Georgian architecture
Georgian architecture is the name given in most English-speaking countries to the set of architectural styles current between 1720 and 1840. It is eponymous for the first four British monarchs of the House of Hanover—George I of Great Britain, George II of Great Britain, George III of the United...
style, but its original appearance was extensively altered in the 1850s. Many of these alterations resulted from the macadam
Macadam
Macadam is a type of road construction pioneered by the Scotsman John Loudon McAdam in around 1820. The method simplified what had been considered state-of-the-art at that point...
izing of Gay Street in 1854. The grading
Land grading
Grading in civil engineering and construction is the work of ensuring a level base, or one with a specified slope, for a construction work such as a foundation, the base course for a road or a railway, or landscape and garden improvements, or surface drainage...
of the street during this period exposed the hotel's cellar, which was subsequently converted into the main entrance.
The theater has a capacity of approximately 700, with two balcony levels. There are two loggia levels and three box
Box (theatre)
In theater, a box is a small, separated seating area in the auditorium for a limited number of people.Boxes are typically placed immediately to the front, side and above the level of the stage. They are often separate rooms with an open viewing area which typically seat five people or fewer. ...
levels on each side of the building. The stage is 35 feet (10.7 m) deep and 69 feet (21 m) wide. The theater is decorated with notable Classical Revival elements, which include Corinthian columns supporting the box levels, reclining muse
Muse
The Muses in Greek mythology, poetry, and literature, are the goddesses who inspire the creation of literature and the arts. They were considered the source of the knowledge, related orally for centuries in the ancient culture, that was contained in poetic lyrics and myths...
pediments above the top box levels, and grape-and-vine motifs adorning the front of the boxes and balconies.
Early history
The Bijou stands on Lot 38 of the original survey of Knoxville drawn by Charles McClungCharles McClung
Charles McClung was an American pioneer, politician, and surveyor best known for drawing up the original plat of Knoxville, Tennessee, in 1791. While Knoxville has since expanded to many times its original size, the city's downtown area still roughly follows McClung's 1791 grid...
in 1791. Thomas Humes, who operated a nearby store on Gay Street, purchased parts of the lot in 1801 and 1805. In 1816, Humes began building the three-story structure on the lot that he planned to operate as a tavern
Tavern
A tavern is a place of business where people gather to drink alcoholic beverages and be served food, and in some cases, where travelers receive lodging....
and hotel, but died before the building was completed. Humes's widow, Margaret Russell Cowan, continued construction, however, and the "Knoxville Hotel" opened sometime around July 1817.
The hotel was initially managed by a local tavern owner named Archibald Rhea, and was advertised as the largest in East Tennessee. The three-story hotel featured 13 rooms, a bar, dining room, and ballroom, and had its own granary
Granary
A granary is a storehouse for threshed grain or animal feed. In ancient or primitive granaries, pottery is the most common use of storage in these buildings. Granaries are often built above the ground to keep the stored food away from mice and other animals.-Early origins:From ancient times grain...
and stables. Throughout much of the 1820s and 1830s, the hotel was managed by a local hotelier named Joseph Jackson, and developed into a popular gathering place for the city's elite. Humes's children sold the hotel in 1837 to John Pickett and William Belden, who rechristened it the "City Hotel." During this period, each room in the hotel contained two feather beds, a table and chairs, and a washstand and looking glass. The hotel also had its own library, a lounge with a piano, and a dining room that served meals on silver plates and china
Porcelain
Porcelain is a ceramic material made by heating raw materials, generally including clay in the form of kaolin, in a kiln to temperatures between and...
.
Lamar House and the Civil War
In 1852, Knoxville banker William M. ChurchwellWilliam Montgomery Churchwell
William Montgomery Churchwell was an American politician and a member of the United States House of Representatives.-Biography:He was born near Knoxville, Tennessee in Knox County on February 20, 1826. He attended private schools and Emory and Henry College in Emory, Virginia from 1840 to 1843. He...
purchased the hotel, and closed it in order to carry out renovations. Churchwell added a 100 feet (30.5 m) by 35 feet (10.7 m) ell overlooking Cumberland Street, expanding the hotel's capacity to 250, and then added a second ell to the first to serve as the hotel's kitchen and dining room. The hotel reopened under the name "Coleman House" in 1854, but in 1856 it was renamed "Lamar House" after investor Gazaway Bugg Lamar. That same year, Churchwell was forced to sell the hotel to William H. Sneed to cover bank debts.
In the months leading up to the Civil War, the Lamar House was favored by the city's secessionist
Secession in the United States
Secession in the United States can refer to secession of a state from the United States, secession of part of a state from that state to form a new state, or secession of an area from a city or county....
leaders (Sneed himself was a staunch secessionist). District Attorney J. C. Ramsey, who ruthlessly prosecuted the city's Unionists during the war, listed the hotel as his business address. In October 1860, ex-Congressman John H. Crozier delivered a pro-secession speech in front of the hotel in which he called the city's pro-Union newspaperman, Parson Brownlow
William Gannaway Brownlow
William Gannaway "Parson" Brownlow was an American newspaper editor, minister, and politician who served as Governor of the state of Tennessee from 1865 to 1869 and as a United States Senator from Tennessee from 1869 to 1875...
, a "coward." During the Confederate Army's occupation of Knoxville (1861–1863), Confederate officers boarded at the Lamar House.
When the Union Army took control of Knoxville in September 1863, the Lamar House was converted into a hospital. General William P. Sanders died in the hotel's bridal suite from wounds suffered during the Knoxville Campaign
Knoxville Campaign
The Knoxville Campaign was a series of American Civil War battles and maneuvers in East Tennessee during the fall of 1863. Union forces under Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside occupied Knoxville, Tennessee, and Confederate forces under Lt. Gen. James Longstreet were detached from Gen...
on November 19, 1863. His death was kept secret throughout the two-week Siege of Knoxville for fear it would demoralize Union soldiers. After the war, Parson Brownlow filed a lawsuit against Sneed and other ex-Confederates, demanding their property be confiscated. By 1866, however, Sneed had regained control of the hotel.
Gilded Age and decline
After Sneed died in 1869, his children inherited the Lamar House, and over the next two decades, the hotel once again developed into the preferred gathering place for Knoxville's elite. The hotel's status was enhanced by the construction of Staub's Theatre— Knoxville's first opera house— across the street in 1870. Masquerade ballMasquerade ball
A masquerade ball is an event which the participants attend in costume wearing a mask. - History :...
s were held regularly in the hotel's ballroom, with cigars, imported wines, and oysters served. Frequent attendees included author Frances Hodgson Burnett
Frances Hodgson Burnett
Frances Eliza Hodgson Burnett was an English playwright and author. She is best known for her children's stories, in particular The Secret Garden , A Little Princess, and Little Lord Fauntleroy.Born Frances Eliza Hodgson, she lived in Cheetham Hill, Manchester...
(whose brother worked as a bartender at the hotel) and artist Lloyd Branson
Lloyd Branson
Enoch Lloyd Branson was an American artist best known for his portraits of Southern politicians and depictions of early East Tennessee history....
. President Rutherford B. Hayes
Rutherford B. Hayes
Rutherford Birchard Hayes was the 19th President of the United States . As president, he oversaw the end of Reconstruction and the United States' entry into the Second Industrial Revolution...
stayed at the hotel during his visit to Knoxville in September 1877. General James Holt Clanton
James Holt Clanton
James Holt Clanton was an American soldier, lawyer, and legislator. He enlisted in the United States Army for service during the Mexican–American War, and later was a Confederate Army general during the American Civil War...
died at the Lamar House on September 27, 1871, after being wounded in a shootout with attorney David Nelson.
In the 1890s, Knoxville's business focus shifted to the Southern Railroad area toward the north end of Gay Street, and the Lamar Hotel began to decline. Sneed's heirs sold the hotel in 1895, and over the next decade, the hotel shifted through six different owners and various new names before being purchased by the Auditorium Company for the construction of the Bijou in 1908. The hotel was known as "Hotel Le Conte" from 1930 until the 1950s, and was called "Hotel Lamarr" in the 1960s. By 1969, the hotel had become notorious for prostitution, and the city ordered it closed.
Bijou Theatre
The Auditorium Company, headed by businessman C. B. Atkin and theater manager Jake Wells, purchased the hotel in 1908 with the intention of adding a theater. The hotel's ell wings were torn down, and the brick theater wing was built in their place, with entrances added to the hotel's lobby. The theater, built at a cost of $50,000, originally had a capacity of 1,500, and featured electric lighting. The theater's backstage was equipped with a two-story scene dock and an Otis elevatorOtis Elevator Company
The Otis Elevator Company is the world's largest manufacturer of vertical transportation systems today, principally focusing on elevators and escalators...
to move sets.
On March 8, 1909, the theater's opening night production of George Cohan's Little Johnny Jones
Little Johnny Jones
For the blues pianist, see Little Johnny Jones Little Johnny Jones is a musical by George M. Cohan. The show introduced Cohan's tunes "Give My Regards to Broadway" and "The Yankee Doodle Boy." The "Yankee Doodle" character was inspired by real-life Hall of Fame jockey Tod Sloan.-Background:The...
was viewed by a sold-out audience. Traditional theater played a major role in the Bijou's early success, with performances that included Mr. Green's Reception, which starred the Marx Brothers. Between 1914 and 1921, B. F. Keith's
Benjamin Franklin Keith
Benjamin Franklin Keith was an American vaudeville theatre owner, highly influential in the evolution of variety theater into vaudeville.-Early years:...
company managed the Bijou, and vaudeville
Vaudeville
Vaudeville was a theatrical genre of variety entertainment in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. Each performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill...
became the theater's primary attraction. While African-Americans were only allowed in the theater's gallery (now the upper balcony) on main performance nights, Knoxville Colored High School used the theater for commencement ceremonies in the 1910s, and Knoxville College
Knoxville College
Knoxville College is a historically black liberal arts college in Knoxville, Tennessee, USA. Founded in 1875 by the United Presbyterian Church of North America, the school has an enrollment of approximately 100 students, and offers a Bachelor of Science degree in Liberal Studies and an Associate...
performed plays at the theater.
Performers at the Bijou during the 1920s included John Philip Sousa and his band, Anna Pavlova and the Ballet Russe, and magician Harry Blackstone
Harry Blackstone, Sr.
Harry Blackstone was a famed stage magician and illusionist of the 20th century. Blackstone was born Harry Bouton in Chicago, Illinois, he began his career as a magician in his teens and was popular through World War II as a USO entertainer. He was often billed as The Great Blackstone. His son...
. In 1935, Kincy Theaters purchased the Bijou for use as a second-run moviehouse (the Tennessee Theatre
Tennessee Theatre
The Tennessee Theatre is a 1920s-era movie palace, located within the Burwell Building in downtown Knoxville, Tennessee, at 604 South Gay Street.-History:...
, which opened in 1928, was Knoxville's first-run moviehouse). Live performances continued, however, among them Dorothy Gish
Dorothy Gish
Dorothy Elizabeth Gish was an American actress, and the younger sister of actress Lillian Gish.-Early life:...
in Life with Father
Life with Father
Life with Father is the title of a humorous autobiographical book of stories compiled in 1935 by Clarence Day, Jr., which was adapted in 1939 into a long-running Broadway play by Lindsay and Crouse, which was, in turn, made into a 1947 movie and a television series.-The book:Clarence Day wrote...
in 1941, Lunt and Fontanne in Robert Sherwood's There Shall Be No Night
There Shall Be No Night
There Shall Be No Night is a three-act play written by American playwright Robert E. Sherwood. The play was presented by the Theatre Guild from April 29 through November 2, 1940, at Broadway's Alvin Theatre...
in 1941, and Ethel Barrymore in Emlyn Williams
Emlyn Williams
George Emlyn Williams, CBE , known as Emlyn Williams, was a Welsh dramatist and actor.-Biography:He was born into a Welsh-speaking, working class family in Mostyn, Flintshire....
's The Corn Is Green
The Corn is Green
The Corn Is Green is a semi-autobiographical play by Emlyn Williams.At its core is L. C. Moffat, a strong-willed English school teacher working in a small poverty-stricken coal mining town in the late 19th century...
in 1943. The Knoxville Symphony Orchestra
Knoxville Symphony Orchestra
The Knoxville Symphony Orchestra is a professional orchestra in Knoxville, Tennessee.The orchestra was established in 1935 and is the oldest continuing orchestra in the southeastern United States. The founding conductor was Bertha Walburn Clark, who led the group until 1946...
used the Bijou for its performances between 1936 and 1941.
Restoration
By the late 1960s and early 1970s, Knoxville's downtown area had deteriorated, and various companies were using the Bijou to show pornographic movies. In 1974, after its owner was evicted for unpaid property taxes, the building was threatened with demolition, and a group of concerned citizens (the forerunner of Knox Heritage) organized a successful campaign to save the building. The theater was renovated as a center for the performing arts. Another partial renovation followed 20 years later, but funding remained a problem, and maintenance suffered. By 2005, the theater was in danger of defaulting on its mortgage, and was saved once again by two Knoxville businessmen, who held off foreclosure while the loan was renegotiated. After a fundraising campaign spearheaded by Knoxville Mayor Bill HaslamBill Haslam
William Edward "Bill" Haslam is the 49th and current Governor of Tennessee. A member of the Republican Party, Haslam was elected to office in 2010...
and the award of a federal grant, another renovation followed, repairing water damage, renovating the theater seats, and upgrading the stage with modern lighting, sound, and fly equipment
Fly system
A fly system, flying system or theatrical rigging system, is a system of lines , blocks , counterweights and related devices within a theatre that enable a stage crew to quickly, quietly and safely fly components such as curtains, lights, scenery, stage effects and, sometimes, people...
.
The grand reopening of the Bijou Theatre in 2006 featured the premiere of the documentary "Bijou Theatre: Gem of the South," by DoubleJay Creative. The film premiered before a live audience and was simulcast on the local NBC affiliate, WBIR TV10. It won a Silver Telly Award, the award organization’s highest honor, and received a nomination for a regional Emmy Award from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. The Historic Tennessee Theatre Foundation now operates the facility.
External links
- Bijou Theatre official website — contains FAQ and seating chart