Tucson-Rialto Building and Rialto Theater-1900

The Rialto Theatre is a performance

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 concert

venue A venue is the location at which an event takes place. It may refer to: Locations * Venue (law), the place a case is heard * Financial trading venue, a place or system where financial transactions can occur * Music venue, place used for a conce ...

located on Congress Street in downtown

Tucson Tucson (; ; ) is a city in Pima County, Arizona, United States, and its county seat. It is the second-most populous city in Arizona, behind Phoenix, Arizona, Phoenix, with a population of 542,630 in the 2020 United States census. The Tucson ...

Pima County Pima County ( ) is a County (United States), county in the south central region of the U.S. state of Arizona, one of 15 List of counties in Arizona, counties in the state. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 1 ...

, southern

Arizona Arizona is a U.S. state, state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States, sharing the Four Corners region of the western United States with Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. It also borders Nevada to the nort ...

. The cinema−theater and surrounding Rialto Building commercial block were listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 2003.

History

First conceived of in the early-to-mid-1910s, The Rialto Theatre was built by William Curlett & Son, jointly with the neighboring Hotel Congress across the street. Upon its opening in 1920, The Rialto Theatre was one of Tucson's first

movie theater A movie theater (American English) or cinema (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English), also known as a movie house, cinema hall, picture house, picture theater, the movies, the pictures, or simply theater, is a business ...

s, playing primarily

silent films A silent film is a film without synchronized recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) or key lines of dialogue may, wh ...

per the time period. In addition, the theater was host to

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, another popular form of entertainment at the time. The first full-length film to play on the Rialto's screen was '

The Toll Gate ''The Toll Gate'' is a 1920 American silent Western film directed by Lambert Hillyer, written by Lambert Hillyer and William S. Hart, and starring William S. Hart, Anna Q. Nilsson, Joseph Singleton, Jack Richardson, and Richard Headrick. It ...

'. In 1929, the theater was bought out by Paramount-Publix, a theater-owning consortium that controlled a significant number of American movie theaters. By the 1930s, the Rialto was hosting

talking pictures A sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades passed befor ...

in addition to weekly Vaudeville shows and plays. During the Paramount-Publix period of ownership, the cinema was significantly revamped. This included buying new seating, new interior decorating, and the installation of

evaporative cooling An evaporative cooler (also known as evaporative air conditioner, swamp cooler, swamp box, desert cooler and wet air cooler) is a device that cools air through the evaporation of water. Evaporative cooling differs from other air conditioning sy ...

, a fixture which lasted in the theater until the early 21st century. Around 1947
the theater's name was changed to The Paramount, reflecting its corporate ownership. Though the studio-movie theater monopoly was broken up by the Paramount Decree of the

Supreme Court In most legal jurisdictions, a supreme court, also known as a court of last resort, apex court, high (or final) court of appeal, and court of final appeal, is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...

in 1948, it took many more years for

Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation, commonly known as Paramount Pictures or simply Paramount, is an American film production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the flagship namesake subsidiary of Paramount ...

to comply. Hence, the ownership would remain the same for at least another decade.

Decline

In 1963, while downtown Tucson suffered a

recession In economics, a recession is a business cycle contraction that occurs when there is a period of broad decline in economic activity. Recessions generally occur when there is a widespread drop in spending (an adverse demand shock). This may be tr ...

, The Paramount was closed as a motion-picture house, citing lack of sales, first-rate films, and a general demographic move away from downtown Tucson. From 1963 to 1971, the vacant theater served as storage for a furniture store. In 1971, the Rialto suffered another name change, this time being re-christened ''El Cine Plaza''. For a while, the theater was transformed into a strictly

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many countries in the Americas **Spanish cuisine **Spanish history **Spanish culture ...

movie house, until 1973. In 1973 it was resold again and re-opened as an adult theater, initially showing '' Deep Throat''. Though the city of Tucson attempted to block The Rialto in its capacity as a venue showing adult films, they were initially unsuccessful, and it remained in this capacity for five years. During its run as an adult theater, there were several incidents of attempted arson, purportedly stemming from one offended local woman; she succeeded at one point in burning the balcony stairs in 1978, and was never caught. In 1978, the theater was transformed once again into a Spanish-language cinema, still under the name ''El Cine Plaza'', and continued showing Latino films until 1984, when a

boiler A boiler is a closed vessel in which fluid (generally water) is heated. The fluid does not necessarily boil. The heated or vaporized fluid exits the boiler for use in various processes or heating applications, including water heating, centra ...

explosion devastated the theater, collapsing the stage and resulting in the theater's condemnation.

Concert venue

The theatre remained closed until 1995, when it was purchased by Paul Bear and Jeb Schoonover. The enterprising duo re-opened the theatre as a concert venue under the original name. Quickly the Rialto garnered a reputation as Tucson's preeminent music venue, as Bear and Schoonover hosted over 700 shows featuring a diverse range of acts such as The Black Crowes, Linkin Park, The White Stripes, Maroon 5, Dave Chappelle, Morrissey, Fugazi, Government Mule, Sam Butera, The Afro-Cuban Allstars, King Sunny Ade, Cesaria Evora, Arturo Sandoval, Dwight Yoakam, Merle Haggard, The Vagina Monologues, Quest for Fire and even the Jim Rose Side Show. In September 2004, Bear and Schoonover sold the theatre to the City of Tucson, as part of Rio Nuevo, a downtown revitalization project. The Rialto Theatre Foundation was founded in April 2004 by Tucson Weekly co-founder Douglas Biggers, who spearheaded the acquisition by the city and was the executive director of the project from mid-2004 until December 2011. During his tenure, the Rialto Theatre was listed on the National Register of Historic Places, more than $2 million in renovation and equipment improvements were made, and the theater was completely re-branded and re-launched in April 2005. The Rialto Theatre is now owned and operated by the Rialto Theatre Foundation. Curtis McCrary, who was the first employee hired by Biggers, became executive director when Biggers left at the end of 2011. McCrary resigned in August 2020. The Rialto Theatre is one of several historic theater and concert venues built along Congress Street, the others being Club Congress (directly across the street) and the newly renovated Fox Theatre several blocks to the west. Both structures were listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2003.

Description

The Rialto Theatre is located in one of the more urban districts of downtown Tucson, across the street from Club Congress. It bears much similarity to the neighboring Hotel Congress, being built in the same year and by the same contractors. In its capacity as a concert venue since 1995, The Rialto was in need of many repairs, as it still sported a swamp cooler (rather than more modern

air conditioning Air conditioning, often abbreviated as A/C (US) or air con (UK), is the process of removing heat from an enclosed space to achieve a more comfortable interior temperature, and in some cases, also controlling the humidity of internal air. Air c ...

) and a dilapidated interior. Since its latest revitalization in 2004, the theater still boasts some of its original historic interior with a nod to an

Art Nouveau Art Nouveau ( ; ; ), Jugendstil and Sezessionstil in German, is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. It was often inspired by natural forms such as the sinuous curves of plants and ...

motif, along with new and much-needed air conditioners. Substantial improvements in the venue’s acoustics was a primary objective of the 2005 renovation. Primarily holding music concerts from all genres, The Rialto hosts other shows and events as well, from dance, performance, and occasional film screenings. Approximately 150 events occur at the Rialto annually, with reported attendance of more than 100,000 patrons.

References

External links