When you turn 90, if you haven’t yet, you should celebrate your way, maybe with family, friends, cake and lovely, varied memories from a long and interesting life.
The Music Box Theatre, Chicago’s grandest surviving movie house, turns 90 this week. It, too, has enjoyed a long and interesting life. And it’s celebrating for an entire week, starting Thursday, in the spirit of its survive-and-thrive strategy: every which way.
A 9 p.m.-5 a.m Dolly Parton film marathon, featuring 480 minutes of Dolly plus specialty cocktails and Parton-themed bingo? That’s one way.
A revival of one of the Chicago-est hits ever? Yes, that’s another: Director Andrew Davis will dish on the subject of “The Fugitive” Friday night, with stories of Harrison Ford, Tommy Lee Jones and a really terrific train derailment.
Something old? Of course. The Music Box birthday festivities begin Thursday with a 35 millimeter screening of “Innocents of Paris,” an early sound musical showcasing the aggressive Gallic charms of Maurice Chevalier, Paramount’s big new acquisition in 1929. It’s dopey as dopey gets, but Chevalier sings his infernally memorable signature tune “Louise.” Once heard, never forgotten. Ever.
The Music Box is still around, and in good shape for its future, because owner Bill Schopf believes in its civic value over its commercial fortunes.
“Chicago’s been good to me over the years,” says the longtime lawyer, wine enthusiast (he owns a vineyard in Michigan) and impresario of Music Box Films, the acquisition and distribution arm of the Music Box label.
“When I bought this place in 1986,” he says, “I was doing it more for the 34 apartments and eight stores that came with it. But I found out this was really an opportunity for me to restore an iconic and historical Chicago institution.”
Music Box operations manager Ryan Oestreich, now in his fifth year, says Schopf has spent nearly $3 million in renovation and repairs, most conspicuously on building an adjoining lounge; upgrading the second, smaller theater; and improving and expanding the number of restrooms. Oestreich says he’s now implementing a second-by-section auditorium seat replacement, starting with 120 down front.
He’d rather talk programming than bathrooms. “The key to our longevity,” Oestreich says, “is that we’ve refused to pigeon-hole our audiences. Fifteen, 16 years ago, (the theater) heard about a sing-a-long ‘Sound of Music’ out in LA; now we do eight shows across two weeks.” The theater hosts 170 events annually; nearly half the calendar that has been “event-ized,” but in enough different directions to draw nearly every taste.
Fans of wide-gauge, widescreen, richly evocative film, take note: The Music Box will screen “Joker,” with Joaquin Phoenix, in a 70 millimeter print this October. (The Music Box 70MM Film Festival will re-appear in 2020.)
Brian Andreotti, programming director and longtime Music Box staff member, cites the company’s investment in old-school technology as its most valuable risk from a brand-identity perspective.
“We hadn’t played 70MM in a long time,” he recalls, “but when ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ was reissued in 2002, ironically, we knew it was going to be available in the widescreen 70MM format. That took a major investment in training and equipment. But we did it. And since then 70 has become a staple of our programming.”
The theater opened on Aug. 22, 1929. It was nearly named the New Blaine Theatre, in honor of Blaine Elementary School across Southport Avenue and slightly to the north. The theater was squarely in the exhibition vanguard then, designed and equipped as a boutique-sized 750-seat alternative to the massive Balaban & Katz auditoriums of the day (the Chicago Theatre was the flagship). The Music Box wasn’t a vaudeville house with movie capabilities. Rather, its shallow stage and newfangled technical facilities supported this new fad called “the talkies.”
Ninety years later, they’re still talking. And moving. Chicagoans have come to know the Music Box as an old friend.
Schopf sees it this way: “I spent most of my career as a lawyer. It took me 20 years to learn how to try a lawsuit to a jury. You have to learn what the truth is, and present the story to the jury in a way that’s truthful and appealing both intellectually and emotionally. And you have to consider different people’s different points of view.”
It’s the same with movies, he says. “The movie business is about the story. People have an almost biological need for stories told on a big screen. I think the Music Box is the perfect place to meet that need in a hundred different ways.”
For more information and tickets, go to musicboxtheatre.com.
Here’s the full 90th birthday schedule of events:
Thursday — Cinema in 1929: “Innocents of Paris,” 7 p.m.
Friday — Made in Chicago: “The Fugitive” with director Andrew Davis, 7 p.m.
Saturday — Silent Cinema & The Music Box Organ: “World City in Its Teens: A Report on Chicago” with live accompaniment by Music Box house organist Dennis Scott, 2:30 p.m.
Saturday — “Dolly Parton 9 to 5er,” featuring “9 to 5,” “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas,” “Rhinestone” and “Straight Talk,” also featuring costume contest, sing-a-long, Dolly bingo and specialty cocktails, 9 p.m.-5 a.m.
Sunday — Family Fun & Celebrating Indie Horror: “Mary Poppins Sing-a-Long,” noon, and “Society” with director Brian Yuzna, 7 p.m.
Aug. 27th — Music Box Films Double Feature: “Ida,” 7 p.m., and “The Deep Blue Sea,” 8:45 p.m.
Aug. 28th — Audience Choice Double Feature: “The Terminator,” 7 p.m., and “Robocop,” 9:15 pm.
Aug. 29th — Celebrating 70MM: “Back to the Future Part II,” 7 p.m.
Michael Phillips is a Tribune critic.
Twitter @phillipstribune
