Uptown Theatre

Uptown Theatre (also known as Balaban and Katz Uptown Theatre) is a former movie palace and concert venue located in the Uptown neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. Designed by Rapp and Rapp and built by Paschen Bros. contractors, it is one of the many movie palaces built by the Balaban & Katz theatre chain run by A. J. Balaban, his brother Barney Balaban, and their partner Sam Katz. The largest remaining in Chicago, it boasts 4,381 seats and its interior volume is said to be larger than any other movie palace in the United States, including Radio City Music Hall in New York. It occupies over 46,000 square feet (4,300 m2) of land at the corner of Lawrence Avenue and Broadway in Chicago's Uptown Entertainment District. The mammoth theater has an ornate five-story entrance lobby, formerly with an eight-story facade. Its decor was opulent, reflecting more than just aesthetic choices. Architect George Rapp declared, "These are not impractical attempts at showing off. Here is a shrine to democracy where there are not privileged patrons. The wealthy rub elbows with the poor -- and are the better for this contact." The Uptown Theater has been closed since 1981. While restoration was often discussed in the following decades, and several concentrated efforts were made to promote the Uptown's restoration, no such efforts were successful, leaving the theater in disrepair. In 2018, plans to renovate the theatre were announced, but those plans fell through in 2021 in part due to the COVID-19 pandemic.