The Paradise Theatre in Westchester was a testament to 1950s postwar optimism.
Its developers chose to locate it just a couple blocks south of the Fox Loyola Theatre, a big success upon its opening in 1946 at 8610 S. Sepulveda Blvd., near Manchester Avenue.
The Paradise, 9110 S. Sepulveda Blvd., also included a bowling alley, the Paradise Bowling Lanes.
Its father-son developers, Alex and Max Schreiber of Schreiber Family Enterprises, had recently moved from Detroit, selling their movie theater chain there in order to build both theaters and bowling alleys in California.
The Schreiber firm built several bowling centers during the 1950s, including Victory Bowl in Van Nuys, and, in 1957, the Bowl-O-Drome (now known as Bowlero) on Western Avenue in Torrance, but Paradise came before those were built.
The theater held its grand opening at 6 p.m. on Aug. 23, 1950; the 16-lane bowling center opened a few days later, on Sept. 1.
Both were designed in the late California Moderne style by prolific architects Arthur Froelich and Ted Rogvoy. (Froelich also designed the Bowl-O-Drome).
The Paradise Theatre seated 1,314 patrons on a single level, and the Schreibers estimated its cost of construction at $750,000. According to the Daily Breeze, its innovations included free parking, “telesonic hearing aids” at each set and a “crying room” for young children.
Its lobby contained an indoor garden and a series of plaques on the walls commemorating Academy Award winners since 1927. Various mementos commemorating films from 1950 onward were embedded in time capsules in the lobby’s walls, and apparently they remain there today.
After the Paradise opened, the Schreibers turned operations over to the Southside chain, which operated several Southern California theaters.
It operated as a second-run theater, though it was often used for red-carpet movie premieres and sneak previews.
Paradise fans posting on the Cinema Treasures website recall seeing Debbie Reynolds in person there for “My Six Loves” (1963), Marlon Brando in attendance for “The Ugly American” (also 1963) and Rock Hudson causing a considerable stir when he appeared at the “Come September” screening (1961).
The Paradise complex also was used as a film location at least once. The lanes can be seen in a brief bowling scene in the 1963 film, “The Courtship of Eddie’s Father.”
The bowling alley interior can be seen in this preview for a few seconds starting at 1:39.
The Pacific Theatre’s chain eventually took over management of the theater, and it was the last chain to run it. Like many such theaters, the Paradise fell on hard times in the 1970s.
Pacific ceded control of the theater to private operators in 1977. The new operators tried to run it as a family theater/revival house, a tactic also used by the Loyola in its final days. They couldn’t make a go of it, unfortunately, and the Paradise closed its doors for good on June 25, 1978.
The building, renamed simply the Paradise Building, was purchased and redeveloped by the H.B. Drollinger Co., which had immediate plans to convert it into an office building. (Its address also was changed to 9100 S. Sepulveda Blvd.)
Drollinger hired the Benton, Park, Candreva architectural firm, whose redesign was executed in 1979 by the George L. Mallery, Inc., construction firm of Inglewood.
These plans included completely gutting the interior of the building. Windows were cut in its walls, the movie theater floor was removed and a second floor was added for more office space.
The finished product, which contains more than 46,000 square feet of office and retail space, won an award for its innovative redesign from a building industry trade publication in 1980.
The unique exterior was kept — its undulating wall is now painted midnight blue — and the movie photos and time capsules remain in place.
Drollinger still owns and operates the building, whose current tenants include various health care offices and a Caltrans field office.
Readers may recall that a similar fate befell the Loyola Theatre just up the street, which became the ABDI Loyola Medical Building after that theater closed in May 1982.
Sources: Daily Breeze files; Los Angeles Times files; “Paradise Theater,” Cinema Treasures website; “Paradise Theatre,” Los Angeles Movie Palaces website.
