The Granada Theater

Unlike many of the faded old movie palaces in Detroit and across the country, The Granada Theater in that quiet little college town of Emporia, Kansas was saved.

Not only saved but restored to its exquisite Movie Palace interior décor splendor—back in the days when movie theaters rivaled the worship and adoration equal to, for example, the grand edifice of the gothic limestone Presbyterian Church looming across Commercial Street in all its grim stoic Midwestern Gothic seriousness.

The Granada was serious business too—but Hollywood business. So serious was the movie business that all the schools of Emporia were closed—and all of us students were herded down to the Granada to take in the new Cinemascope sandal & tit classic movie, The Robe (1953).

The Robe was a great success story—grossing more than any film ever had done at the box office. Richard Burton as the tribune in the time of Christ in charge of the group that crucified Jesus, Jean Simmons as his lover, Victor Mature as Demetrius the slave/gladiator and the campy Jay Robinson as the totally mad hairdresser Caligula, the mad emperor of Rome, well, that’s what me and my classmates at demure little Walnut Elementary got dragged off to see one afternoon in 1953.

We were all dutifully stunned and somewhat thrilled, I suppose, but the extravagant cinematic wonder of it all—the Cinemascope Technicolor production meant to make all of us born-again Christians perhaps.

But for me, all that The Robe ever did—was to prepare me for the future air-conditioned wonders of all of the magnificent movies that Hollywood could conjure up—to make me a born-again worshipper of all the Divas and Queen Bees that the Silver Screen could deliver.

Lana Turner in Imitation of Life, Elvis the Pelvis Presley in Love Me Tender, Bette Davis and Joan Crawford in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, Marilyn Monroe in Some Like It Hot, Zsa Zsa Gabor in Queen of Outer Space, Rita Hayworth in Blood and Sand, etc. etc.

The Granada like so many old film palaces fell into disrepair and was closed, the roof leaked, the pigeons and bums moved in. It was on the verge of being torn down—when some historically minded residents took pity on the ruins & restored it to its original glorious beauty.

The photos above show some of the restored original interior decorating—which is a story in itself out of the past and full of love for the cinematic heritage of that little Athens of the Midwest, Emporia, Kansas.

The other photo from David Naylor’s Great American Movie Theaters (1987) is an interior shot of the Granada Theater taken in 1948 of an audience back then at a special promotion giving away a Chevrolet town sedan. Circled in red is yours truly, my grandparents and my Mommy Dearest—all of us anxiously waiting for the drawing to begin.

Thanks to Kenton Rhoades for the interior photos.