South City Theatre in Pelham

On October 9 Dianne, myself and a friend of ours attended a matinee performance of George Batson's play "Design for Murder" at South City Theatre in Pelham. Back in the winter Dianne and I had seen their production of Agatha Christie's "The Mousetrap", and we thoroughly enjoyed both of these performances.

South City Theatre has mounted over 150 adult and children's productions since its founding around 2000. In 2015 the non-profit company moved to its current location in Pelham. The venue is small but intimate, and it's nice to have live theater so close to home.

Below are some photos and more information related to the most recent production we saw and to the play itself. 

These two photos show the set for "Design for Murder". 

"Design for Murder" is licensed by the Samuel French Company. Below are a couple of quotes from reviews of earlier productions and the plot summary on the company's web site. Written in 1960, the play is set in the 1930's. Batson seems to have written a number of comedies and light-hearted mystery plays over several decades. Tallulah Bankhead also toured in Batson's final production, "House on the Rocks", according to his obituary in the New York Times. 

"A swell chiller. A couple of juicy killings and the identify of the culprit well concealed." - New York Mirror 

"A fast moving, highly tensed whodunit." - London Stage

"Tallulah Bankhead toured in this exciting play. The story concerns Celia Granger, her son David and her efforts to maintain the traditions attached to her family and home, a magnificent old mansion on the Hudson River. Suddenly a young maid is killed and Celia finds herself living in a violent present. The detective on the case, a rugged self made man, is revealed to have admired Celia and brings a touch of romance to her life. When the chauffeur who had stumbled upon information linking David and the slain girl is also brutally murdered suspicion falls on every member of the cast. The climax finds Celia alone in the house and the murderer ready to strike again. Comedy is supplied by two women friends who also figure among the suspects."

That Night Movie Fans "Besieged" the Alabama Theater

No, I'm not referring to a showing of Gone with the Wind. That film first appeared in Birmingham on January 31, 1940, at the Ritz Theatre.

In March 1952 Birmingham saw its first actual Hollywood movie premiere. Birmingham News amusement editor Lila May Caldwell wrote two articles about the film Steel Town and the stars who also appeared in the city that month. See the articles below; links are provided where you can find more readable copies.

Her second article notes that an estimated 7000 people saw three showings of the film on March 20, and 7000 more jammed the streets as the stars arrived for the 9 pm show. Fans "shrieked welcome" to Ann Sheridan, John Lund, and Howard Duff.

Steel Town was filmed at a factory in California, but local businessmen urged Alabama Theater manager Norris Hadaway to convince Universal-International executives to hold the premiere in Birmingham. He did, and the "first picture ever to dramatize the making of steel" and its stars came to the Magic City.

The story follows a mill owner's son who has gone to work in the facility to learn the ropes. He's also living incognito with a steelworker's family; the daughter just happens to be played by Ann Sheridan. Her boyfriend played by Howard Duff  and the son played by John Lund vie for her affections as the steel is made.

I haven't seen this Technicolor film, but will now have to search it out. The Internet Movie Database identifies the film's tagline as "Men of steel! Women of flesh!" What more could a movie fan want?

 This article appeared in the Birmingham News on March 9, 1952.

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections



A second article appeared in the Birmingham News on March 21.

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections



Birmingham Photos of the Day (36): The Shubert Theatre Orchestra

Local developer Frank O'Brien opened his four-story "O'Brien's Opera House" at the corner of 1st Avenue and 19th Street North in 1882. The actual auditorium, built for traveling theater groups, was located on the second floor and seated over 1200 patrons. The first floor was occupied by a grocery store, dentist's office, hardware store and a saloon. A hotel took up the top two floors. 

You can read the rich history of this building at the BhamWiki site linked below. In 1910 the facility was purchased by the Shubert Organization, a chain of theaters that still operates today. Although Shubert was successful at the site, the fire marshal declared the building unsafe the following year. The building was finally demolished in 1915. Today a plaque marks the location. Before his death in 1910, O'Brien had served in the Alabama House of Representatives and as Jefferson County Sheriff and Mayor of Birmingham.

The last photo below shows the Shubert Theatre Orchestra which had a very short life.

This undated photograph shows O'Brien's Opera House.

Source: BhamWiki.com

 Source: BhamWiki.com

This photograph notes that H.E. Snow was the orchestra's manager. The Archive site linked below identifies the date of this photo as somewhere between 1890 and 1910, but the Shubert Theatre operated only in 1910 and 1911. Of course, some of the musicians may have played in previous orchestras at the theater.

Source: Alabama Department of Archives & History Digital Collections 

Birmingham Photo of the Day (17): 19th Street in 1908

The 1908 coffee table book Views of Birmingham Alabama (title page below) has a number of fascinating photographs of the area from that time. The photo below shows 19th Street looking north from 1st Avenue. 

The street is busy. Pedestrians are on the sidewalks and crossing the street. Two streetcars can be seen in the distance. A horse-drawn carriage is coming toward us. We can see a prominent "Saloon" sign on the lower left and what looks like another one on the lower right.

Across the street is a large "Gayety" sign, and we can see "New Gayety" down the building on the left. These signs advertise the Gayety Theatre which opened in the building in 1905. Theatricals performed there were of the burlesque variety.

The building, seen completely in the photograph below, opened in 1882 as the O'Brien Opera House. Follow the Bham Wiki link for a fascinating history of the structure, which was torn down in 1915. The site is a parking lot today.

An undated photograph of the Gayety Theatre in its first incarnation as O'Brien's Opera House which opened in November 1882. Source: Bham Wiki

Birmingham Photo of the Day (12): Birmingham Theatre in the 1940s

This photograph by Oscar V. Hunt is taken from the Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections. BPL's record for this photograph notes the marquee as proclaiming the Birmingham Theatre "the largest and finest colored theatre in the entire South, 1st run pictures and stage shows exclusively for colored people."

According to the BhamWiki site, this building at 17th Street and 3rd Avenue North was constructed in the 1890s as a public auditorium. The Birmingham Theatre opened there in 1946 but was unsuccessful; the building was demolished in 1950.

O.V. Hunt photographed scenes in Birmingham for many years; he died in 1962. BPL has many of his photographs in their collections. Alabama Mosaic indexes more than 200 of them.

Birmingham Photo of the Day (11): Eastwood Mall Theatre Marquee

This photo comes from the Birmingham Public Library's Digital Collections and was taken on March 22, 1965. The theater marquee is advertising one of Rock Hudson's many romantic comedies, which had been released on February 10. 


Eastwood Mall, the first of its kind in Alabama and probably the Southeast, opened in 1960. Birmingham Public Library has an entire digital collection devoted to the mall, which was demolished in 2006. That collection also has links to other resources about the mall in its heyday, decline, and destruction. 

DeadMalls.com has features on several Alabama malls, including Eastwood.

Birmingham Photo of the Day (8): Alabama Theatre, 1927

Here's another photo of the Alabama Theatre from the Birmingham Public Library's Digital Collections. 

This view shows the theater under construction in 1927; signs in the window give a December 26 opening date. Also shown are more of those neat cars they had in the past!

Birmingham Photo of the Day (7): Alabama Theatre, 1959

This photo of the Alabama Theatre in July 1959 is from the Birmingham Public Library's Digital Collections. I wonder what kind of business Goldstein's Furs did during an Alabama summer. The film people are lining up to see was Audrey Hepburn's latest, The Nun's Story. 

Alabama Ruin: Clanton Drive-In Theater

In August 2012 my son Amos IV and I were tooling down I-65 South headed for Montgomery to see some historic sights there. Not long after we left Pelham, we were slowed to a crawl by a traffic backup and decided to use one of the Clanton exits to detour. 

We hadn't gone far when we passed this Great Alabama Ruin, the former Clanton Drive-In, located at 3404 7th Street North. We looked at each other, both saying wow!, so I turned around. The photos below were taken by my son and reveal what we saw on that hot summer day. 

The Cinema Treasures web site notes the drive-in opened sometime before 1955, was owned by a B. Clark and had 416 spaces for cars. That number would provide a lot of eyeballs to watch such late 1950's movies as Some Like It Hot [1959] a comedy with Marilyn Monroe; The Big Country [1958] a Western with Gregory Peck; the Ten Commandments [1956] with Charlton Heston; and Alfred Hitchcock's thriller North By Northwest [1959] with Cary Grant. We can also hope that in the 1960's such classics as Beach Blanket Bingo [1965] with Annette and Frankie also appeared on that giant screen.  

At the time this theater opened, the only places to watch a movie on a big screen were probably way up in big bad Birmingham or way down in Montgomery. After all, the only Over-the-Mountain community developed at that time was Vestavia. Wonder when the first movie theater opened there? Small town movie theaters were not unknown back in the day, however. 

No indication is given on the Cinema Treasures site as to when the drive-in closed. At some point S&H Mobile Homes opened there, and it closed in 2010. The only signs left of the original use are the screen, the empty marquee and the flat field for cars. We can only imagine the building that housed projection equipment, the snack bar and restrooms, and all of the poles for the little sound boxes to be hung on car windows.   

Some 86 open movie theaters in Alabama are currently listed on the Cinema Treasures site; a few are drive-ins. The site also lists 361 closed theaters in the state; many of those are drive-ins. That number includes the Whitesburg Drive-In in Huntsville, opened in 1949, closed in 1979, and since demolished. At least the people who watched drive-in movies in Clanton still have something tangible left in addition to their memories.

On his LiveJournal site, J.J. MacCrimmon provides a number of photographs of this drive-in that he took in 2011.

Anyone having more info about this site should feel free to comment below!

There I am, probably pointing out the obvious.

Here I am again, trying to grin in the heat.

Once a field of Tinseltown dreams, long ago and far away.

Another view of that field of dreams.

Birmingham Photo of the Day (2): Downtown, 1921

This 1921 photo by O.V. Hunt from the Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections shows 3rd Avenue North and 18th Street. The Lyric Theatre is in the foreground and Loew'sTheatre in the background. The large billboard over the Argeros & Company building advertises the coming semi-centennial of the city featuring a visit by President Warren G. Harding.