Theatre Design & Technology - Spring 2006 - 71

book
reviews
Arnold Wengrow

editor

Puttin' on the Glitz
The Restoration of the Sioux City Orpheum Theatre
Sioux City, IA: G.R. Lindblade & Co., 2003.
Videorecording, Videodisc, ca. 33 min. DVD,
$25; VHS, $20.
Reviewed by Mike Monsos
Imagine you are traveling across our country
and come to a town you've never visited before. You drive downtown and walk around
Main Street to get a feel for the place and a
sense of the strange souls who chose this place
so new to you. The buildings are familiar: gas
stations, banks, stores, government buildings.
And then you see it: the historic theatre. Built
before you were born, it instantly obsesses you
with those ornate walls. Curiosity rises as you
explore the exterior with your eyes and wonder how to gain access to see the condition
within. Has the interior been changed? Did it
succumb to the vagaries of economics? Or has
it remained intact, untouched, the age adding
a patina to the historic surface? Even if it has
been "updated" or "modernized" (poor adjectives for work that has generally been inflicted
on old theatres), your mind races to imagine
all that has happened here.
Sioux City, Iowa, had just such a theatre.
Designed and built in 1927 by the Chicago architectural firm of Rapp & Rapp, the Orpheum
was a grand movie palace used for everything
from local theatre and music productions to
touring companies and movies. Weddings,
policemen's balls and children's dance recitals
were also held in this elegant 2,700-seat building, making it not only a sophisticated arts establishment but also integral to community
life. Unfortunately, the community's needs
changed, at least as far as making a profit
goes, leading to dramatic interior remodeling
and eventually the closing of this handsome
old structure. This is where a video documentary, The Restoration of the Sioux City
Orpheum Theatre, begins.
It chronicles the building's history and

THEATRE

DESIGN

the efforts to save it from destruction or worse.
(It could certainly be argued that "adaptive reuse" of a theatre into a wholly inappropriate
use is a fate much worse than at least the dignity of being torn down when its time is up.)
Restoring a theatre is not a task for the faint
hearted. It means convincing people of the
need for the building, finding the funding,
finding architects willing to design and work
with respectfulness towards history, finding
theatre consultants who help, not hinder, the
process, finding craftspeople who are trained
in historic preservation methods, and most importantly, developing an overall plan farsighted enough to guarantee the continued use
of the restored building. Luckily, Sioux City had
all of this. The result is a magnificent restoration and the salvation of a tangible part of city's
history.
The DVD is divided into five sections:
Puttin' on the Glitz; A History of the Sioux City
Theatre; Remembering the Orpheum; Behind
the Scenes at the Orpheum; and a Photo Gallery. The first section is the main feature and
outlines the history and the restoration process. It begins with a visual journey through
the building before and after the restoration,
setting the stage for the narration and the interviews which explain the process this community went through. Although the documentary
does not delve deeply into the technicalities

TECHNOLOGY
SPRING

2006

(and difficulties) of the restoration process, it
does highlight some very important issues in
preserving theatres, especially the importance
of employing a good theatre consultant and
documenting the event.
The scenes of the building in its historic
state, as well as its earlier remodeling (or remuddling) are often the most interesting. The
finished product is so much more awe-inspiring when the story is complete, as the beauty is
truly in the details. The video shows how it is
nearly impossible to obtain too much documentation, as several times your curiosity is
piqued as to how certain restoration efforts
are accomplished. And although the intent of
this video was not to train the viewer how to
restore buildings, the sequences that follow
specific projects in a complete, chronological
order could be interesting for others involved
in theatre restorations.
In the second section, A History of the
Sioux City Theatre, Richard L. Poole, a theatre
professor at Briar Cliff University, narrates the
development of all the early theatres in Sioux
City, which fills in some nice details about the
development of the city's performing arts. This
adds clarity and fine points to the whole story.
Theatres cannot nor should not exist in a
vacuum, and the circumstances around a
theatre's development can offer as much insight as the history of the theatre itself. The
choice to include this additional history lesson
adds to the richness of the Orpheum's story.
But it is the third feature, Remembering
the Orpheum, that will, I hope, inspire all of us
to gather additional records of our own theatres. The documentary includes, albeit too
briefly, a series of interviews with members of
the community reflecting on the theatre as they
were growing up. Their comments make you
smile, reminding you how theatres transcend
architecture into a living, breathing, dynamic
force in a community.
The fourth feature, Behind the Scenes at
the Orpheum, is a four-minute, condensed

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