Alex Theatre
The Alex Theatre on Brand Boulevard in Glendale is one of Southern California’s most distinctive picture palace landmarks, defined by its soaring Egyptian Revival pylon tower and neon sign that have illuminated the city’s main commercial street since its landmark 1940 redesign.
At a glance
The Alex Theatre at 216 N Brand Boulevard has anchored Glendale’s commercial downtown since its opening in 1925. The theater was extensively redesigned in 1940 by prominent Los Angeles theater architect S. Charles Lee, who transformed the original silent film house with an iconic Art Deco and Egyptian Revival treatment: a soaring vertical pylon tower with neon signage became the theater’s signature element, visible for blocks along Brand Boulevard. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the Alex today serves as a performing arts center programming concerts, film events, and theatrical productions for the greater Los Angeles area.
Key facts
- Address: 216 N Brand Boulevard, Glendale, CA 91203
- Original opening: 1925 (silent film era)
- Redesigned: 1940 by S. Charles Lee
- Style: Art Deco / Egyptian Revival (post-1940 exterior)
- Seating: approximately 1,400
- Listed: National Register of Historic Places
- Current operator: City of Glendale Arts
History
Glendale’s explosive growth in the 1920s, driven by the same automobile-era suburban expansion that was reshaping Greater Los Angeles, created demand for a large neighborhood theater on Brand Boulevard. The Alex opened in 1925 as a single-screen film palace designed for the silent film era. By the late 1930s, the original building’s design had aged stylistically, and a major redesign was commissioned from S. Charles Lee.
Lee was the dominant Los Angeles theater architect of the Art Deco period, responsible for the Los Angeles Theatre (1931), the Tower Theatre (1927), and dozens of other Southern California venues. His 1940 redesign of the Alex introduced the iconic vertical pylon tower and atmospheric neon signage that made the theater instantly recognizable on Brand Boulevard. The Egyptian Revival vocabulary of the tower — a deliberate invocation of ancient monumentality filtered through Hollywood’s Orientalist fantasy tradition — reflected a design language that had been widely popularized following the 1922 discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb.
The theater operated continuously through the mid-twentieth century and eventually passed to public management under the City of Glendale, which undertook restoration work and repositioned the venue as a performing arts center. Today the Alex is the primary venue for Glendale’s cultural programming calendar and hosts the Glendale International Film Festival alongside a year-round concert and theater schedule.
What you see
The Alex Theatre’s most distinctive feature is the vertical pylon tower that rises above the Brand Boulevard sidewalk, a sleek Art Deco shaft topped with a globe and decorated with stylized Egyptian motifs and neon tube lighting. The tower belongs to a family of theatrical marquee pylons S. Charles Lee employed at several Southern California theaters, adapted here to a specifically Egyptian vocabulary. At street level, the theater’s lobby entrance and box office are set within a marquee projection that extends over the sidewalk in the standard picture palace manner.
The auditorium interior retains atmospheric plasterwork in the Egyptian Revival manner, with decorative ceiling elements and side-wall treatment consistent with Lee’s atmospheric theater design approach. Restoration work has brought the house to contemporary technical standards for amplified concert performance while preserving the historic spatial character of the hall.
Practical information
- Events: check alextheatre.org for current calendar
- Box office: open during events and limited daytime hours
- Tours: the pylon tower and lobby are viewable during events; exterior visible at any time
- Time needed: 15 minutes for exterior; 2–3 hours for a performance
Getting there
The Alex Theatre is on Brand Boulevard in downtown Glendale, accessible from central Los Angeles by the Metro Gold Line to the Glendale station, 10 minutes on foot north. By car, Glendale is immediately northeast of Los Angeles, about 10 miles from downtown LA via the 5 Freeway; parking is available in city garages off Brand Boulevard. Bob Hope Airport (BUR/Burbank) is approximately 4 miles northwest.
Nearby
- Forest Lawn Memorial Park — the celebrated garden cemetery at 1712 S Glendale Avenue houses the Great Mausoleum and extensive collections of art reproductions; the final resting place of numerous Hollywood figures
- Brand Library & Art Center — housed in Leslie C. Brand’s 1904 Moorish Revival “El Miradero” residence at 1601 W Mountain Street; an art and music library with gallery programming
- Museum of Neon Art — dedicated to electric and neon art; relocated to Glendale, on Brand Boulevard; the museum’s collection includes historic advertising and theatrical neon from the mid-twentieth century
Sources
- Alex Theatre official site (alextheatre.org)
- National Register of Historic Places nomination, Alex Theatre
- Naylor, David. American Picture Palaces: The Architecture of Fantasy. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1981.
- Valentine, Maggie. The Show Starts on the Sidewalk: An Architectural History of the Movie Theatre. New Haven: Yale UP, 1994.
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