Missouri Theatre

History

The Missouri Theatre, 203 South Ninth Street, occupies most of a downtown Columbia block between Locust and Elm. The Boller Brothers of Kansas City designed the movie palace and vaudeville house after the Paris Opera; it opened October 5, 1928, at a cost of more than $400,000, and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979. It is Columbia’s only surviving pre-Depression movie palace. Commonwealth Theaters leased it as a single-screen cinema from 1953 until 1983. The Missouri Symphony Society bought it on January 7, 1988. The University of Missouri began a lease in 2011 and took ownership on July 1, 2014. Mizzou Arts describes surviving Belgian marble wainscoting, plaster reliefs, stained glass under the balcony, and an 1,800-pound Italian chandelier. It is home to the Missouri Symphony Orchestra and a main stage for the MU School of Music. Sources: Wikipedia; Mizzou A