Porch Notes
The Largest Movie Palace Still Standing in America Is in Detroit
History and culture
Picture a movie theater with more than 5,000 seats, a lobby six stories tall and half a block long, blood-red marble columns topped with jeweled idols, and a ceiling dripping with gold. That’s not a fantasy — it’s the Fox Theatre in downtown Detroit, and it’s the largest surviving movie palace of the 1920s in the United States.
The Fox opened on September 21, 1928, built for film pioneer William Fox as the flagship of his nationwide theater chain. Its architect, Detroiter C. Howard Crane, designed something gloriously over-the-top — a swirling mix of Far Eastern, Egyptian, and Indian styles sometimes called “Siamese-Byzantine.” The opening-night film was a silent picture called “Street Angel,” and the Fox was among the very first theaters built with the equipment to play “talkies.”
For decades it was Detroit’s grand movie destination, hosting everything from newsreels to Elvis Presley to Motown shows. But as downtown struggled in the 1960s and ’70s, the Fox faded, until by the early 1980s its future looked grim.
It was rescued by a familiar name. In 1987, Mike and Marian Ilitch — the couple who founded Little Caesars Pizza — bought the Fox and poured more than $12 million into a careful restoration, reopening it in 1988 and moving their company headquarters into the attached office tower. The neighborhood around it is now nicknamed “Foxtown.”
Today the Fox is a National Historic Landmark and one of the busiest theaters in the country, hosting concerts and Broadway tours. The best way to appreciate it is simple: buy a ticket to anything, walk into that towering lobby, and look up.
Where to see it
The Fox Theatre, 2211 Woodward Avenue, downtown Detroit. Catch a concert or touring show; the auditorium and that six-story lobby are the real attraction.