2700 Colorado Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90041 | map |
Opened: October 1, 1973 by Robert Lippert as the Eagle Rock Cinemas 4. It was on the east end ground level of the Eagle Rock Plaza mall adjacent to Montgomery Wards, the developer of the project. That store location is now a Target. The theatres opened along with the mall opening in 1973. Thanks to Bob Meza for sharing his March 2001 photo on the Cinema Tour page about the theatre.
Seating: About 1,150 initially. Pacific did a revamp when they took over resulting in a total count of 959. Auditoria #1, 2 and 3 each had 244 seats, #4 sat 227. Thanks to Bill Gabel for the Pacific era numbers.
Architects: Vincent Robert Bonfanti and Donald J. Lawrence of the firm Bonfanti & Lawrence.
Robert Lippert. Thanks to Ron Strong for locating the photo. He has some comments about him:
"With the purchase of the Roxy Theatre in Oakland in 1931, Lippert soon became a major independent theater owner. But determined to prove that he could make better films than the features he was being offered by the studios, he began producing films and releasing them himself (something that a young Roger Corman paid attention to).
"By 1941 he owned over 50 theatres and several drive-ins, ending with close to 200 theaters under his control. Lippert was a film producer in the 1940s through the 1970s having
produced such wonders as 'The Lost Continent,' 'Rocketship X-M,' Samuel
Fuller's debut feature 'I Shot Jesse James' and the Vincent Price
classic 'The Last Man on Earth.'"
An October 3, 1973 ad for the first day of operation when they were charging admission. Thanks to Mike Rivest for locating it. Visit his site: Movie-Theatre.org
Lippert was gone and Pacific Theatres took it over in 1982. Ron Strong notes:
"On September 10th the Eagle Rock Cinemas closed. No warning was given, no news announcements were made. The theatrejust had a sign in the box-office stating 'Temporarily Closed.. Be back soon!' The doors were covered over with thick white paper on the interior. No one had any answers."
It reopened September 24, 198w as a Pacific operation. Joe Vogel notes that as late as 1986 they were still booking first-run films into the theatre.
Auditorium #3 in the Pacific Theatres era. Thanks to Ron Strong for sharing the photo.
An ad in the L.A. Times for the last day as a Pacific operation, September 27, 1998. Thanks to Joseph Anthony Sobora for locating the ad for a post on the Cinema Treasures page about the theatre.
It reopened as the Eagle Rock Plaza 4, an independent operation, on December 25, 1998. Ron Strong notes that for the reopening week they had "Pleasantville" on all four screens.
The January 15, 1999 listings in the L.A. Times.
Closing: November 2001.
An ad in the L.A. Times for November 16, 2001 -- the final day of operation. It was located by Joseph Anthony Sobora.
A recent first floor plan from the
Eagle Rock Plaza website. The entrance had encompassed space 111 and part of what is now space 115. The gray area, now a storage room for Target, was once the location of the four auditoria. The Macy's store on the west end of the mall closed in 2023. It had originally been the May Co. and later a Robinson's-May. Also see a plan of the
upper level.
There's a page about Eagle Rock Plaza Mall on
Mallmanac. The author comments:
"Los
Angeles has to be one of the most over-malled cities in the world.
Even the iconic Sherman Oaks Galleria of 'Valley Girl' and 'Fast Times
at Ridgemont High' fame succumbed to its nearby competition. But I
wasn’t interested in what was considered the latest and the greatest; I
wanted to see what remained of those other places deemed redundant.
"That’s
what brought me to the neighborhood of Eagle Rock, located just to the
northeast of downtown Los Angeles. No longer a significant shopping
destination for most of LA’s populace, Eagle Rock Plaza has transformed
itself to serve the niche population in its vicinity. Today sometimes
referred to as 'The Mall of Manila' due to being located in a
neighborhood largely occupied by Filipino Americans and hosting brands
such as Jollibee and Seafood Marketplace, today’s Eagle Rock Plaza
serves as a gathering place for much of the surrounding community.
Mabuhay...."
In the mall's center court looking east toward Target and the former theatre location. Photo: Bill Counter - 2026
The entrance to the Eagle Rock 4 was just this side of what is now Target. The space is now occupied by LBC Express, a firm specializing in money transfers to the Philippines. Photo: Bill Counter - 2026
In the southwest corner of the Target store looking for the storage area that had once been the four auditoria. Photo: Bill Counter - 2026
Outside the mall:
1999: A shot taken by Joseph Anthony Sobora early in the year, shortly after the theatres had reopened as an independent operation. Thanks to Joseph for sharing this on
Cinema Treasures.
2001: A photo taken by Bob Meza in March. Thanks to Bob for sharing it on the
Cinema Tour page about the theatre.
2026: The entrance to the mall's upper level from the parking deck. Target is off to the left, the dead Macy's off to the right on the west end of the mall. Photo: Bill Counter
2026: The less-glamorous entrance to the lower level, where the theatres once were. Photo: Bill Counter
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