Published On: 04.12.17 | 

By: 9316

On this day in Alabama history: Tuscaloosa’s Bama Theatre opened

April 12 feature 2

Bama Theatre, 2010. (The George F. Landegger Collection of Alabama Photographs in Carol M. Highsmith's America, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division)

April 12, 1938

The Bama Theatre in Tuscaloosa opened with a parade led by the University of Alabama’s Million Dollar Band before showing its first film, Bringing Up Baby, starring Katherine Hepburn and Cary Grant. With funding from city bond issues and Public Works Administration (PWA) grants, Birmingham architect David O. Whilldin designed the 1,200-seat movie theater. He selected a style now known as PWA Moderne for the exterior that contrasted with an extravagant interior described as having a feel like that of a Spanish garden on the Mediterranean. The theatre was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984 and now serves as a performing arts venue, art gallery, and movie theater.

Read more at Encyclopedia of Alabama.

Bama Theatre. (Brettstout, Wikimedia)

For more on Alabama’s Bicentennial, visit Alabama 200.