Metro Theatre (Toronto)
The Metro Theatre was an adult movie theatre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Located at 677 Bloor Street, it was open ten hours a day throughout the entire week[1] before its closure in 2013. Built in 1938, it is one of the several Art Deco theatres built in Toronto in the 1930s by architects Kaplan and Sprachman.[2] Metro Theatre opened in 1939 as a neighbourhood theatre showing second run films and B movies[3] and in 1976 started to show adult films.[1] The theatre is stylized for the 1940s, one of its screening rooms had 286 seats and another 320, there is also a snack bar.[1] The entrance contained signed photos of notable pornographic stars, including Ron Jeremy.[1]
In the 1990s, Metro Theatre was used to screen kung-fu films and as a counter-culture performance space.[2] Metro Theatre is featured prominently in scenes in the 2008 film The Lollipop Generation by G. B. Jones, and also briefly in the music video for "So Strung Out" by C-Block.
The theatre closed at the end of 2013 after being purchased for million by a numbered company directed by Saroj Jain. The building was partitioned to create two commercial spaces: a large indoor area where the theatre used to be, which houses an indoor rock climbing gym[4] and a smaller retail storefront facing Bloor.[5]
References[edit]
- ^ a b c d Jenny Yuen (March 12, 2011). "Toronto's last movie porn palace". Toronto Sun. Retrieved 14 Dec 2013.
- ^ a b Brendan Kennedy (Dec 29, 2011). "The Metro: Still X-rated, still for sale". Toronto Star. Retrieved 14 Dec 2013.
- ^ "Metro Theatre closes, ending an era of porn cinema in Koreatown | CBC News".
- ^ "Toronto's last porn theatre to become rock climbing gym". Toronto Star. May 1, 2015. Retrieved May 1, 2015.
- ^ "Someone paid $1.00 for the Metro Theatre". Toronto Life. May 30, 2014. Retrieved May 30, 2014. [permanent dead link]
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