Mac Rating: 5.00 | Votes: 1 | Date: 03/07/2026 01:11:00

Newspapers called it "The Pride of the Pacific" when it opened - and it is now the last surviving historic theatre still operating in Honolulu. The Hawaii Theatre, at 1130 Bethel Street on the edge of Chinatown, opened on 6 September 1922 as the flagship of the Consolidated Amusement Company: 1,760 seats of Beaux-Arts opulence with Corinthian columns, Roman arches and lavish ornament, later crowned with its famous Art Deco marquee and vertical neon sign. Designed by architects Walter Emory and Marshall Webb, the theatre ran vaudeville, silent films with pipe organ, and then decades as a grand movie palace. Television and downtown's decline eroded the audience through the 1970s, and when Consolidated declined to renew its lease in 1984, the house went dark - with demolition a genuine possibility. The rescue came from its own volunteers: members of the theatre's pipe-organ group formed the non-profit Hawaii Theatre Center, bought the building in 1986, and mounted a decades-long restoration. Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer's award-winning interior renovation brought the house back to life on 26 April 1996, and the 2004-05 exterior restoration rebuilt the 1938 marquee and the landmark HAWAII neon blade sign. Today the 1,350-seat theatre - 585 orchestra, 765 balcony - is downtown Honolulu's premier stage: national touring concerts, comedy, hula and Hawaiian music festivals, film premieres and community productions share the calendar, the building hosts over 100,000 guests a year, and it is listed on both the State and National Registers of Historic Places. Guided tours run regularly for the architecture alone. The Bethel Street setting puts it at the heart of Chinatown's arts district - First Friday gallery nights swirl around the block - with parking in nearby municipal garages. A century on, the Pride of the Pacific has earned the name twice: once for being built, once for being saved.