Indoor Theaters
Arcadia Theater. (See Chief Theater.)
Arnett Benson Theater, 105 University Ave, (formerly College Ave.). Opened in 1955.
Backstage Twin. (See Chaparral Twin.)
Broadway Theater, 1116 Broadway, 514 seats, opened in 1935 and closed in 1955. Later became the popular Skibell’s clothing store, then a production home for Lubbock Community Theatre (with a pole in the center of the stage).
**Cactus Theater, 1812 Buddy Holly Ave. (formerly Ave. H), opened in 1938 and closed on May 6, 1958. Reopened by Don Caldwell and a board of directors in 1993, and continues to operate as a successful live music venue, primarily on weekends.
Chaparral Twin, formerly the Backstage Twin, located in the Town & Country Shopping Center on Fourth Street, across the street from Jones Stadium. Auditoriums were tiny, with fewer than 100 seats, and sound bled through the thin walls.
Chief Theater, 1211 Ave. H.. This originally was the Arcadia Theater. The theater changed hands in 1950 and was renamed the Chief, and then closed in 1955.
Cinema West, located on the southeast corner of 19th Street and Quaker Avenue, 652 seats, continental searing (no center aisle). Opened in 1975 and closed in 1998.
Circle Theater, address unavailable.
Clifton Theater, located on a corner at Main Street and Avenue J, across the street from the larger Lindsey Theater. This theater originally opened as the Palace Theater, and then was purchased and the name changed to the Clifton in the early 1950s.
Lindsey Theater, 1019 Main St., specifically on the southeast corner of Main Street and Avenue J. A large theater with a second-story balcony.
Llanos Theater, 1419 Ave. G.
Lyric Theater, located on Texas Avenue, one block north of Broadway and across the street from the Lubbock County Courthouse, 510 seats. Opened in 1935 and closed in 1964.
Mann Fox Fourplex, located on West 19th Street, directly east of the beautiful Cinema West. Opened as the Fox Twin, but was crudely twinned again into a fourplex.
Mann Slide Road, four screens, located in a strip center on Slide Road, across the street from the South Plains Mall.
Midway Theater, 1805 Broadway. This building kept changing hands, and the theater kept changing names. The Midway later was the Centre, the Gay 90s, the El Tejas, the Varsity and the Continental. The Varsity was considered an art theater, often showing films requested by Texas Tech professors. The Continental wound up being run by young owners who did bring in desired foreign films, but whose projectionists at times showed the films without making the subtitles visible.
**Movies 16 (Cinemark Theaters), 5721 58th St.
Orpheum, address unavailable. Reported by historian Leonard Graves to be Lubbock’s first movie theater, with a 1909 opening. Closed one year later.
Palace Theater. (See Clifton Theater.)
Plains Theater, 717 Broadway.
Plaza Theater, 26th Street and Boston Avenue. Opened in 1947.
Rex Theater, address unavailable.
Ritz Theater, 1701 Ave. A., specifically on a corner of Avenue A and 17th Street, about five block south of Broadway. Opened in 1945 and closed in 1955.
Rose Theater, address unavailable.
**Showplace 6 (Noret Theaters), 6707 S. University Ave.. Originally opened as the Showplace 4, then two more screens were added. Though a discount house specializing in second-run films, one auditorium at Showplace 6 is the largest currently in Lubbock.
State Theater, 1316 Texas Ave., 997 seats. Theater was remodeled in 1950 and closed in 1975.
Tech Theater, 1211 University Ave. (formerly College Ave.)
Texan Theater, address unavailable. A very small theater that opened in the early 1930s and had closed before 1950.
**Tinseltown 17 (Cinemark Theaters), 2535 82nd St.
Tower Theater, 1007 University Ave. (formerly College Ave.), located across the street from Texas Tech. Opened in 1940 and closed in 1964.
UA (United Artists) South Plains Cinema, four screens, located at the South Plains Mall on south Slide Road. Entrance was on the east side of the mall, separated from Slide Road by a massive parking area.
Village Theater, located in a strip center on 34th Street, east of University Avenue. The former theater now is home to a baseball batting cage.
Winchester Twin, 3417 50th St., deep set into the southwest part of the intersection of 50th Street and Indiana Avenue. Opened with “Doctor Zhivago” in 1966 as the gorgeous, single-screen Winchester Theater. It had a deeply curved screen and was able to handle wide-screen 70-millimeter prints. (It was never equipped for Cinerama features.) Could not fight the multiplexes and closed in 1999.
** -- Open, active
Drive-In Theaters
Circle Drive-In, 2515 55th St. Located off a multi-exit intersection known as Lubbock’s “traffic circle.”
Corral Drive-in, located on the Idalou Highway.
Country Club Drive-In, address unavailable.
Fine Arts Drive-In, located on West 19th Street and showed adult X-rated movies. Before changing hands, this was known as the Westerner Drive-In, and before that the name was a simple Western Drive-In.
Five Points Drive-In, two screens, located at the point where Slide Road, West 34th Street and the Brownfield Highway all intersected. Lubbock’s first drive-in, opened in 1947.
Golden Horseshoe Drive-In, two screens, 6400 University Ave. Maximum capacity was 1,000 cars, or 500 cars for each screen. The Super K-mart on University Avenue is where the Golden Horseshoe once stood.
Plains Drive-In, also located on the Levelland Highway (19th Street, west of Lubbock). Opened in June 1948.
Red Raider Drive-In, two screens, located on North University Avenue.
Stars & Stripes Drive-In, three screens, 5101 U.S. 84. Opened in 2003 as a twin; third screen added in 2007. Still open.
Sunset Drive-In, address unavailable.
Trail Drive-In, Clovis Highway.
Westerner Drive-In. (See Fine Arts Drive-In.)
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