Orpheum

Orpheum is a name often used for theatres or other entertainment venues. It may refer to:

Theatres

Orpheum Theatre (Omaha)

The Orpheum Theater is located at 409 South 16th Street in downtown Omaha, Nebraska. The Orpheum hosts programs best served by a more theatrical setting, including the Omaha Performing Arts Broadway Season, presented with Broadway Across America, and Opera Omaha's season. The theater is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

History

The current site of the Omaha Orpheum Theater was previously home to the Creighton Theater.John A. McShane organized a stock company to build the original theater in 1895. The architects for the original theater were Fisher & Lawrie and the general contractors were Rocheford & Gould. Paxton and Vierling installed the iron curtain that weighed 11 tons. The theater was named after John A. Creighton, a local philanthropist, and a large portrait of Count Creighton decorated the proscenium arch. The Creighton Theater was eventually added to the Orpheum Circuit, which by 1900 had expanded to nine western cities: Omaha, Chicago, Kansas City, New Orleans, Denver, Salt Lake City, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Sacramento. The reference to Creighton was eventually dropped from the theater's name.

Orpheum (Vancouver)

The Orpheum is a theatre and music venue in Vancouver, British Columbia. Along with the Queen Elizabeth Theatre and the Vancouver Playhouse, it is part of the Vancouver Civic Theatres group of live performance venues. It is the permanent home of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra. The Orpheum is located on Granville Street near Smithe Street in Vancouver's downtown core.

History

Designed by Scottish architect Marcus Priteca, the theatre officially opened on November 7, 1927 as a vaudeville house, but it hosted its first shows the previous day. The old Orpheum, at 761 Granville Street, was renamed the Vancouver Theatre (later the Lyric, then the International Cinema, then the Lyric once more before it closed for demolition in 1969 to make way for the first phase of the Pacific Centre project). The New Orpheum, which was the biggest theatre in Canada when it opened in 1927, with three thousand seats, cost $1.25 million to construct. The first manager of the theatre was William A. Barnes.