Santa Rosa: Another Houston theatre bites the dust

With all of the controversy concerning the possible destruction of the River Oaks and Alabama theatres, little has been said of another Houston theatre that fell to the wrecking ball this year. The Santa Rosa Theatre, once one of the elite Interstate neighborhood theatres, was demolished earlier in 2007 and the property now stands vacant.

True, the Santa Rosa has spent the last few years boarded up and abandoned. Prior to that, it served as an X house – first running films in the auditorium, and later converting the lobby area into an X-rated video rental area. However, it was one of the few Interstate structures still standing.

Interstate’s expansion into the neighborhoods began with the North Main in 1936, followed by eleven more theatres over the next dozen years. Of these, the Eastwood, Yale, Almeda, Village, Wayside, Broadway, and Fulton are all razed. The North Main and Garden Oaks still stand, having been converted into churches, while the Tower operates as a video store and the Alabama, a book store (and the only one that still retains its theatre persona). Now the Santa Rosa has joined the ranks of the fallen.

The Santa Rosa was the first Houston theatre constructed by Interstate after WWII, opening on December 20, 1946. Dallas architects Pettigrew and Worley were contracted to handle the Santa Rosa project, and would go on to design the Broadway, the Fulton, and the Garden Oaks. The firm had previously worked on the River Oaks theatre, and John A. Worley had handled the Alabama design.

By the mid-seventies, it had changed formats, running Spanish-language films. Later, it changed to an X-format, and the exterior name changed from Santa Rosa to Star.