St. James Theatre (Boston)

The St. James Theatre (1912–1929) of Boston, Massachusetts, was a playhouse and cinema in the Back Bay in the 1910s and 1920s. It occupied the former Chickering Hall on Huntington Avenue near Massachusetts Avenue, adjacent to Horticultural Hall.^[1] For some years Loew's theatre chain oversaw the St. James.^[2] In 1929 the theatre "became part of the Publix (Paramount) chain, and was renamed the Uptown."^[3]

Images

Interior, 1912
Interior, 1912
Advertisement for "vaudeville and super photo-plays," 1920, including Charlie Chaplin's A Day's Pleasure
St. James Theatre (center), next to Horticultural Hall (at left), 1920
Advertisement for Boston Stock Company production of Charles H. Hoyt's A Temperance Town, 1922

^ Edwin M. Bacon (1916), A guide book of Boston, adopted by the New England Hardware Dealers' Association for the joint convention and exhibition of the National Retail Hardware Association and the New England Hardware Dealers' Association, Boston: Woodberry Press, OL 14010593M
^ Moving Picture World, Feb. 5, 1916
^ Donald C. King (2005), The Theatres of Boston: a Stage and Screen History, Jefferson, N.C: McFarland & Co., ISBN 0786419105, OL 3392044M, 0786419105

Library of Congress. Keith-Albee St. James Theatre, (Boston Player Stock Company), Huntington Ave. near Massachusetts Ave., Boston, Massachusetts. Drawing of theater facade, 1928.
Boston Public Library.Postcard of St. James Theatre, Boston, Mass., published by Mason Bros. & Co., ca. 1915-1930
Bostonian Society. Photograph of Uptown Theater, 239 Huntington Street, ca. 1962-1963. "Demolition (replaced by Christian Science Center). Originally the Chickering Hall (built 1900-1901), later Saint James Theater."
CinemaTreasures.org. Uptown Theatre, 239 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA 02115 (successor to the St. James)