Leslie S. Hodgson and Myrl A. McClenahan, premier local architects, were commissioned to take on the design task. They visited the newest and trendiest West Coast theatres. Swayed by the King Tut-mania of the time, and obviously impressed by Grauman’s Egyptian Theatre ( Hollywood, 1922), the duo soon had Peery’s Egyptian down on blueprints.
Construction began in the autumn of 1923 on ground where the Peery family’s first Ogden home once stood. The Egyptian’s debut occurred just 10 months later, July 3, 1924.
Peery’s new 1,200-seat show house was built entirely of poured, reinforced concrete. Prior to the fireproof theatre’s opening, 70,000 pounds of gravel were piled atop the auditorium to test the building’s strength. Before and after measurements revealed a roof stress variance of just a fraction of an inch. Large lettering on the back of the Egyptian proclaimed it to be, “ Ogden’s Only Fireproof Theatre… A Safe Place for the Kiddies.”
The opening feature movie was Zane Grey’s “Wanderers of the Wasteland,” photographed in what were claimed to be “natural colors.” Musical accompaniment for the silent film was performed on the Egyptian’s “Mighty Wurlitzer” Theatre Pipe Organ.
Its Egyptian-revival “atmospheric” auditorium makes Peery’s Egyptian quite a rarity among theatres, where, with the flick of a switch, a daytime sky magically turns to nighttime, replete with twinkling stars.
Seating is on a single, steeply raked floor, providing excellent sight lines from anywhere in the house. Its ornate terra cotta façade, with original colors and details remaining as bright and crisp today as they were in 1924, is widely acclaimed for its intricate beauty.
Talking pictures came to the Egyptian April 27, 1929 with the showing of “In Old Arizona.”
With the introduction of sound movies, use of the Egyptian’s “Mighty Wurlitzer” dwindled, primarily played during intermissions and occasional programs into the 1950s. It was removed in 1960.
After Twentieth Century-Fox was incorporated in 1935, Peery’s two show houses— the Egyptian and the Ogden—were leased by Fox Inter-Mountain Theatres. Early on, the new operators replaced the Egyptian’s original box office and installed a drop ceiling in the outer lobby to accommodate a new marquee that quadrupled the size of the original.
A major refurbishing took place in 1951 under the auspices of Fox. In some ways, the Egyptian was then more elegant than ever.
“It Came From Outer Space” inaugurated 3-D movies at the show house July 18, 1953. Just three months later, on October 28, the first CinemaScope motion picture, “The Robe” was introduced. To present the new wide-screen films, inner-proscenium columns were removed to accommodate a picture twice as wide as it was tall. The new format came with a revolutionary four-channel stereophonic sound system. Audiences were both visually and audibly wowed.
A 1961 remodeling was not kind to aesthetic sensibilities. Many of the 1924 interior designs and colors were painted over. A mammoth new screen was erected in front of the stage and proscenium, and auditorium walls were painted pink, to match new drapery. On a positive note, chairs installed in 1951 seats were rebuilt for added comfort, and the auditorium floor was re-configured to provide more patron leg room, reducing seating capacity to about 850.
Under Fox Inter-Mountain’ corporate successors—National Theatres, National-General Corporation, and finally Mann Theatres—the Egyptian remained a major first-run venue for more than two decades.
But circumstances changed dramatically in the early 1980s. Operated by a small, local chain by then, and reduced to a second-run dollar movie venue, the Egyptian was ordered closed by county authorities late in 1984 for health code violations.
After being boarded up for several years, and threatened with destruction, the Weber County Heritage Foundation bought the Egyptian from its absentee owner literally at the final hour. Ironically, the purchase price was identical to what it cost to build the structure in 1924: $250,000. The rescued building was turned over to the Egyptian Theatre Foundation, who signed it over to Ogden City. It eventually came under Weber County direction.
Through a complex partnership that included Weber County, Ogden City, Weber State University, Egyptian Theatre Foundation, and Ogden/Weber Chamber of Commerce, not only was the Egyptian saved and restored, but the adjoining David Eccles Conference Center was constructed, and a rebuilt department store became new Weber County government offices. Hundreds of monetary contributions, large and small, made the project possible. Major donations and grants came from the likes of the George S. and Delores Dore Eccles Foundation, Dr. Louis S. and Jan Peery, and the Utah State Legislature.
A superbly restored Peery’s Egyptian reopened January 17, 1997 as a performing arts/movie theatre.
After an absence of decades, a magnificent Wurlitzer theatre pipe organ once again fills the Egyptian with music, making its debut in July of 2004.
Facts About Peery’S Egyptian Theater
- Listed on the National Register of Historic Sites (1978)
- Listed on the Ogden City Register of Historic Sites (1982)
- One of possibly as few as 42 Egyptian-design theatres constructed in the
- United States (Theatre Historical Society of America estimate)
- One of an estimated dozen Egyptian-style theatres of movie palace status remaining in the United States
- Thought to be one of only two Egyptian-style “atmospheric” theatres (with an auditorium “sky” dotted with twinkling stars) in the nation
- Probably the only “atmospheric” theatre of any design in the Intermountain region
- Utah’s only existing bona fide movie palace
