The Capitol is an historic theatre on Swanston Street in the central business district (CBD) of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Opened in 1924 as part of the Capitol House building, the art deco theatre was designed by American husband and wife architects Walter Burley and Marion Mahony Griffin, and is the oldest of Melbourne's large picture palaces. It is famous for its extravagant decor and abstract motifs, including an intricate geometric ceiling containing thousands of coloured lamps, designed to evoke the walls of a crystalline cave.
Proposals in the early 1960s to demolish the theatre sparked one of Australia's first major heritage conservation campaigns. While the cinema was saved, its seating capacity was reduced and parts of the original ground level foyer were replaced by a shopping arcade. RMIT University purchased The Capitol in 1999 for use as a lecture theatre, and in 2014 it was closed to undergo an extensive five-year restoration and upgrade. The Capitol reopened in 2019 and has since hosted various film festival screenings, theatrical performances and other events.
The Capitol is registered with the Australian Heritage Council, the National Trust of Australia and Heritage Victoria, which describes its avant-garde design as "extremely unusual in the realm of theatres and cinemas worldwide" and "a technical triumph".
History
Construction
The Capitol Theatre was commissioned by a group of Melbourne businessmen, including the Greek Consul-General Antony J. Lucas and the American-born Phillips brothers, who had previously developed Luna Park and the adjacent Palais Theatre in St Kilda. The architects were WB Griffin with Peck & Kemter, but the design is attributed to American husband and wife architects Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin, known for her work on interiors. Lucas had worked previously with the Griffins on the development of both the Vienna Cafe in 1916 and then his own property Yamala in Frankston, and the Phillips’ had worked with them on the interior of St Kilda's Palais de Danse.
Marino Lucas, brother of J. J. Lucas, had previously built the Majestic Theatre in Launceston, which at the heights of the Great War became the most profitable cinema in Tasmania. Centrally located within the Launceston tramway network on a main street, the Majestic's phenomenal success may have influenced Lucas' decision to construct a centrally positioned theatre in Melbourne.
The official plans for the Capitol were submitted for approval on 21 November 1921, with approval granted on 9 February 1923, and construction completed in 1924. It was officially opened on 7 November 1924. The theatre was part of a larger a mixed-use complex, known as Capitol House, incorporating shops at ground level, a basement cafe, a 10 storey office tower perched above the lobbies, with the main part of the auditorium projecting out behind. The office tower is described as Chicagoesque style, with vertical proportions and a prominent cornice. The theatre itself was considered an architectural masterpiece, and quite unique.
It was described in the 1960s by the leading architect and academic Robin Boyd as "the best cinema that was ever built or is ever likely to be built".
The building is noted in the Victoria context for its unusual mixed uses, and for the structural design that allowed them to co-exist, as well as for the daring cantilever of the concrete street verandah, but it is the geometric plaster ceiling of the theatre auditorium that is the most outstanding feature. Composed of angular crystalline forms in molded plaster, it was based on organic design principles from 'the natural world' and are composed in a way which is both evocative of a glittering cave, while it is also distinctly modern. The ceiling plasterwork incorporated hidden lighting of about 4000 coloured globes in red, yellow, blue and green, which could be controlled from a central point to produce different effects, used on their own and in conjunction with the original orchestral scores in the early silent film era to add drama for the spectator.
The Capitol was also the home of the first large Wurlitzer Organ to come to Australia. The Wurlitzer was used to provide music and sound effects for the films, when the orchestra was not used. After "sound" films took over it was used for musical entertainment in between shows. It was frequently broadcast on the ABC and remained in regular use until the mid 1950s. Originally seating 2137 (stalls 1306, balcony 633, loges and boxes 198), it was altered during the 1930s, with the seating capacity reduced to 2115 people, and a wider proscenium.