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Last week, it was reported that Chicago-based Honore Properties had purchased the 17-story building at 70 E. Lake St. in the Loop. The 99-year-old office building will be converted into approximately 170 luxury apartments.
Just another real estate story, just another sign of an evolving downtown. There’s nothing villainous about this; in fact, it will likely inject new life into the structure for generations to come. Still, for me and for my fellow critics from the Chicago area (especially the veterans), there was a deeply personal element, because for decades, that gorgeous and weathered Gothic Revival/Art Deco building has been home to one of the most iconic screening rooms in the world.
The place where Siskel & Ebert saw so many films. A newsroom away from the newsroom, a destination where critics from the Chicago Sun-Times, the Chicago Tribune and suburban papers, as well as TV and radio personalities and producers and publicists, gathered for advance showings of movies that would be coming soon to a theater near you.
The Lake Street Screening Room.
This is where Roger Ebert would always sit in the last row on the left, closest to the entrance, and Gene Siskel would take the farthest right seat in that last row. Back in the day, there was a small table in the middle of that back row with a landline telephone. Before and after screenings, Gene or Roger would sometimes work the phones, confabbing with an editor or the producers for their local TV gigs or their nationally syndicated show. When you saw them on your television on Saturday or Sunday, or on Carson or Letterman or Leno, engaging in passionate conversation about a particular film, there was a good chance they had seen that movie at the Lake Street Screening Room. (Sidebar: I can neither confirm nor deny that on occasion between screenings in the 1990s, Gene would take me over to the Off-Track Betting facility around the corner on State Street.)
Downtown Chicago commuters hustling to and from work, tourists on their way to the Magnificent Mile and Grant Park, street musicians and traffic cops, shoppers and diners, hotel guests—virtually none of them had any inkling that while they were going about their business, a small group of us were hunkered down in the cool and soothing darkness of the 48-seat screening room on the 16th floor as early as 10 a.m., lost in the latest film from Spike Lee or Steven Spielberg or Quentin Tarantino, or tapping our feet while enduring some tepid remake or unnecessary sequel. (Although you never really knew what anyone else was thinking. The first unwritten rule of Screen Club was you generally kept your opinions to yourself, until it was time to share those opinions with your respective outlets.)
There was no marquee on the outside of the building, no concession stand in the lobby. On countless mornings and afternoons dating back to the early 1990s, I’d walk down a stretch of Lake Street that was not particularly glamorous, maybe stopping in at the 7/11 (still open) or the branch of the Billy Goat Tavern (sadly, closed) for a coffee before walking past Imperial Shoe Services and entering the lobby. I’d take an elevator car with a capacity of four people (hey, the building is about to turn 100), ride up to the 16th floor, and make a hard left past the framed movie posters to enter the screening room. The curtains are straight out of a 1980s “Tonight Show” set and the seats are well-worn, but the sound and picture were always state of the art.
That pristine viewing experience came courtesy of Steve Kraus, who has been with the Lake Street Screening Room for some four decades and has run it as his own business since 2000. “It used to mean getting there an hour before showtime to inspect heads and tails of every reel of film prior to projection,” said Kraus. “Now it means going to ingest movies onto the server. Usually days before. Many cinemas get movies via satellite. We get them on hard drives.” (Kraus’ expertise is such that Roger would often rely on him to answer technical questions for the “Movie Answer Man” columns.)
When Siskel & Ebert celebrated their 20th anniversary, I interviewed them in the Lake Street Screening Room. When the city honored the 50th anniversary of their TV partnership last year, ABC-7’s Hosea Sanders interviewed me in the Lake Street Screening Room. In the 2000s, Roger and I would huddle with our producers in the stairwell on the 16th floor between screenings, mapping out the next show taping. Kevin Smith attended a screening there when he was filling in for Roger on an episode of “Ebert & Roeper.” When an actor friend of mine was in town shooting a long-running hit TV series, I took them to a showing of “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy” at Lake Street. In addition to the regular critics’ screenings, Kraus would often screen a locally made film for cast and crew. Shortly after COVID, he held a test screening for a biopic starring an A-lister.
Still, it was never about Hollywood or celebrities or glamour. Day in and day out, the screening room was a workplace in a building filled with workplaces. In fact, it shares 16th floor space with an office that has housed administration for the Joffrey Ballet and legal aid organizations, among other tenants. Get this: whenever a movie was playing, the sound was piped into the bathrooms, so your friendly neighborhood critic wouldn’t miss any dialogue while taking a break. Imagine being a guest or a new employee at the adjacent office, going to the bathroom—and hearing Tom Hanks saying, “Life is like a box of chocolates” or a blood-curdling cry from a “Scream” movie emanating from an overhead speaker.
Not that Lake Street was the only place for advance screening. We sometimes saw “big ticket” films at commercial theaters, along with other critics and fans who had been granted an opportunity to see a movie in advance. These days, nearly all of the screenings I attend are in the afternoon or evening at one of the AMC theaters in the city. I still see a lot of friendly faces, including critics who write for this very site, as well as the new breed known as influencers. Every once in a while, there’s a screening at Lake Street—and when there is, I almost always take my usual spot in the third row. Sometimes the attendees sitting in Roger’s or Gene’s old seat are aware that royalty once occupied those spots; I would imagine that with other, younger members of the press, they might not be aware of all the history. That’s OK. Time marches on.
I asked Steve Kraus if he planned to establish another space after 70 E. Lake closes. His answer was matter-of-fact: “No. Business is too low. It pays the bills but not much beyond. It’s been a good run. No complaints.” Although Kraus does note that the timeline on the end is unclear (“could be a matter of months or years”) and there’s even “a remote chance they wish to keep the space as an amenity.” Although that seems unlikely to include film critics.
Over the last 30 years, Chaz Ebert has been a treasured regular at Lake Street screenings. “The Lake Street screening room, presided over by Steve, served as a magic cocoon over the years to see movies with Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel and Richard Roeper,” she said. “What a thrill when we saw something we suspected would be special. Steve always made sure the sound and picture was just right. As I think back on those times, I realize that the glow of the friendship among the film critics was sometimes as special as the glow from the screen. There was an unspoken agreement not to talk or do anything to distract from the experience we were having from the film. What beautiful memories.”
The building at 401 N. Wabash Ave. that once housed the Chicago Sun-Times, Roger’s home newspaper (and mine as well), was demolished to make way for a gleaming luxury condo skyscraper. The tower at 435 N. Michigan Ave. that once housed Gene’s home newspaper, the Chicago Tribune, has been converted into a high-end condo building. A similar future awaits the home of the Lake Street Screening Room. In the not too distant future, residents will move into their new homes with the prestigious address of 70 E. Lake Street. I’m sure there will be times when someone living on the 16th floor will unwind at night by playing an old movie. They’ll probably have no idea how fitting that will be.
from Roger Ebert https://ift.tt/jSFvKTn
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