Theater-restaurant to open downtown

Kyle Boggs/Summer Reporter DINNER AND A MOVIE? The Lafayette Theater will be reopened for movie goers.

By Kyle Boggs
Summer Reporter

A pretty standard date has always been dinner and a movie. Starting next spring, for the first time since 1939, residents can get their dinner and movie all in the same place.

The Lafayette Urban Enterprise Association (LUEA) has invested in the Lafayette Theater (600 Main St.), a long time vacant building in Lafayette. Constructed in 1939, the building was originally a classy place in which couples could go eat dinner at tables and watch a movie at the same time.

"We wanted to rehabilitate the building and restore it to its original Art Deco style," said LUEA's executive director Dennis Carson.

Both Purdue graduates; president of Deco Entertainment Jay Mermoud and vice president Kent Allison first looked at the building in late 1997.

"We were curious and wanted to see what shape it was in," said Mermoud. "Then I thought, 'hmmm,' I wonder what could be successful in here and what would it cost."

Mermoud and his company purchased the building in 1999 and renovations have just begun.

LUEA is helping Deco Entertainment with the cost of the project by supplying most of the money. This is not the first but the second investment cost credit LUEA has obtained lately. The first was for the new Holiday Inn Select City Centre that’s currently going up on South Street between Fifth and Sixth Streets.

Carson says this is just the beginning of many dramatic developments downtown.

There aren't many theaters like this anymore; they are primarily found in larger cities like Indianapolis and Chicago, Carson said.

Funds also come from businesses and organizations such as the Main Street Façade Program, Build Indiana funds, the Neighborhood Action Committee and Historic Landmarks Foundation of Indiana.

Allison said the theater's stage also offers opportunities for pre-movie acts, such as samplers from Civic Theatre or Long Center performances. "It's not just entertainment, it's an experience," he said.

The first night the theater is open, if he can find it, Mermoud hopes to show the movie "Four's a Crowd," the first film ever shown in the theater.

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