Des Plaines Theatre roof repairs to cost $94,000, city says

Upcoming repairs to the city-owned Des Plaines Theatre’s roof will cost $94,000, documents indicate.

The city council last week awarded a contract for the job to L. Marshall Roofing & Sheet Metal, a Glenview company. The firm touts Woodfield Mall in Schaumburg, University of St. Mary of the Lake in Mundelein and Northwestern University among its past clients.

L. Marshall Roofing & Sheet Metal presented the least expensive of four bids for the project, which involves installing a new layer of material over the existing roof. The bids ranged as high as $184,800, documents indicate.

Work should begin this month, said Tim Watkins, the city’s public works and engineering director. The repairs should take about 60 days to complete, he said, and they won’t affect theater events.

Occupying a prime spot in the downtown area at 1476 Miner St., the theater opened as a venue for vaudeville acts and movies in 1925. After the decline of vaudeville in the 1930s, the theater’s focus shifted almost entirely to films for decades.

Des Plaines bought the theater for about $1.3 million from a private owner in 2018. A three-year, $6.7 million renovation followed, and the facility reopened to the public in 2021.

It primarily hosts live musical acts now, although this summer it has screened family-friendly movies for just $1 a ticket. “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial” and “Ferris Bueller's Day Off” have been among the movies shown; next up is “Apollo 13” on Sept. 22.

During a brief public discussion of the proposed contract before last week’s vote, 6th Ward Alderman Mark Walsten said he was surprised a new roof wasn’t part of the building’s multimillion-dollar rehabilitation.

In response, Watkins said the roof “was in somewhat decent shape” when the city bought the building. To save money at the time, crews applied a protective coating to the roof rather than replacing it, Watkins said.

“The coating only lasts so long,” Watkins said.

Moments later, the council unanimously approved the contract.

rlissau@dailyherald.com