Despite a push from eager community members and the Honolulu City Council’s chair, city officials are wary of taking over the dilapidated Queen Theater which, at 90 years old, has sat closed in Kaimukī for almost half its life.
Officials have considered using eminent domain to purchase the theater. In late 2024, council members formally requested the city administration take it over to restore it as a community performance venue.
But now administration officials say it’s not worth the trouble.
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Drag the arrows above to compare photos of the Queen Theater then and now. Historical photo courtesy of Friends of Queen Theater. Contemporary photo by David Croxford of Civil Beat.
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Drag the arrows above to compare photos of the Queen Theater then and now. Historical photo courtesy of Friends of Queen Theater. Contemporary photo by David Croxford of Civil Beat.
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Drag the arrows above to compare photos of the Queen Theater then and now. Historical photo courtesy of Friends of Queen Theater. Contemporary photo by David Croxford of Civil Beat.
“With challenging site conditions, lead-based paint, asbestos and mold, in addition to the lack of parking … the administration is not willing to prioritize this acquisition and development,” city managing director Mike Formby said in a written statement Tuesday. He said the city prefers to focus on acquiring sites for initiatives such as affordable housing.
Council Chair Tommy Waters, who represents Kaimukī, wants to allocate money in the upcoming city budget to purchase the theater. He initially suggested $4 million, but Kevin Auger, director of the Department of Housing and Land Management, said that’s a big ask.
“Four million dollars is roughly half of our operating budget,” he said Monday during a council budget committee meeting. “So I’m not quite sure if that’s a mistake or if that’s something we need to kind of look at.”
Many neighbors envision the theater welcoming back films and live performances. (Courtesy: Friends of Queen Theater)
Auger said the administration has thought hard about acquiring the theater, which sits in a prime spot along Kaimukī’s main thoroughfare Waiʻalae Avenue. But the building’s owners have not been willing to cooperate, and that, combined with the building’s maintenance issues, make it more trouble than it might be worth, Auger said.
Waters then halved his ask to $2 million and said the state might be able to fund the rest. He said the city could purchase the theater and then a local nonprofit could operate it, though those details aren’t fully fleshed out.
State Rep. Jackson Sayama, who Waters said he’s spoken with, said he’s happy to work with Waters on the project but isn’t sure about the specifics. Still, he supports the city condemning Queen Theater given the decades it’s sat fallow.
“It continues to be kind of a blight on the Kaimukī community,” Sayama said.
Lack Of Progress
When Waters introduced a resolution in 2024 asking the administration to condemn Queen Theater, owner Adoree Yu testified at the City Council in opposition.
She knew progress had been stalled, she said, but she would work on fixing up the property. At the time, Yu presented a three-phase plan: Exterior renovations would be done by May 2025, she said, while interior renovations on the second floor and in the lobby would be done by the end of 2025. Renovations would be done by the end of 2026.
It’s unclear how much of that work has been completed. The city’s permitting portal shows the only permit application for the building since that meeting was a sign permit in late 2024, which has since been closed. Attorney Ryan Toyomura, who represents the theater’s corporation Queen Management, did not respond to requests for comment.
The Queen Theater opened in 1936 and is part of a declining generation of local theaters, including University Avenue’s Varsity Theater that closed in 2007. (David Croxford/Civil Beat/2024)
What is also unclear is who would take over the theater. Kaimukī community members support the theater’s revitalization, but there’s no large-scale effort for anyone to eventually manage operations.
Despite its name, Friends of Queen Theater isn’t up for the job. Members say the group is too small and is mostly geared towards advocating for the theater’s revitalization – an aim that has so far proven futile.
“Our group would have to become a bigger group,” member Mahlon Moore said Tuesday. “More robust.”
The effort to restore Queen Theater to its former glory has had so many stops and starts that some advocates have become tired of it. Save for a smattering of attempts to resuscitate it through things such as Rocky Horror Picture Show performances, Queen Theater has been essentially devoid of audiences for a little more than 40 years.
“When I went in, they were using the auditorium as a storage place for a plumber,” Moore said. “And so it was just full of crap – full of pipes and stuff like that. And most of the seats had been removed.”
That was almost six years ago.
Posters adorn a wall under the empty marquee. Since this photo was shot in 2024, fresh paint and new walls covering the openings have been added. (David Croxford/Civil Beat/2024)
In its prime, Kaimukī’s Queen Theater was a family friendly, no-frills neighborhood staple that showed popular films from studios such as Disney. Narciso Yu bought the theater in 1978, by which time his other six theaters in downtown and Waipahu were already showing X-rated pornographic films, which he brought to the Queen as well.
Kaimukī residents were aghast at the new management, according to media reports at the time. In response, council members and then-Mayor Frank Fasi tried to shut the theater down, but the law they passed to do so was deemed unconstitutional by federal judge Samuel P. King.
Still, police raids continued to target theater employees for showing lewd films. A massive raid in 1985 led to its eventual shutdown, from which it has never recovered.
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