Owner Gives Up on Old Theater, Decides to Sell

The owner of the rundown Whittier Theater is selling out because he is tired of fighting with the city and conservationists over the fate of the Depression-era landmark, according to an associate.

Peter Doerkin has put the theater up for sale, making way for a buyer to either restore or demolish it, said Don Gerstein, an executive and spokesman for Doerkin Properties Inc. of Santa Monica.

“We’re tired of dealing with Whittier,” Gerstein said. “We’re going to put our tail between our legs and go on to something else.”

Gerstein would not disclose how much Doerkin is asking for the theater, which he purchased for about $1.1 million from the Pacific Theater chain in 1987. “We are not asking an excessive amount,” Gerstein said. “We want enough to recover our costs.”

The historic film palace at Hadley Avenue and Whittier Boulevard has been at the center of debate since before the Oct. 1, 1987, earthquake.

When Doerkin purchased the theater in June, 1987, he told the council he was going to restore it and convert it to a performing arts center. But several months later, he asked the city for permission to replace the theater with a $14-million shopping plaza because, he said, fixing up the theater would be a losing proposition.

The council had not yet acted on Doerkin’s request when the 5.9-magnitude earthquake rocked the area in October, 1987, severely damaging the historic building.

City building inspectors ordered that the theater be demolished because they said the earthquake had made it unsafe. A wrecking crew worked on the theater for about 45 minutes in November, 1987, before lawyers for the Whittier Conservancy--which had successfully argued in court that the city had to obtain an environmental impact report before razing the theater--arrived with a restraining order to stop the destruction.