FULLERTON : Pact to Restore Old Theater Coming Up

After months of negotiations, an agreement to restore and reopen the Fox Fullerton Theatre will come before the City Council on Tuesday.

The agreement calls for the city to build a 200-space parking structure behind the Fox in exchange for the owner’s spending up to $1.55 million to restore the 65-year-old theater.

It has been considered a city landmark, and its reopening is part of the city’s goal of attracting more people downtown in the evenings.

The Fox closed in a state of disrepair in 1987 and since has sat empty on Harbor Boulevard.

The new owner, Edward G. Lewis, an attorney in Hollywood, asked the city last year for help in reopening the Fox.

The agreement, which the council will consider signing after a public hearing Tuesday, spells out how the Fox must be restored and what the city will do to help the theater reopen. Plans call for the balcony to be walled off and the theater converted to two smaller screens. The city will require that murals, decorative ceilings, fixtures and the proscenium be restored.

Lewis has signed an agreement with Landmark Theatre Corp. of Los Angeles to restore and operate the Fox. Landmark has said it will show art and foreign films, as well as movies aimed at families.

The agreement calls for the city to buy the necessary land behind the theater, relocate renters now living there and build a parking structure. The city also has plans to buy a closed mortuary nearby to allow better access to the parking structure.

The city’s cost is estimated at $4.1 million.