Palace Cultural Arts Association

Marion, Ohio, is one of the American towns that saved its movie palace. The Palace Theatre opened there in 1928 as an atmospheric house — a painted night sky above the auditorium, stars and drifting clouds, architecture pretending to be an open courtyard — and when the cinema trade collapsed the building was taken over by a non-profit association rather than demolished. That association now runs it as the town's arts centre, programming film, drama, touring music and community productions in a room that has kept its original conceit intact.