Chicago's Oldest Movie Palace Is Back: The New 400 Theater Reopens in Rogers Park After Three-Year Closure
By Socialhood News · Rogers Park ·
Rogers Park neighbors, one of the neighborhood's most beloved landmarks is showing films again — and if you haven't made it through the doors yet this summer, September is the perfect time to go.
The New 400 Theater at 6746 N. Sheridan Road reopened on July 31, 2026, under new ownership, ending a three-year closure and reviving what Block Club Chicago confirmed is Chicago's oldest movie palace. The theater had been dark since 2023, leaving a conspicuous void on one of Rogers Park's most iconic commercial blocks. Now it's back — and the programming it launched with signaled an owner with genuine cinematic ambition: the opening night double bill featured the premiere of "Spider-Man: Brand New Day" alongside "I Want Your Sex," pairing a blockbuster draw with more adventurous independent fare on the very same night.
For a neighborhood that has always prided itself on cultural depth and accessibility, the return of the 400 is more than a real estate story. The theater has logged 111 years as a neighborhood institution on Sheridan Road, surviving everything from the collapse of the single-screen era to a global pandemic that pushed the previous operator to close in 2021 before a brief reopening and final closure in 2023. That a new owner stepped in specifically to revive it — rather than redevelop the site — says something important about what Rogers Park's commercial corridor is capable of attracting in 2026.
Tickets for the reopening screenings went on sale in person and on the theater's website around July 27, and the 400 has been running its schedule since. For neighbors who haven't been back since the previous run, or who moved to the neighborhood during the closure, this is the moment to walk through those doors. The Sheridan Road location is easily accessible via the Red Line's Morse stop, just steps from the theater.
The 400's return fits neatly into a broader pattern of Rogers Park investing in what it already has rather than erasing it. The neighborhood is simultaneously watching the long-shuttered firehouse at 1721–23 W. Greenleaf Ave. move toward life as a café and event space, and the Werner Bros. building on Paulina Street inching toward transformation into 80 units of affordable housing. Each of these projects represents a conscious choice to honor the neighborhood's built history while finding new uses that serve the community going forward.
And if a movie at the 400 works up your appetite for more neighborhood culture this fall, the Rogers Park Business Alliance's Glenwood Sunday Market is running every Sunday through October 25 — in its 17th season, on the west side of Glenwood Avenue between Lunt and Morse, with a ribbon-cutting for the season having taken place June 7. The market runs from June through late October and has become one of Rogers Park's most reliable weekly gathering points, offering local produce, baked goods, cheeses, meats, and prepared foods from vendors the neighborhood has come to know over more than a decade and a half.
Taken together, a revived 111-year-old movie palace and a farmers market in its 17th season paint a picture of a neighborhood that holds onto what works. The New 400 Theater didn't need to become luxury condos or a chain retail space — it needed a new owner who believed in what it was. Rogers Park, your neighborhood cinema is back. Go see something.
Sources:
1. https://blockclubchicago.org/2026/07/22/rogers-parks-new-400-theater-closed-since-2023-opening-this-month-under-new-owner/
2. https://www.burbio.com/states/Illinois/Chicago/rogers-park-business-alliance