Saguaro Theater

When it opened in 1948, the Saguaro Theater (spelled “Theatre” back then) was big news in Wickenburg. Under a banner headline, The Wickenburg Sun trumpeted the theater’s Western vibe, with its peeled logs, flagstone fireplace and enormous saguaro towering above the neon-lighted marquee.

The giant cactus being its dominant feature, you might think the name suggested itself as plainly as the nose on your face. Yet in a naming contest, Wickenburg residents offered countless other suggestions. Wickenburg High School sophomore Douglas McPherson was one of 30 who suggested “Saguaro,” winning the $25 prize on the strength of his letter. “What could be more apropos than the name ‘Saguaro’?” he asked. “Just look at the picture which was printed in the Sun!”

Like the College Theatre (now the Valley Art), which had opened in Tempe eight years earlier, the Saguaro was a partnership between Harry L. Nace and Dwight “Red” Harkins. While it operated as part of the Harry L. Nace Theatres chain, Harkins got credit for the design, which replicated the College Theatre’s floorplan.

The Arizona Republic declared the Saguaro “one of the most modern and picturesque theaters to be found anywhere in a Western community,” adding that it was acoustically designed for talking pictures. Every story noted its innovative “smoking bar,” equipped with speakers, where patrons could enjoy a cigarette behind a glass panel and miss neither sight nor sound. And in the similarly equipped “crying room,” moms could console caterwauling kids.

The smoking and crying rooms now serve as storage areas, and the original “ultra-modern” seats have been replaced many times over. But the theater’s namesake cactus remains, and so does the single-screen auditorium.

While most theaters of its kind have gone the way of the 8-track, the Saguaro has survived the introduction of television, multiplexes and the transition to digital. It’s still a place where patrons enjoy first-run movies with the latest technology, but at yesterday’s prices. And on Tuesday nights, they can step back in time to watch a film from a bygone era in a classic setting.

“The first memory I have of getting to go to the theater was when Queen Elizabeth was coronated,” former Wickenburg Vice Mayor Royce Kardinal recalls. “Tom Murphy and his wife, Shirley, operated the theater. Shirley walked around with a flashlight and whacked your ankle if your feet were on the seat in front of you.”

Molly Murphy Atwood says her mother was fearless when it came to rule breakers: “You just didn’t mess with her.” When Wickenburg was still the dude ranch capital, Shirley had no problem breaking up fights that occasionally broke out between cowboys. “She didn’t put up with that rowdiness,” Molly says, “and would get in the middle of them and tell them to straighten up and head on down the road.”

For decades, the theater was a family affair. Molly began selling tickets and popcorn at age 14. Her brothers both worked as projectionists. “My grandmother even worked for the theater for a while,” she says.

When Brian Deveny bought the business in 1995, his then-wife, Beth, recalls, the first improvement he made was adding doors to replace the curtains separating the lobby from the auditorium. Before that, “You could hear traffic during the movie,” she says, “and you could sometimes hear cows mooing.” The sound system, meanwhile, picked up ham radio conversations from a nearby trailer park. Brian “had to beg this guy not to speak during these hours,” Beth says.

The theater did go dark for brief periods. The first was in the 1960s, amid declining attendance that was blamed on television. It was in danger of closing again when films went digital in 2014, but the community rallied to raise money for a compatible projector; former manager Ben Polley recalls that Val Kilmer’s mother, Wickenburg resident Gladys Leach, made a sizable donation. And when theaters had to close during the COVID-19 pandemic, restaurateur Jim Swift stepped in.

“He bought everything so he could keep it as a theater and it wouldn’t close down,” Polley says, adding that the previous owners “had done a lot of remodeling, and when Jim came in, he took that and [multiplied] it by 10.” Swift’s upgrades included a state-of-the art laser projector and more comfortable seating.

When Swift sold the theater in 2025, he accepted Patty Sickles’ offer from among competing bids because the longtime resident and business owner planned to run it as a theater. With a nod to the Saguaro’s roots, Sickles plans to open an ice cream shop in the small adjoining office space that originally housed the theater’s concessions.

Molly says it swells her heart that people have worked to preserve both the landmark and its spirit, keeping it a place where imagination mingles with the scent of buttered popcorn — and families enjoy a brief distraction from whatever’s going on in their lives and in the world.