The Sunshine Theater, which occupies a significant portion of the building, was Albuquerque's first movie palace. The first film shown there was Scaramouche, starring Ramón Novarro and accompanied by a special orchestra for the occasion. The theater stopped showing first-run movies in 1974 and closed completely in the 1980s, but has since been remodeled into a popular live music venue. The Sunshine Theater has hosted a number of notable acts such as The Strokes, Snoop Dogg, Stone Temple Pilots, The Smashing Pumpkins, Modest Mouse, Rancid, Coheed and Cambria, Social Distortion, Deftones, and Deadmau5 among others.
