The marquee for FIVE, the new live music venue opening this week at the former home of the Sun-Ray Cinema in Five Points. | FIVE
Published on May 13, 2025 at 11:42 am
Free local news and info, in your inbox at 6 a.m. M-F. Sign up for the Jacksonville Today newsletter.
FIVE is finally alive in Five Points, 10 months after the iconic Sun-Ray Cinema closed in the spot where it had operated for more than a decade.
The new music venue already has a packed concert schedule.
Jacksonville Today thanks our sponsors. Become one.
BoyWithUke will inaugurate FIVE’s new stage Tuesday. Kameron Marlowe will perform the second show on Thursday, and Reggaeton Rave will wrap up the first week in operation on Friday.
The new use of the former movie house was announced in July, just two days after Sun-Ray showed its last movies at 1028 Park St., where it had operated for 13 years. Now FIVE will be managed by Marathon Live, which operates several other venues across the country.
“It has been an incredibly fun challenge to rework this amazing theater to host live performances again!” Marathon Live Chief Development Officer Josh Billue said in a news release. “We are excited to be a part of the Five Points community, and we can’t wait to welcome people back to a building Jacksonville has known for nearly 100 years.”
Jacksonville Today thanks our sponsors. Become one.
The Sun-Ray shut down after the building’s latest owners, an Atlanta developer called Union South Partners, chose not to renew the theater’s lease. At the time, Union South Partners said it planned $2 million in renovations to the four-story building to “honor the building’s historical uses around entertainment.”
Architect Roy Benjamin designed the four-story building in 1927, and part of it was the Riverside Theatre. The facility changed format and design a few times, and the theater closed a few times during the 1930s and 1940s. The site was remodeled in 1949 as the Five Points Theater, then converted in the 1980s into a live theater operated by the River City Playhouse.
In 1991, the building became the Club5 nightclub. Then Sun-Ray Cinema opened there in 2011. Jack Shad acquired the building in 2004, investing $5 million in renovations to restore its original facade and secure a city landmark designation.
FIVE’s grand opening was originally planned for January, but issues with construction and permits caused a delay that forced the cancellation or rescheduling of at least 17 planned shows, according News4Jax, a Jacksonville Today news partner.
Marathon Live operates five facilities in cities including Nashville, Tennessee; Kansas City; and St. Louis. It also is developing the Dennis + Ives office space and music venue on Dennis Street in the city’s Rail Yard District, according to its website.
