Photo from Friedenau-aktuell.de and Cabaret Berlin

The Titania-Palast, which opened on 26 January 1928, in the transition from silent to sound film, was truly a palace, a luxurious one, situated in the middle-class borough of Steglitz, about 3 miles south of Berlin’s own Broadway, the area around the Zoo and the Gedächtniskirche, where most premiere cinemas were located.

The architects Ernst Schöffler, Carlo Schloenbach and Carl Jacobi designed the exterior in the New Objectivity style, with simple geometrical forms, in this case an assembly of several cube-shaped structures. The most striking feature was the 30-meter-high tower at the corner of the building. A steamer chimney for some, a "ladder to heaven" for others, when illuminated by night it was visible from afar, like a beacon. Even critics who didn’t like the building, did approve the use of modern lighting technology: the lighting is here an element of the building. Three different means were used - indirect lighting for the cornices, neon lights for the name of the cinema and other texts, and opaque glass strips for the 27 divisions of the light tower and the other elements of the architecture. It was an example of so called "night-architecture".

Almost at the same time, Erich Mendelsohn’s Universum Theater, also in avant-garde style, opened in Lehniner Platz.

1928. Photo Max Missmann, Stadtmuseum.

The cinema opened with the silent film Der Sprung ins Glück (The Leap into Happiness) starring Italian actress Carmen Boni, Berliner star Hans Junkermann and cabaret artist Rosa Valetti. The public was surprised by the contrast between the austere, functional exterior of the building and the luxurious interior. The large Art Deco foyer, the curved walls covered in red velour, the gilded elements, a round light dome on the ceiling and the shell-shaped arches around the screen imparted a feeling of elegance and sophistication. Still, some contemporary observers criticized it due to its deliberately asymmetrical arrangement and the entire facade parts without function. But the facades did have a function: they were meant for advertisement.

The film program of the Titania consisted mainly of light entertainment films and comedies distributed by National-Film AG. The premiere of the first German-speaking, sound film ("Die Königsloge"), with the legendary theater actor Alexander Moissi, took place here 21 november 1929. The film was shot in America.

The Titania-Palast was more than just a cinema: it became an important cultural centre in the district of Berlin-Steglitz during the Weimar years. Theatre performances were held here in addition to film screenings. The cinema was designed to accommodate an orchestra of up to 60 musicians. The mixture of different cultural offers was well received by the audience, so that the cinema corner of the Titania was compared by the press in terms of circulation, traffic and inflow with the cinema life in central Berlin.

After WWII, Titania-Palast provided the venue for several historical events. In May 1945 the Berlin Philharmonics gave here their first post-war concert and on December 1948, the founding ceremony of the Freie Universität Berlin took place here. During the Cold War, just after the Berlin Blockade by the Soviets, the Congress for Cultural Freedom (CCF) was founded at the Titania, attended by writers and philosophers like Tennessee Williams, Bertrand Russell, Raymond Aron and Arthur Koestler.