Toulouse Theatre

The building at 615 Toulouse Street has been a site of New Orleans entertainment since 1961, when it opened as a movie theater in the heart of the French Quarter.

Through the late 1970s and early 1980s, the Toulouse became home to Vernel Bagneris's vaudeville musical One Mo' Time!, a joyful celebration of 1920s Black theater that began there in 1978 and ran into the mid-1980s. While the show played the main room, the lobby bar hosted a weekly residency by James Booker — the flamboyant, virtuosic pianist who remains one of New Orleans' most mythologized figures.

The Shim Sham Club opened in 1999, establishing the address as a destination for burlesque, swing, and rock. One Eyed Jacks opened in 2002 and ran as a rock club through the 2010s, closing in March 2020.

After the COVID-19 pandemic forced a closure, the venue was purchased in 2020 by a group including Preservation Hall's Ben Jaffe. Reopened on October 29, 2021 as the Toulouse Theatre, the room presents a curated calendar spanning rock, jazz, funk, and touring acts.