An atmospheric theatre is a type of movie palace design which was popular in the late 1920s. Atmospheric theatres were designed and decorated to evoke the feeling of a particular time and place for patrons, through the use of projectors, architectural elements and ornamentation that evoked a sense of being outdoors. This was intended to make the patron a more active participant in the setting.

The most successful promoter of the style was John Eberson. He credited the Hoblitzelle Majestic Theatre (Houston, 1923, since demolished) as the first. Before the end of the 1920s he designed around 100 atmospheric theatres in the U.S. and a few other countries, personally selecting the furnishings and art objects. His most notable surviving theatres in the United States include the Tampa Theatre (1926), Palace Theatre (1928), Majestic Theatre (1929), Paramount Theatre (1929), and the Loew's Theatre (1929). Remaining international examples include The Civic Theatre (1929, Auckland, New Zealand), The Forum (1929, Melbourne, Australia), as well as two theatres completed in Sydney, Australia, the Capitol Theatre (1928) and State Theatre (1929) (both designed by Henry Eli White with assistance from Eberson), and Le Grand Rex, (1932, Paris, France) which was designed by architect Auguste Bluysen with assistance from Eberson.

John Eberson was the most successful promoter and designer of the atmospheric style. His last atmospheric design in the US was the "Midwest Theatre" at 17 N. Harvey Ave., Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, which opened August 1, 1930, but was demolished in 1976. The following seventeen of his atmospheric theatres in the United States are still in operation.

The Akron Civic Theatre was built in 1929 by Marcus Loew and designed by theater architect John Eberson. It opened as Loew's Theatre, and later Cinema Theatre and seats 3,000 people. The auditorium is designed to resemble a night in a Moorish garden. Twinkling stars and drifting clouds travel across the domed ceiling. Located on Akron's South Main Street, the theater's entrance lobby extends over the Ohio and Erie Canal. The theater has a small multicolored terra cotta façade dominated by a large marquee. The interior of the entrance and lobby is designed to resemble a Moorish castle with Mediterranean decor, complete with medieval-style carvings, authentic European antiques and Italian alabaster sculptures. A grand full-sized Wurlitzer organ hidden beneath the stage rises to the stage level on a special elevator. In June 2001, the Akron Civic Theatre closed its doors for the most expensive and extensive renovation in its history in order to bring the theater up to modern performance and patron standards, and to restoring its failing 72-year-old infrastructure. The renovation cost just over $19 million, which included additional restroom facilities, new concession stands and expansion of the lobbies. The renovation allowed for the Civic to better serve customers with special needs by adding more handicapped seating and a new elevator. To bring the theatre up to new standards the dressing rooms were all redone and the stage was expanded from twenty-six feet to forty feet. Also added to the Civic was a freight elevator, a new loading dock and a cross-over space behind the stage's back wall. Other improvements included updating the sound system, HVAC, roof exterior, electrical service and modernizing the plumbing. The newly renovated Civic Theatre re-opened in November 2002.

The Avalon Regal Theater opened in 1927 as the Avalon Theater, known later as the New Regal Theater, built in a Moorish Revival style. From 1927 to 1937 it was a live performing arts venue, and then a movie venue until first closure in 1967. By this time, more African Americans began to move into the area around the theater, transforming local culture and taking advantage of this historic gem for their musical and artistic ends. It reopened in 1970 as Miracle Temple Church and a meeting place for 15 years. It then closed for renovation, reopening in 1987 as a performing arts venue named the New Regal Theater, in homage to the Regal Theater in Bronzeville, which had been a celebrated cultural center for Chicago's African American community beginning in the 1920s until it caught fire in September 1971. In 2003, the New Regal Theatre closed due to insufficient attendance to cover running costs, but funds were obtained for renovation and it reopened in late 2008. Unfortunately, some of the funds were misapplied to the new owner's personal expenses, and it closed for the fourth time in 2011, due to foreclosure. Kanye West has pledged $1 million, and funding continues, to raise capital to reopen and run the venue, with possibilities including plans "to recreate pivotal moments in entertainment history using holographic stage technology".

The Capitol Theatre is a cinema and concert venue. It opened in 1928, designed to look like a Roman garden, was remodelled in 1957, but has had a major restoration to the original ambience but with up-to-date services, completed in 2011.

The Carpenter Theatre, originally Loew's Theatre and later the Carpenter Theatre Center for the Performing Arts, is the cornerstone of the Dominion Energy Center (previously Richmond CentreStage), which also includes three adjacent modern performance spaces, offices, and elsewhere the Altria Theater (none of which are atmospheric and all of which are by different architects). The Carpenter Theatre was built in 1927/28, giving a Spanish-Moorish ambience. It currently has about 1,800 seats and is said to be fully renovated and restored, but now with state-of-the-art lighting and world-class acoustics. It has "newly installed fiber optic stars twinkling overhead in the repainted midnight sky ceiling, one of the many preserved and enhanced elements of John Eberson's original theater design"

The Indiana Theatre has a Spanish courtyard design and was one of the first Eberson theatres to exhibit atmospheric elements. While not fully atmospheric, the Indiana Theatre's original lighting system gave a blue hue to the auditorium ceiling and scattered light to simulate stars. The tile and terrazzo flooring, shapes of windows, prominence of Spanish coats of arms, Churrigueresque exterior, as well as numerous plaster designs that were seen first in the Indiana Theatre became a framework for later designs. Eberson stated, "Into this Indiana Theatre I have put my very best efforts and endeavors in the art of designing a modern theatre such as I have often pictured as what I would do were I given a free hand."