Adib said his passion for the theater, and his work, spring from a love of art and history. Some of his rugs and tapestries date back more than three centuries.

One rug, which Adib personally commissioned, required eight people working simultaneously, six days a week, for a period of seven years before it was completed.

"That's 56 years of one person's life," Adib said. "Those kinds of pieces are not necessarily about the money anymore. With the theater, it is the same way. Once you preserve something, you enjoy it while you're here. And then when you're gone, several other generations will enjoy it."

Anne Polinsky, president of the volunteer guild of the Utah Heritage Foundation, said the theater was the only one in the area when she was growing up in the 1950s. Polinsky said that since Adib has purchased the building, the theater has faced frequent vandalism and graffiti.

"It just made it that much more difficult for him," Polinsky said. "I think that he is really to be commended for what he is doing. We would have liked to, of course, to keep it as a theater, because so many of us remember going there and seeing this movie or that movie and going on dates."

Adib recalls one gentleman who recently walked in and said that his first date was at the Villa 40 years earlier.

"He told me they have been married since," Adib said. "You don't have those kinds of things with a new building. A new building would not have the character."

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E-mail: danderton@desnews.com