The theater hallway is a hallway that leads from the bridge of the Satellite of Love to the theater. The hallway is entered through a huge door located behind the desk on the bridge. Inside the hallway there are five additional doors, numbered six to one. Cambot is usually the only character who actually uses the hallway to get from the bridge to the theater and back between the host segments and movie segments. When he passes through the hallway, the doors either open or close in front of him, depending on where he is going. The other characters usually use another entrance, which is never shown. Only three times in the entire series the other characters used the hallway: Joel in the episodes Humanoid Woman and The Corpse Vanishes and Mike in the episode Soultaker.
The five doors have changed in appearance over time. A first set was made for the KTMA-season. A second set was used in season 1 to 5. After Mike Nelson took over as host from Joel Robinson, a third set of doors was made which was used until the end of the series. In Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Movie, a fourth set of doors was seen. This was also one of the few times where Mike, Crow T. Robot and Tom Servo could be seen using the hallway. Given the sheer size of the SOL, it seems unlikely that the hallway extended entirely from one end of the ship to the other, given that Joel and Mike were able to run from bridge to theater in so short a time; however, if it didn't, precisely what was at the other end of the SOL was never revealed. In Episode #410 (Hercules Against the Moon Men), Tom and Crow proved able to travel at least 50 yards (46 m) away from the theater doors while still on the non-theater side of the doors and corridor (i.e. at an angle to the viewer's left and forward, out of range of the camera) and in the episode Fire Maidens of Outer Space, Joel came out of the bridge door with a gardening rake to attack timmy (thus implying that there are other hallways from the bridge door that lead to different locations of the Satelite of love, hence how he got the gardening rake).
Trivia
- In MST3K: The Movie, a mask of TV's Frank can be seen on the last door.
- In the Sci-Fi era, a miniature Doctor Forrester doll can be seen on the right near the end of the hallway sequence.
Behind the scenes
- The hallways were always miniature, with the camera being pushed ona dolly. However, for MST3K: The Movie, the hallway was made full size.
- In the pilot episode, the hallway was merely a series of opening doors that were chroma-keyed onto each other.