Old cinemas of sheffield

[bigkev]

it was both. first it was the cineplex then they changed it over to the cinecentre that is one picture palace I was glad when they shut it down for good. You will have heard the saying men in old dirty raincoat brigade well that place was full of them cant tell you what they got up to not here anyway, it doesnt take much to work it out what with them showing all them swedish films.The first time I went in there I was taken aback of what went on it was even worse when one of them tried it on with me now I am over 6 foot tall and even then I weighted 17 stones but it was not fat you dont get much fat working in the heavy forge or rolling mills because of the sweat what you lost and the weight, I told him politely to move but he took no for answer so I just grab his meat and two veg and he screamed I was asked to leave but when I was going this limp wristed person says to me you can come back to my pad and we will get it on if you like didnt thump him just lifted him of the floor and said oh yes do you want to be bowed legged for the rest of your life because I will kick you where you you wont like it so I walked out. it was even worse at night going past there at 23:00pm the things that was happening If I remember correctly it used to stop open all night from 20:00 until 07:00am.

[Plain Talker]

the ABC was on Angel Street, where the travelodge hotel is now, (at the side of the Argos store).

 

the Classic was in FitzAlan Square.

 

there were two seperate cinemas on flat street,

there was teh odeon, which is now a mecca-bingo place, and the one further down, on the landings above pond street bus station, was called the Cinecenta (not sure about the spelling, there)

 

PT

[Greybeard]

I remember the 'Classic' in Fitzalan Square when it was called 'The News Theatre'. They ran continous news reels between comedy films like Three Stooges and Laurel and Hardy etc. I think the programme ran for about two hours but you could sit in there all day if you wanted. There was a bar down some stairs at the side used to sell draught Bass and Worthington beers - think it was called the King's Head.

 

There used to be two cinemas in Barker's Pool, the Gaumont and the Cinema House, and of course the Hippodrome round the corner on Cambridge Street with a pub nearby called the Barley Corn, which had the unsavoury reputation of being a 'knockin' shop'. There was another cinema in town on Union Street - opposite the stage door to the Empire, - I think it was called the 'Union Palace' but not really sure now.

 

In Heeley Bottom there were two cinemas...the Heeley Palace just past the railway bridge, but a little way back towards town on the same side was the Heeley Coliseum which was a bit of a 'flea-pit'.

 

The Abbeydale and the herbalist shop were well known to me as my grandfather lived just round the corner I too used to use Heeley baths on Broadfield Road every Saturday morning - usually the first session at 7.30 am.and then call on my grandad for a big mug of tea and a couple of thick slices of toast and jam The Abbeydale also had a large snooker hall in the basement which I used as a teenager, and another snooker hall above a cafe on the corner of Broadfield Rd. and London Rd. on Heeley Bottom.

 

Went to the Star on Ecclesall road only occasionally as well as the Chantry in Woodseats, - usually to see a film we'd missed at a local cinema. I was away from Sheffield for fifteen years from 1960 so missed many of the major changes.

[superCol]

Originally posted by Plain Talker

the ABC was on Angel Street, where the travelodge hotel is now, (at the side of the Argos store).

 

 

You've no idea how sad that makes me feel. She (and she was a she, just like the great ocean liners) was younger than me. Opened in 1961, what a short life. She had the most fantastic ceiling of any mid-twentieth century picture house. It looked a bit like the starship enterprise. And the screen!! Watching the curtains and the masking run out from the Pearl & Dean adverts (in wide screen) to to it's full width to show a 70mm feature was worth the ticket money by itself. Even better than watching a flick in cinemascope.

 

Modern multiplexes are but a mere imitation of the true cinematic experience.

[muddycoffee]

Originally posted by Greybeard

I too used to use Heeley baths on Broadfield Road every Saturday morning - usually the first session at 7.30 am.and then call on my grandad for a big mug of tea and a couple of thick slices of toast and jam The Abbeydale also had a large snooker hall in the basement which I used as a teenager, and another snooker hall above a cafe on the corner of Broadfield Rd. and London Rd. on Heeley Bottom.

 

Good Good News Greybeard. If your grandad is still alive, you could still do all that.

 

Langtons snooker is still there, and so is their cafe,

Abbey snooker as it is now called, is in the old ballroom and half of the billiard room of the Abbeydale cinema, and the friends of Abbeydale cinema can show you around the whole building if you go on an open day. And Heeley baths is in fine fettle, with specialist early morning sessions, adult only, and women only sessions too.

[Hal9001]

Here is a website with all you need.

Here

[bigkev]

can anybody remember going to see cinerama in sheffield, I once went with my dad when I was younger the place where they had was up division street straight past what is now the frog and parrot up to where the hornblower use to be well across the road was a big open space this is in the late sixties so there would have been some alterations going on, anyway what I can remember is that it was in a very big tent with seating inside well you can imagine what it was like not seeing cinerama before the first film was that you was on a tobbogan and hurtiling down the sledge run at the front all these people who had come to watch it well they was going from side to side as you would, then the second film was you was on a plane going to land on a aircraft carrier I have never been so frightened in my life then there was the roller coaster a runaway train and then there was a bloke in a tower crane who had just had a drink out of a bottle when he dropped it and as you looked up you though it was going to hit you and if I remember correctly you was in a racing car going round the track at some breakneck speed.Boy I wish I could see cinerama again and take my kids to see it they would get a right thrill out of it I think the nearest I would get to it would be the IMAX screen at the photography and television museum in bradford.

[Hal9001]

I saw Cinerama here at Pictureville. The film you saw was 'This is Cinerama'. It was amazing wasn't it? They may show it again. The Cinerama installation is still there.

 

For more info on Cinerama, go here

[Greybeard]

Originally posted by muddycoffee

Good Good News Greybeard. If your grandad is still alive, you could still do all that.

 

Langtons snooker is still there, and so is their cafe,

Abbey snooker as it is now called, is in the old ballroom and half of the billiard room of the Abbeydale cinema, and the friends of Abbeydale cinema can show you around the whole building if you go on an open day. And Heeley baths is in fine fettle, with specialist early morning sessions, adult only, and women only sessions too.

 

That's amazing ! - it was 1950 I started going to Heeley baths. My dad's idea of killing two birds with one stone, - to make sure I got a bath [and it was an education sitting in the slipper bath listening to the old men ] and to learn to swim. Learning to swim usually meant being tossed in the deep end by a gang of bigger lads, - but we weren't allowed to drown . Grandad would be 120 years old this year !

 

The snooker craze was from 1953 - 56, on the way home from school, but we couldn't have long in the Abbeydale because we had to be out by the time they opened the bar....so I think that's when we started going to the one on Broadfield Road.

 

Will have to have a look around my old haunts...wonder if that Youth Club at the bottom of Heeley Station approach is still open ?...great juke box they had, - Bill Haley and the Comets, Little Richard, Frankie Lane etc etc

 

Ooops - gone way OT

[Alanbro]

Me and my late wife used to queue for what seemed like hours at the ABC and The Gaumont. We always used to make a day of it when we were courting, going to the cinema in the afternoon and then on to the town centre pubs. The first film I remember seeing at the original Odeon was The Sound of Music. They also had live shows at the Gaumont and I saw Eddie Cochran, Gene Vincent and the Beach Boys there, not all on the same show.

When technicolor and cinemascope first came in it was fantastic,but of course, DVD, Video, Sky,etc. has got rid of a lot of that.

Coming more up to date, I think it was a shame when they closed the UCI Cinema at Crystal Peaks. It was on the doorstep for a lot of people including me and my family. UCG is quite good, but on some of the days that I,ve been we,ve had to park in the overspill at the back.

Course going back to town centre cinema heyday, I didn,t have a car and we bussed it everywhere. Safe as houses in them days. ------ and do remember the continuous films when you could stay in and watch what you'd missed or even watch the film again if you wanted to.