Odeon Luxe London Leicester Square

i saw ep III in the royal circle a few days ago. fantastic legroom, comfy seats and removable armrests ;–) at last – £17 bl**dy well ought to be!!!!

The Odeon Leicester Square incorrectly claims the “largest in Europe” tag – Scarborough’s Futurist holds 2155, although a full house for a film is unknown!

Yes, the Odeon Theatre, Leicester Square has a Licenced Bar selling alcoholic drinks.

The Odeon Leicester Square has been charging premium prices for many years now. I believe I paid £12.00 on my last visit, at current exchange rates that’s $23. Movies these days tend to open en-mass in both the West End (ie Leicester Square area) and in the suburbs where the top price is around £7.00 ($13).

It would be great to have the Compton organ at the Odeon Leicester Square playing each performance. Now that would warrant a premium price!

Mainly invited guests and film industry people attend. They are black tie and best dress events, so the general public are not encouraged to attend (off the street). The premiers are never advertised, the only way of knowing that one is going to happen, is by enquiring at the box office, or looking for signs in the booking schedule where, usually a whole days performances of the regular film playing will be cancelled. Of course an obvious sign is walking through Leicester Square and seeing the barriers up and the red carpet down, with crowds of fans forming as they usually attract the main stars of the movie being premiered and many other celebrities.

Hello Tanja;

There seems to be a premier event happening about once a week in Leicester Squar, either at this main Odeon Theatre or occasionally at the Odeon West End Theatre or Empire Theatre. Living here in London we tend to hear about them on the day on local news broadcasts on tv.

Fans tend to gather outside the theatre from around mid-day and wait behind the temporary barriers until the ‘stars’ start to arrive in the early evening.

I would recommend that you go along to the Odeon and ask one of the front of house staff to enqure about the date of the next premier. Hope you are lucky enough to catch one on your visit to London. Have a great time while you are here.

Not just a ‘world premier’, in the UK we have the facility to give a film a Royal World Premier, which is what “Lawrence of Arabia” had at the Odeon, Leicester Square on the 10th December 1962. The 70mm print of this film ran for an exclusive 8 weeks engagement at this theatre.

The original art deco interior was swept away in the name of ‘progress and modernisation’ in 1967. Into the skip went etched glass doors, plaster mouldings on the ceiling above the prosceneum arch and the famous ‘flying lady’ figures on each side wall of the auditorium, leaving a bland auditorium for many years and an acute embarrassment to the Rank Organisation who ordered the mutilation.

Only recently has this been corrected somewhat and copies of the ‘flying lady’ figures have been put back, together with some of the concealed lighting in the auditorium ceiling rib bands.

The Odeon is the home of almost all premiers in London nowadays, sometimes there are two a week with all the major stars treading the ‘Red Carpet’ and greeting thousands of waiting fans. Not all films that premier here go on the play the theatre, they just get their one night premier here.

The original seating capacity when first opened was 2,116 (1,140 in the orchestra stalls and 976 in the circle), now reduced to 1984. Plans are to re-step the circle and re-seat it in 2005 which will further reduce the seating capacity.

The Compton 5 Manual/17 Rank theatre organ (with its multi-coloured illuminated console surround) is still played on special occasions.

The Odeon is fully equipped with the latest projection and sound equipment, which includes 3 main projectors (35mm and 70mm capable), 16mm projector, video projection from vhs tapes and digital dvd projection.

I recently went to the opening night gala of the London Film Festival and was pleasantly suprised to see the organ being played.
The audience whooped with delight at this multi-coloured leviathan as it descended into the pit….it is a great shame that Odeon dont have an organ interlude on a regular basis.

Yes this is the theatre which holds all the major premieres. The Empire use to hold many premieres also.brucec

This theatre is so over-rated, the seats are uncomfortable and the legroom is very poor, the screen is far too small for a theatre of this size and the sound is poor too, the refurbishment has left a very clinical bland modern lobby and circle lounge with all the atmosphere of an airport lounge.
although the empire sc 1 across the square is a bit shabby its a million times better with its stadium style seating, comfy reclining seats and enormous screen, and its glitzy vegas syle lobby decor at least creates some sense of being in a real movie theatre
You cant help wishing though that they both played a more diverse range of films as they are both dominated by long runs of the latest blockbusters.

I think the Rex in Paris is larger. Every time Im in London I try to catch a flick at the Odeon. This is how a deluxe theatre should be operated. I wish The Empire would be restored and was programed like the Odeon. Brucec

Although my main focus are legit theatres with live performance, a theatre is a theatre is a … since so many have been both legit and movie palaces. New York City has destroyed more theatres than exist now, and this week we learned of another Broadway house set to be torn down. The Henry Miller’s Theatre, current home of the Broadway production of “Urinetown.” The theatre (and the musical) will close in February ‘04. However, the facade is protected and will remain and the company, the Durst Corp. is building a new theatre on the site as well as a skyscraper. We need skyscrapers here in NYC. There aren’t nearly enough. So we lose one and we get one. Let’s just pray they hire a good designer so we don’t end up with yet another of those God-awful things totally devoid of style and personality.

Keep up the good work.

Do