Comments from handlebar

Great little Cinema. Fine picture and sound. In the 40’s a staff member would walk down the aisle and sit on a stool at the bottom of the screen waiting to close the curtains as ‘The End’ title appeared. Waited there during the interval until the Censors credit appeared and then opened them and disappeared up the aisle. Always a 3 hour programme. Doors either side of the screen made proper ‘Cinemascope’ impossible. They installed a much larger 4x3 and when a ‘scope’ film was showing masking descended leaving a letter box picture at the bottom. This was smaller than the normal films! Films ran Mon to Wed and Thurs to Sat with old and sometimes ancient films shown on Sunday for one day. The Saturday morning children’s club was something to see. Cinema was packed for just 6d (2 1/2p) Always started with a sing song with words on the screen (hands knees and bumps-a-daisy…Underneath the spreading Chestnut tree etc) and then the club song: ‘We come along on Saturday morning’ sung on record by Tommy Handley, a famous radio comedian. Two hours of noisy fun with Tarzan, The 3 Stooges and Laurel and Hardy. It finished when the Royalty (just down the street) opened their ABC minors club in competition. The ‘Old Harborne’ (as we knew it) lost it’s audience. The cinema had no proscemium arch and curtains hung from a track fixed to the ceiling. Sounds primitive but it was neat and adequate. It closed in 1957 with John Mills in ‘Town on Trial’. How I wished I’d taken a photo of the inside before it closed. Happy memories of queues in the rain and great films seen with my mom and sister.

We lived directly opposite the cinema. I could look through the window to see what was on. The Royalty was a somewhat posh cinema. If you had little money you went in the stalls through it’s own entrance (extreme right on picture) and queued down the side. The better off entered through the front doors and paid at a separate box office. The stalls crowd went down little steps and entered in front of the screen. Projection was from under the balcony. A huge place with excellent sound and picture. When Cinemascope was installed two large boards at opposite ends of the building proclaimed ‘in the wonder of Cinemascope’.It was actually quite impressive (unlike the Picture House up the road). They took the brown curtains down and replaced them with a frilly descending curtain that covered the wide curved screen. The place had an odd smell (Jeyes fluid?) but was always full until the advent of t.v. Films ran Mon to Wed and Thurs to Sat with old and often abridged films on Sundays. I expected a three hour show. Two films, Pathe News, Adverts, trailers and sometimes a Pathe Pictorial. The show would finish with the National Athem but folk would rush for the exit to avoid it!! They had a lively ABC Minors Saturday Morn kids club. When it started all the children previously attending The Picture House club left (free badges, Birthday presents etc.) and joined the new one. The Picture House (known as The Old Harborne) kids club closed as it’s audience had gone. I remember them showing a 3D film called ‘Metroscopix’ with red and green glasses. A ladder came out of the screen!! Another gimmic was a film called ‘House on Haunted Hill’ in a process called ‘Emergo’ It was simply a wooden coffin on stage which opened to allow a plastic skeleton to pass on a wire over the heads of the audience about ten minutes from the end of the film!! You could buy the ABC film review on your way out to read of the coming films and stars. Maurice Smith worked there and I used to help him on Saturdays. The Cinema is now closed and terribly run down. The people of Harborne should be ashamed that they have a single screen gem in their midst and have let it go to wrack and ruin. If only I lived back home I’d have tried to do something about it. Is it too late??