Bayshore Cinema

Smith Management - General Drive-In later General Cinema - drops the largest new hardtop screen in the south opening at Cinema Theatre in Bayshore Gardens October 19, 1960 at 6016 14th Street. The theatre would be renamed as Bayshore Gardens Cinema and Bayshore Cinema. The theatre closed for two months to become twins relaunching on November 16, 1973 with Cops & Robbers and American Graffiti and renamed as Bayshore Cinema I & II. At end of lease it was then dropped by GCC. At the end of lease. It briefly held on as an independently run discount house that closed on May 14, 1991 with King Ralph and Awakenings. It was then razed.

This theater was located on the North Tamiami Trail/US 41 going south toward Sarasota, so it’s possible that it might be listed as Sarasota. And the 1960 opening date sounds right because it was an older theater, even in the 1970s. Someone once told me they saw “Earthquake” there while it was still one large single screen, before it was split into two auditoriums. The first thing I remember seeing there was “The Rescuers” in 1977 (which I saw there again when it was re-released in the 80s), but I can’t remember if it was still only one screen or if it had already been “twinned” by that time. The last thing I saw there was “Honey, I shrunk the Kids”, by which time it was operating as a discount theater. It was torn down shortly after that, so 1991 seems accurate as the year it closed. The location of the theater was just to the right of where the Target store on US 41 stands today, about where TJMaxx is.