United Cinemas Avalon

Avalon is one of the northernmost of the Northern Beaches, about 22 miles from Sydney at Broken Bay. Movies were shown in a tent theatre until the Avalon Theatre was built and opened on 4th August, 1955. The debut feature was 20th Century Fox’s “There’s No Business Like Show Business”, and it looked good on the theatre’s wall to wall 30ft wide CinemaScope screen.

The owners, Arnold and Joan Spry, hired architect Bruce Furse to design a very contemporary theatre. It featured great splashes of color on the walls with a rippled ceiling, no proscenium and aboriginal motifs on the curtains. There were 777 seats in stalls & circle levels.

The Sprys operated the theatre until August 1985 when they sold to Mike Walsh’s Hayden Theatres of Cremorne Orpheum fame. He carried out renovations and reopened it on 16th November 1985 with a new look of softer, earthy colors as the Hayden Cinema.

Four years later it was sold to United Cinemas and was split into 2 screens.

Recent comments (view all 2 comments)

johngleeson on May 20, 2013 at 3:39 pm

We are indebted to Warringah Library Services for theatre information and photographs. Thank you Ms. Rose Cullen.

JohnWilson2 on January 6, 2017 at 1:25 am

The information above is incorrect. It’s all good until the end of >>The Sprys operated the theatre until August 1985 when they sold to Mike Walsh’s Hayden Theatres of Cremorne Orpheum fame.<<

Mike renovated the cinema but kept it as a single screen (not 4). When it was sold to United Cinemas it was only then that it was cut up and only into 2 screens as it remains to this day (Not 7).