Kingsway Picture House

Located in the Grey Lynn suburb of Auckland, on-line sources differ, between 1902 and 1906, as to when Richmond Hall was built. The sources do, however, agree that it was initially used by pupils of Grey Lynn School, before their new facility opened in nearby Surrey Crescent in 1911.

The Richmond Hall was then modernised (though it apparently remained rather basic, with wooden forms!) and was converted into the Richmond Hall Picture House. Showing films used a lot of power, and it is recorded that the trams controller used to regularly ring up the cinema and ask if they could switch the theatre’s power off, because there were trams stuck halfway up the nearby main road, Queen Street, because of the low voltage!

By 1928 it had been renamed the Kingsway Picture House and was being operated by William and Sybil Traill. However, that year, they moved a very short distance to their newly built Adelphi Cinema (see separate Cinema Treasures entry).

Richmond Hall then spent some time as a film production studio (sadly not well documented) before, in 1945, it was converted into the present day Grey Lynn Returned Services Club.

Get Movie Tickets & Showtimes

Want to be emailed when a new comment is posted about this theater?
Just login to your account and subscribe to this theater.