- How one of the world’s oldest Picture Houses is saved for the future.
The Paignton Picture House project has great reason to celebrate today , 30th June 2023 – they have secured Community Ownership funding of £285,000 towards
the preservation of this wonderful old building. And it means that the Picture House will be renovated back to a place for all kinds of community works and, of course, a cinema.
The Paignton Picture House ( first called the Electric Bioscopic Exhibition Centre, as “cinematics “ and their jargon were in their infancy ) has proved part of community life for over 100 years.
It sits on the corner of Torbay Road, by the Dartmouth Steam Railway station. Broadmead Hotel first stood on the site when the idea of Cinema began. People would enter the grand hotel’s front doors to view short films of 4 to 5 minutes with musical accompaniment.
Later the hotel was demolished and replaced with the purpose built cinema which we remember. Doors opened in 1914.
Currently it stands as a dilapidated old building , boarded up from public view since being closed in 1999
The Cinema’s closure was inevitably compounded by the new Multiplex Vue cinema that opened on the Paignton seafront and is a great modern asset to the town .
Back in the day, the old Picture House was a popular haunt of Agatha Christie – she
favoured seats one and two on the upper second row . Such was her passion for the place that she modelled the Gaeity Theatre that features in many of her books on the Picture House.
There is a grand entrance with Art Nouveau decorative details and stained glass windows. In the Cinema’s hall is a barrel vaulted ceiling, supported by decorative pillars with characters from the film industry carved atop. The tip-up seats remain , together with art deco features and a wonderful curved balcony. A unique, circular glass paned entrance door is still there and the paint colours typical of the era. The 21 piece orchestra pit was the first outside London. And there was seating for around 400 people – segregated ladies and gents .
The building even had such innovations as a ventilation system to provide heating in winter , and air conditioning in summer.
With a balcony view, Agatha could merrily watch films whilst her butler, who accompanied her, served drinks.
The Picture House was also popular with another interesting character, Paris Singer, of the Singer sewing machine family. He discretely visited one of three private boxes in the Upper Circle with his mistress , dancer Isabella Duncan. There were many other rich and famous visitors to the English Riviera at that time, who frequented the Picture House too.
But fashions changed and the last film shown was “ The Smallest Show on Earth” , screened in 1999. And then Paignton’s cinema closed her doors and has been empty ever since.
At time of closure, the building was owned by the Dartmouth Steam Railway. They bought it in 1987 with plans of making it a grandiose booking hall on the lines of Grand Central Station in New York. However Torbay Council and English Heritage stopped their plans and the building was Grade II listed in 1991. It thus limped on as a cinema until 1999, before closure. Fresh plans were proposed to demolish the old Picture House after that , noting it was not profitable.
There was a suggestion to replace the site with a train terminus, second platform and new booking hall.
However a local petition to save the cinema , gained 11,000 signatures, backed by the British Film Commission and English Heritage – who said the building was of national importance.
But it wasn’t until 2013, when a Trust was set up by locals to save the building. The building was acquired by the Paignton Picture House Trust in 2015. And so the renovation project began.
It’s a big project, but intricate renovation works have begun, and this week’s funding will see the building reopen its doors to the Community.