South County Cinema
South County Centerway,
St. Louis,
MO
63129
South County Centerway,
St. Louis,
MO
63129
2 people
favorited this theater
Showing 26 - 40 of 40 comments
Theatre opened November 23, 1966 (the same day as the Northland) with “The Liquidator.”
When plans were announced to built the theatre in 1964, the architect listed was Maurice Sornik. However, when the theatre was under construction the architect mentioned was Kenneth Balk.
Initial seating capacity (as a single screen venue) was 1000.
Lotta Lemon Classic- check your e-mail!
Dave’s Omni, Roxanne’s sweet-natured personality, blue jackets that were never washed, sweatin' it out in the popcorn room, cleaning seat-backs, 1985 4-ever, one day we’ll use that ticket box in the vestibule!, Mike Batey Memorial Field, Rob the super-softball-sub from Sunset Hills, hmmmm what’s in the damaged candy box?, “please exit to your left” – “but sir I have to use the bathroom!”.
I once knew a guy who could recite the last few lines of “Revenge of the Nerds” verbatim on demand. Glad to know he’s still around. Rickoshea, I have made copies of a couple of DVD’s for you that contain priceless footage of cinema softball games played at Love and Stacy Parks circa 1985, as well as a get-together at Roxanne’s and Objects softball at Forest Park featuring Doward Dawson in bright yellow shorts and matching baseball jersey. Contact me at and I will get them to you somehow.
Lotta Lemon. Softball games. Denise’s red VW convertible. Dan McCann’s undeniable physical resemblance to Hagar the Horrible. Doward sleeping on a cot in the projection room. Those god-awful Bissell carpet sweepers. When Doug made me go with him to a party at Buffy From Sunset Hills’s house and when we got there with a trunk full of booze there were 3 guys sitting around watching TV. Those parties at the old 66 Drive In on Watson road. The time Maggie and Greg didn’t show up to play soccer at 11pm at the old Soccerhaus, so 3 employees who will remain nameless broke into the theater and called them from the pay phone in the lobby. When Ron Watermon got in trouble for telling Roxanne’s little brother he was the manager.
Memories… Lotta Lemon flavored Memories… of the way it were…
Hello all. I worked at South County Cinema from 04/83 to 08/87. The two movies there when I started were “Spring Break” and “Max Dugan Returns”. I was hired for the rush expected with the opening of “Return of the Jedi”. Many applied for a job there at this time, and I had the luck of knowing someone who worked there who put in a good word for me. I loved working there and will never forget the black bowtie and blue jacket I had to wear. Sometimes the theater was busy and bustling with movie-goers, and sometimes it was just dead. I made many friends there and coached our theater’s softball team. It was just for fun and we only played pick-up games with teams from surrounding theaters. I worked for Maggie Wild and Dan McCann. If anyone reading this worked with me there at any time and remembers me, please either post here or drop me an e-mail at I love to reminisce about my theater days – they were great! Live on Lotta Lemon… —-Jeff Cassell
Hi GCC alumni. I worked at the South County Cinema for 1 ½ years (‘86-'87). We could fill a theatre back then if we had a decent flick. The projectionists at that time were Doward Dawson and Joe Chilton. One of my favorite memories from those days were the South County vs Sunset Hills software games.
My first memory of this cinema was when I was about 7 years old. My mother took my brother and me to see a Planet of the Apes movie. My last memory was walking around the parking lot after the theatre was demolished. I picked up a piece of the rubble and I still have it :–)
I have another nice souvenir from that Cinema- one day while I was working there, I found an original “Grand Opening” brochure for the Cinema.
I remember this place from the 60’s. Saw Raquel Welch in ‘One Million Years BC’ and Jane Fonda’s striptease in ‘Barbarella’. Great stuff when you were 15 or 16.
The bank has been there forever. We had to walk a whole twenty feet from the front doors of the theatre to drop the deposits in the night drop. The restaurant (macaroni grill, if I remember correctly from my last drive past) is actually on the site where the theatre stood.
We had the same Million Dollar Duck story at the Westgate Cinema City in Cleveland – and whoever did it also broke open the timer box on the pylon and lit it up. The local police called the manager and made him come there to change the sign at 4 in the morning…
During the run of “The Million Dollar Duck”, someone climbed up onto the Lindbergh Blvd pylon sign one night, removed an “F” from another title, and used it to replace the “D” in the last word. It had a lot of passing motorists laughing the next morning.
I have many great memories from the 70’s and 80’s regarding this theatre. I worked in the mall right behind the cinema (at Record Bar now long gone as well) and spent alot of my childhood / teen years there seeing movies with family, friends and dates. I remember countless Disney re-releases, For Your Eyes Only, skipped out of school early to catch Return of the Jedi on opening day with my friend Kevin… I also fondly remember a re-vival showing of House Of Wax in 3D starring Vincent Price. Not all my memories revolve around the movies though. I remember they always had great video games in the lobby too, I played Sinistar there for the first time. Spent many hours in the parking lot one night using their pay phone after my friend Bob locked his keys in his car. Stuff like that didn’t seem so important back in the day, but just seeing the facade of the cinema again and the big square lettering on the sign really takes me back. It’s a shame it’s gone now.
I’m looking for employees who worked at Sunset Hills Cinema in the mid-1980s. Doug Clemons was the chief of staff before he went to South County Cinema. I worked there from about 1984 to 1986.
The South County Cinema was demolished to make way for a new Bank on it’s location.
The South County (or CINEMA South County as the generic sign was supposed to read) CINEMA was one of a series of such cinemas designed by Maurice D. Sornick of Massapequa Park, NY in the early ‘60s. The others known were the BIG TOWN CINEMA, Mesquite Texas, the CINEMA WESTLANE (which ended its days as the SOUTHTOWN 5&6) in West Allis (Milwaukee), Wis., and the NORTHLAND CINEMA, Jennings, MO., as mentioned above. A unique item of decor ties all these together aside from their structural duplication: the use of the then new abstract plastic grillework called “Sculpta-Grille”, a design by sculptor Richard Harvey, of the Harvey Design Workshop, Lynbrook, LI, NY. The pattern of the 40-ft. wide by 10-ft high wall of grillework on the lobby mezzanine was called “#C-10 Contemporary” and resembled nothing so much as “dinosaur bones” as they were called in the Milwaukee area CINEMA. Further information may be had about such grillework from the Theatre Historical Society of America (www.HistoricTheatres.org), in Elmhurst, ILL.
South County Cinema. I worked there from 8/84 to 8/87 (showing when I started: “Revenge Of The Nerds” and “Body Double”).
I grew up in that neighborhood, and used to go to movies there all the time (first one I remember- “The Million Dollar Duck”).
South County Cinema was originally a one-screener, but in the late 70s was divided into 2 screens.
Oddly enough, General Cinemas had another theater that was 100% identical in design- Northland Cinema, in North St. Louis County.
As late as 1985 the theater was still drawing pretty big crowds. Around that time, Wehrenberg opened a new multi-screen complex just a few miles down Lemay Ferry Rd., which began to sap audience from South County Cinema.
Finally, in 1987, General Cinemas decided to open an 8 screen theater across the street, the “Lindbergh 8”. The new cinema did poor business for a few years, before becoming a “bargain house” with 2 dollar tickets and second run shows. The South County Cinema closed in 1988.
The management, from 1984 on:
1983-1985: Maggie Wild (assistant managers Greg Aubuchon, Jeff Ziele) 1985-1987: Dan McCann (assistant managers Jeff Ziele, Dennis Jauer, Doug Clemons) 1987: Dave McCann (Dan’s brother) (assistant managers Doug Clemons, Chris Hogan) 1987-1988: Dennis Barlow (assistant manager Dave Toole)
On a personal note, I gotta say, I was real sad to see the South County Cinema close. I know it was just an ugly, generic box, but I grew up going to the movies there, and had a lot of fun working there.
I love this web site!