Odeon Putney
27 Putney High Street,
Putney,
London,
SW15 1SN
27 Putney High Street,
Putney,
London,
SW15 1SN
1 person
favorited this theater
First opened in 1907 as the Electric Pavilion, it was part of the small circuit operated by Israel Davis. In 1911, a Jones 2Manual organ was installed. In 1918 it was taken over by the independent Blue Halls Ltd. chain and was re-named Blue Hall Cinema in 1920.
It was re-named Palace Cinema in 1927 and a Compton 2Manual/5Ranks theatre organ was installed, and opened by organist George F. Somes (who was also the orchestra leader at the cinema). In 1928, it became part of the United Picture Theatres circuit (UPT), but in July 1930 UPT were taken over by Gaumont British Theatres. It was closed a couple of times during the war, re-opening on 28th January 1945.
From 22nd August 1955 it was re-named Gaumont and continued under the Rank Organisation management when it was re-named Odeon on 25th November 1962.
It closed on 11th December 1971 with Bruce Davison in “Willard” and Michael Latimer in “Man of Violence”. A deal was done with EMI who owned the adjacent ABC (former Regal) Cinema which closed on the same day. Both buildings were demolished and a new three-screen ABC cinema (currently Odeon) was built on the site, opening in September 1975.
Contributed by
KenRoe
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Recent comments (view all 6 comments)
Photographed as the Palace Cinema playing the Gaumont release in October 1949:
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A photograph of the rear of the Palace Cinema in October 1949:
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Photographed as the Gaumont playing the Gaumont release in May 1956:
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The facade modernised as the Odeon, photographed in April 1971 (the roofline of the adjacent ABC (ex Regal) can be seen to the left of shot):
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The Palace Cinema was equipped with a Compton 2Manual/5Rank theatre organ which was opened by George F. Somes in 1926.
A picture after closure
http://geocities.com/johnllon/odeput.htm
Here is another photo of the Odeon Putney. I don’t know if this is one of the four photos posted on Jan 12, 2006, but I’ve only found one photo available at that site now.
Here are new links for the other three photos:
Photo1
Photo2
Photo3
I started here age 16, as a trainee projectionist in August 1967, it was an amazing place to work. The hours were long, but I loved every minute of it, well most of it, the chief projectionist could be really mean after he had a couple of quarts of Old English cider. I was there when it closed and it was one of the saddest days of my life when we had to gut the inside and put everything on a lorry to be taken away. I did have many souvenirs, sadly long since dissapeared.