Odeon Darlington

The Majestic Cinema opened on 26th December 1932 with Nancy Brown in "Maid of the Mountains". It was built for an independent operator.

Seating in the auditorium was provided for 1,039 in the stalls and 541 in the balcony. The proscenium was 45 feet wide, the stage 17 feet deep and there were five dressing rooms. The cinema was equipped with a Compton 3Manual/8Rank organ which was opened by Frank Matthews. An additional facility was the provision of a cafe.

In November 1935, it was taken over by National Provincial Cinemas Ltd. who were part of Union Cinemas chain. In 1937, Union Cinemas pulled out of the running of the Majestic Cinema and it returned to its original operators.

It was taken over by the Oscar Deutsch chain of Odeon Theatres Ltd. on 16th July 1943 and re-named Odeon on 9th April 1945. The cafe was still advertised as open during the 1950’s. In 1968, the Compton organ was sold and removed from the building. It was around this time that the facade was covered over with metal strips, in order to ‘modernise’ the building.

There was talk of the Odeon being converted into a twin-screen cinema, but these came to nothing. It was loosing money, and the Rank Organisation closed the Odeon on 24th October 1981 with Burt Reynolds in "Cannonball Run" being the final film screened. The building lay empty and unused for several years, and in October 1986 it was converted into use as a snooker club, which operates in 2008 as Riley’s Snooker Club.

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