Charlottetown Mall Cinemas

Some excellent history, some images about General Cinema can be found at:
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Charlottetown Cinemas did have three screens at one time (c1981). By 1982 it had 4. Two photos of it can be found at my flickr site: View link
No one has talked about the bathrooms! I can’t speak for the men but in the womens' each stall had it’s own sink. Big, roomy, private stalls! (of course, a nightmare to clean!!!!)

General Cinemas usual practice with a big twin was to split one side, making a triplex, then coming back a few years later to split the other large auditorium ending up with in 4-screens. So at some point along the way I’m sure it was Charlottetown Cinema I-II-III, as Michael C. suspects.

[quote]The correct name for this theatre was Charlottetown Mall Cinemas. This theatre never had 8 screens. It opened as a twin cinema. Years later the two auditoriums were split to make a 4-screen cinema. — posted by jce on Feb 9, 2004 at 7:52pm
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Are you sure it went from two screens to four? Wasn’t there a period where the theater had three screens? I ask because newspaper advertising from the late 1970s identified it, in typical General Cinema stylization of the era, as Charlottetown I-II-III.

Plans for this very early twin cinema were done by the Boston architectural firm of William Riseman Associates. The plans are dated 1962. The original name of the theatre was apparently Charlottetown Twin Cinemas. Some of the firms plans and drawings for the project are now part of the J. Evan Miller Collection of cinema plans, which is held by the special collections department at Young Research Library, University of California, Los Angeles.

All the General Cinema theatres that they built had the popcorn machine hidden away upstairs or in a back room or somewhere out of view. I don’t know why they had this policy, we sell more popcorn when the people smell it and see it cooking. When we would bring the popcorn down to the stand in the bags to fill the warmer, we were always accused of buying pre-popped corn and warming it up. Several times, when a customer was getting very vocal about it, I would take them upstairs, through the projection room to the popcorn room, where an usher was in there popping away on our double-kettle Cretors machine.

By the way, popcorn cooked in peanut oil is the BEST, with cocoanut oil a close second. Nowadays, thanks to the “food police” aka ‘The Center for Science in the Public Interest’, an organization that specializes in minding everybody elses business, we have to use this garbage canola oil, which makes lousy popcorn, and only tastes good the moment it comes out of the kettle. As soon as it cools a little it tastes stale. While it is true that eating popcorn cooked in peanut oil 3 meals a day, seven days a week probably isn’t a good idea, they got the public to believe that eating a bag of popcorn at the movies now and then would instantly clog their veins and arteries.

“Official” name or not. No one called it Charlottetown Mall Cinema. It was always just Charlottetown and that is what the sign over the theater said. The mall was across a busy street and wasn’t connected to the theatre.

When the theatre was split in the early eighties I was working at the theatre. All of the seats were replaced (I still have a friend that owns a pair) and angled towards the screen. It still was somewhat awkward as one wall was straight and the second wall was angled, because of the way they split the room.

Shortly after putting in the new seats they painted the theater and spots of paint collected on the new seats. The painters didn’t bother to cover the seats as they painted. As an employee, I spent hours cleaning the new seats to remove the paint.

Charlottetown also had the distinction of owning the popcorn popper that supplied bags of popcorn to Eastland and Southpark (the other General Cinema Theatres in Charlotte). The popper room was located behind the concession stand. Unlike today where the popper is within most concession stands, this was a huge machine that cranked out massive amounts of popcorn which we then bagged into 50 gallon bags for delivery.

Please update to show under General Cinema chain list.

View link if the other link for the CINEMA sign does not work

The correct name for this theatre was Charlottetown Mall Cinemas. This theatre never had 8 screens. It opened as a twin cinema. Years later the two auditoriums were split to make a 4-screen cinema. This theatre has significance for North Carolina. I believe it was the first multi-screen theatre in North Carolina, and it was General Cinema Corportion’s first entry into the North Carolina market. It was the first Charlotte theatre to institute a bargain matinee policy. Bargain matinees cost 50 cents but prices increased over the years. It was also the only cinema (that I know of) that had a smoking section in each auditorium. The smoking section was located in the middle of each auditorium and was distinguished by golden, tobacco-colored seats. The smoking sections were eliminated after a few years.

I believe the theatre opened around 1964 and closed around 1993. A twin cinema was a unique concept in 1964, particularly since other theatre chains continued to build single screen cinemas in North Carolina into the early 1970’s.

I saw many films at the Charlottetown. I never really liked this theatre. The seats were modern but very uncomfortable. There were no curtains or distinguishing decor. For me, the theatre became very uninviting after splitting into four cinemas. The seats were not properly angled to the screen. The theatre became uncomfortable and was void of any atmosphere or character.

The Charlottetown must have been a huge success as a twin cinema. I remember huge crowds here. By the late 1980’s the theatre was falling on difficult times. The demographics of the area was changing. Weekday matinees were elimated. Movie bookings became predominately action-type films.

This theatre was only a few blocks from downtown, but it seemed miles away. Theatre advertisements mentioned acres of free parking, and the parking lot was really immense. This property has become extremely valuable real estate. The theatre still stood a few months ago, but I understand it will be razed. Central Piedmont Community College (CPCC) is located nearby, and I have read they want to expand on the property.