Cineworld Cinema - Leicester Square
5 Leicester Square,
London,
WC2H 7NA
5 Leicester Square,
London,
WC2H 7NA
42 people
favorited this theater
Showing 201 - 225 of 721 comments
Looks like some renumbering of the screens is going on, as The Greatest Showman Sing-A-Long is now bookable from 23 February in screen 5 except the seating plan matches the layout of screen 7. I guess with a clean slate there’s no reason to keep the Superscreen and IMAX as screens 1 and 3 respectively.
I wonder if there will be a 4DX version of Fifty Shades? ;)
Another “Fifty Shades” film? Good grief…
(Incidentally, a number of seats are already reserved for the first screening listed at 19:30!)
I guess then literally all that will have happened is strip out/fit out of the foyer/public access areas. I had an odd dream last night in which I removed a piece of the old marble wall cladding from a skip outside…!
Fifty Shades Freed is bookable in the Superscreen (shudder) from 9 February and Black Panther in the IMAX from 13 February. No obvious changes to the seat maps in these screens.
Westminster Building Control application no. 17/00439/OTHFP has had its status updated to “Building Work Started,” with the 15th January 2018 as the commencement date.
I cannot locate any new licensing application on Westminster’s site, which I assume will be required for the 4DX screen. I suspect the cinema will not be reopening by “early February”!
Incidentally—or perhaps not coincidentally—the hoarding on Leicester Street for the 1-4 Leicester Square works (hotel, etc.) has now been removed.
I had a look at the current external state of the Empire Leicester Square last night—no changes to the main entrance, but the poster boxes are now empty. The high level IMAX sign remains lit, as does the colour LED display on the left side of the canopy. (Although some sections were flickering!)
Other than the notice on the Leicester Square doors, the only sign of any building work is a “Construction Site” notice on the Leicester Street fire exit doors—photo uploaded.
A couple of repairs seem to have been completed to the Leicester Place elevation, photo to follow.
I saw a film in screen 4 on 30 December (side masking not used, grr!) and hadn’t been back until 7 January (The Greatest Showman, Superscreen), so some time between those dates.
D'oh! I’m running a tracker blocker plug-in, I guess that’s what’s blocked it as I see the banner in another browser.
How long have Screens 4/5 been blocked?
Yes, those “DFS”-grade sofas were always awful—good riddance!
On the Cineworld website I’m seeing a banner stating that the cinema is closed and to visit Picturehouse Central. It’s served as an ad so if you’ve got an ad blocker running you probably won’t see it.
They had Tensabarriers in front of the doors to screens 4 and 5 and had moved the saggy leather sofas from around the foyer to be in front of them just to drive the message home! (Made the mistake of sitting on one of those a few months ago, was very hard to get back up again)
Zappomatic: Blocked with sofas? Maybe they’ll be refurbishing Screen 4/5 concurrently?
Thanks for uploading the photos of the foyer’s last night of service—I haven’t been there in months now as no desire to keep saying “goodbye” again!
Oddly, Cineworld’s site makes no mention of the closure—just has no trailer nor screening times listed!
Bye-bye 1962/89 foyer. :–(
I’ve uploaded a photo (taken last night) of the blacked out front entrance doors, with the notice reading:
“EXCITING THINGS ARE HAPPENING — YOU’RE GOING TO LOVE WHAT’S COMING
“Whilst we work on improving your cinema, you can visit Picturehouse Central to watch the latest movies.”
I walked around the entire block (i.e. Leicester Sq., Leicester Street, Lisle Street and Leicester Place)—no signs of the refurb (yet?) externally.
There is a hoarding on Leicester Street which has been there for quite some time, but I assume this is for the redevelopment of 1-4 Leicester Square (Ground floor to 9th floor) only. All the more puzzling since Screen 2 has been closed for months!
Noticed in the cinema state that it’ll be closed from tomorrow until 6 February. The doors to screens 4 and 5 have been blocked with sofas and the foyer generally feels tired and ready for the refurb.
Contrary to the email I posted above, this cinema’s last day before closing for refurbishment works will be Sunday 7 January.
Thanks Zappomatic.
Hmm, “for some of the works to take place.” I assume this means that they’ll phase the works so that the foyer and associated areas, plus the 4DX auditorium will be complete by then, followed by refurbishments to other auditoria in 2018. (For the sake of completeness, I suppose the toilets also, at some stage.)
Possibly an opportunity to add larger seating, e.g. IMPACT/Superscreen balcony?
There are numerous complaints online about the lack of legroom in the IMAX auditorium. Even if restepping is an option—and I suspect it isn’t—they would end up losing centre seats.
I can’t say I trust Cineworld not to ruin everything special about the place, but we shall see… It might be said that it is fortunate that in part because of all the changes Empire Cinemas made, they have relatively little room for manoeuvre!
Cineworld sent out an email to Unlimited members with Leicester Square set as their favoured cinema. Text below:
Dear Zappomatic,
We are contacting you because you have Cineworld Leicester Square listed as your favoured cinema.
Exciting news! Cineworld Leicester Square will be undergoing a refurbishment in the new year, so you’ll be able to enjoy all of your favourite films in our new look cinema.
So that we can look our best as soon as possible, Cineworld Leicester Square will temporarily closed from Wednesday 10th January 2018 until early February for some of the works to take place. We’re sorry for the inconvenience this will cause, and to make up for us being out of action in January, we would like to let you know that your January Unlimited membership is on us!
If you pay annually, we will credit your account with an additional month of Unlimited membership. If you pay monthly we’ll apply a one month credit to your account in January.
We’re looking forward to welcoming you back to Cineworld Leicester Square soon. In the meantime, our other London cinemas at Cineworld Fulham Road, Cineworld The O2, Cineworld West India Quay, Cineworld Wandsworth, Cineworld Enfield, Cineworld Ilford, Cineworld Wood Green, Cineworld Bexleyheath, Cineworld Feltham, Cineworld South Ruislip and Cineworld Wembley will all be open as usual.
Thank you,
The Cineworld Team
Yikes, bye bye domes…
Zappomatic: Where did you get the information about the refurbishment dates from?
Something that surprised me is that rather than making Picturehouse Central available free of charge to Unlimited members during the refurb, they are instead giving members with Leicester Square chosen as their favourite cinema a free month. I suspect Picturehouse Central is busy enough now compared with when it first opened that the influx of people could cause problems.
Closing for refurb from 10 January until early February.
Zappomatic: Good grief, I wonder if mice like to chew at Rockwool?!
Fortunately for myself, the OLS mouse just sat still and then disappeared after a while, maybe 20-30 minutes. In a way, it’s actually less distracting than popcorn-muching patrons… (The auditorium was almost empty for that screening.) “One eye” on the mouse and the other on the screen rather than intermittent crunching and rustling sounds.
The pests you report seem to crop up mostly in what I assume are the older parts of the Empire, albeit I’ve never been clear on which bits date back to the 19th century. The block from LSQ to the main auditorium block seems to have been extended up since 1928, at least with the addition of a “mansard” roof level presumably hiding services.
Lighting research update: I have just obtained an OSRAM E14/SES LED bulb for my desk lamp, 4000K colour temperature, looks the same colour as the IMAX/IMPACT auditoria house lights. (Model: “LED STAR Classic B40.”) OTOH, I also obtained some OSRAM “VALUE Flex 900” white semi-professional LED tape with integrated current regulation, also sold as 4000K, and it doesn’t! I’d guess it’s fairly similar to the general background lighting in the foyer areas of the refurbished Vue West End.
The riser mounted (behind seating) LED modules referred to by the Integrated Systems Technologies case study are presumably similar to these:
Osram Oslon SSL Modules – Red
Osram Oslon SSL Modules – Green
Osram Oslon SSL Modules – Blue
They are supplied in strips of 12, but can be divided into individual LED sections.
N.B. In the unlikely(?) event that anyone reading this has the idea that they might acquire some, say, for their home cinema, or other DIY applications, it cannot be overemphasised that the power, control, thermal, optical, physical handling and mounting requirements/systems/accessories needed for these must be understood first.
I have to qualify the news about Coke to Pepsi by stating that this came from a Cineworld barman rather than any official source!
Regarding mice there’s an interesting exchange on Twitter where apparently a mouse came out of one of the wall panels in screen 5 and ran across people’s laps/chests! And I was once in a screening at Haymarket when a woman across the aisle jumped up and screamed after a mouse ran across her foot.
Zappomatic: Interesting! Wonder if the Pepsi Max logo will be reinstated on the front canopy… I assume whatever agreement Empire Cinemas had with Pepsi has been terminated.
What they really need is one of those touchscreen machines for some added-flavour (e.g. Strawberry) Pepsi Max!
The first time I ever heard of nachos was when viewing the animated Warner Cinemas policy trailer.
There seems to have been some problems with mice in West End cinemas, albeit the last inspection (2014) of the Empire LSQ yielded a 5 star hygiene rating.
https://celluloidjunkie.com/2014/05/05/london-cinemas-food-hygiene-scorecard-quite-good-room-improvement/
Still, I can’t help but wonder about the condition of the external walls in certain locations…
P.S. I have seen mice in the OLS auditorium… :–(
It seems Cineworld have solved the problem of every seat in the IMAX screen having a Pepsi Max logo – soon to be switching from Coke to Pepsi across the chain (bar supplier has already changed – now hoping they ditch Rollover and their awful nachos)
According to CityAM, now confirmed by Cineworld:
“[Cineworld’s statement says that] the companies are in ‘advanced discussions’ and are ‘finalising due diligence.’”
They’re like a modern day kleptomaniacal Cannon (albeit without a parent company churning out dubious films)!