Pembroke Mall Theatres
4554 Virginia Beach Boulevard,
Virginia Beach,
VA
23462
4554 Virginia Beach Boulevard,
Virginia Beach,
VA
23462
5 people
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Additional Info
Previously operated by: ABC Southeastern Theatres, Cineplex Odeon, Plitt Theatres
Firms: Six Associates
Nearby Theaters
Originally opened in October 1971 as a single screen Ultravision theatre with 800-seats. It became a twin screener in 1974 and was formerly located outside Pembroke Mall Shopping Center in Virginia Beach, Virginia. The design of the theater if viewed by helicopter was in the shape of an old fashioned 35 millimeter movie camera with the 2 round film canisters on top. Because of the curved wall design of the auditoriums this dual plex could fit a curved screen perfectly.
I sat through many a “Star Trek” and “Police Academy” movie here. The theatre was originally owned and operated by Plitt then sold out to Cineplex Odeon. It was closed in spring of 1987 and was demolished. Sometime in the late-1980’s or early-1990’s Cineplex moved inside Pembroke Mall on the side facing the old two screener. The Pembroke Mall was demolished in 2024.
Contributed by
Adrian Everett
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Recent comments (view all 13 comments)
AdrianEverett: I couldn’t get your link to work so I searched Pembroke Mall on Google Earth instead. Was the empty, odd-shaped lot on the corner of Jeanne Street and Constitution Drive the site of the Pembroke Mall Ultravision Theatres?
Yes Sir !!!
It was ABC before Plitt. A feature I thought was unique were curtains over the screens that were opened and closed electronically when a movie was starting or ending.
The theater’s were on the north side of the mall. Pembroke Mall has made many changes to the north side over the year’s. In addition to the detached theater building, an open air mall that connected to the main building was once there. An outside strip section with store openings near the theater was also there. Eventually this area was redeveloped as a Hess department store and the open air portion was modified and enclosed. The theater moved to the newly enclosed area and the original building was demolished. Since then the entire north section has been redeveloped as a Target. Because of the many modifications on the north side, the original theater site is difficult to locate.
Here’s a new 4-page 50th anniversary FIDDLER ON THE ROOF retrospective featuring a roadshow playdate chronology and historian Q&A. Pembroke’s run is mentioned in the piece.
The Pembroke Mall Theatres operated from October 1971 until Spring 1987, and it was actually first operated by ABC Southeastern Theatres, not ABC Southern Theatres.
Opened on July 23rd, 1971. Grand opening ad posted.
June 28th, 1974 grand opening ad posted.
Not originally a twin but maybe later. Along with the Terrace in Norfolk the two Ultravision theaters on that side of the bay. The poor Terrance was horribly twinned without adjusting where the seats were facing, a disaster since the building was round. There was also an Ultravision Twin in Newport News.
Opened as an 800-seat single-screener by ABC Southeastern Theatres in 1971, the Pembroke Mall UltraVision Theatre was designed by the architectural firm Six Associates, based on a concept developed by the firm’s head, William Bringhurst McGehee, in conjunction with Wilby-Kincey Theatre Service, in 1967. A second screen in a building mirroring the first was added in 1974. The UltraVision houses were known for their very large, deeply curved screens and their continental seating formats.
The UltraVision theaters were a very late manifestation of the large cinema format, and within a few years were considered obsolete. The Pembroke Mall twin was closed and demolished in 1987, being replaced by an 8-screen multiples inside the mall in 1990. In 2024 the last surviving part of of the original Pembroke Mall was itself demolished, to be replaced by a modern mixed-use development.