Tudor Cinema

In Lancashire, located between Oswaldtwistle and Accrington, in an area known as Church, the Queens Hall Picture Palace opened on 7th April 1914. Its operating company, Queens Hall (Church) Ltd. had been registered in June 1913, with £4,000 in capital.

A conversion of an earlier building (where it is thought that cinematograph shows might have been shown as early as 1910), the cinema was owned by Arthur E. Millward, while the manager was E. Aspin. Into the 1920’s the stalls seating consisted of wooden forms, with the more expensive ones in the rear covered with long cushions. There were tip-up seats in the circle. The proscenium was 27ft wide.

There was a small stage, used in the late-1920’s for “Go As You Please” variety competitions. The house curtain was on a roller, covered with brightly coloured advertising. There were two dressing rooms.

In about 1930 a British Talking Pictures(BTP) sound system was installed. Shows were twice nightly, with three shows on Saturdays. In the late-1940’s some alterations were carried out and it was equipped with a RCA sound system. It was re-named Tudor Cinema and had closed by 1963. The building became Queens Bingo in 1964.

In June 2017 the ‘Lancashire Telegraph’ reported that the bingo hall had closed “a number of years ago”. The basement was being used by Potters Sports Bar, as a snooker and pool hall, and businessman Umraz Khan had applied for permission to convert the ground floor into a 50-seat ‘Kebabish Original’ restaurant.

(I am grateful to John Simpson, Accrington Library, for extracts from ‘90 Years of Cinema in Oswaldtwistle and the Upper Irwell Valley’, by Brian Hornsey, and the May 1985 edition of the North West Cinema Preservation Society News.)

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