Picturedrome

The Picturedrome opened on 31 January 1916, apparently as the Tipperary Picture Palace, with a screening of the Johnson-Willard fight of the time. The big Irish flick ‘Knocknagow’ was shown here in 1917 and Mary Connolly, the tenor, performed in 1919. It had a ground floor and two balconies, but the house burned down on 31 January 1921. Proprietor William Evans, who previously had owned a motor garage, moved the operation to the Town Hall the following month taking out a lease. This too was gutted by fire on 18 October 1941. His sons Herbert and Edgar were already running the Excel next door which opened the previous year so the hall had mainly been used for dances and plays after that. Only the clock tower remains with the rest of the site being the entrance to a supermarket car park.