Renton Village Cinemas

THEATER WAS OPENED BY RALPH OSGOOD, I KNOW RALPH HE WAS THE SECOND MANAGER OF WESTGATE l & ll, BROCKTON, MA. I WAS REPLACE RALTH AT WESTGATE, SADLY RALPH HAD KIND OF A PROMISE FOR HE WAS A YOUNG STAR AT THE TIME HE END UP AS D.M. IN AREA, SO THE STORY IS, BUT G.C.C. THAT CHANGED WHEN COMPANY WAS LOOKING FOR A FMALE D.M. AND THAT WAS THAT SAD

Another disagreement with the opening date:
39. THE SEATTLE TIMES – October 26, 1989

8-SCREEN THEATER TO OPEN NOV. 17
RENTON Moviegoers hungering for another theater in this city have less than a month’s wait. An eight-screen facility will open Nov. 17 at the site of the old Renton Village triplex.General Cinema Theatres, which last year closed the triplex to make way for a larger facility, plans to open the Renton Village 8 to keep pace with the demand for a variety of movies. The complex, at South Grady Way and Interstate 405, will have two computerized box offices and seat up to..

I don’t remember the trailers being in Sensurround we were running them i am pretty sure way before Universal had the speakers put in.They hired the doormen to unload and position the speakers in the Imperial.Universal told our theatre chain ABC THEATRES they would pay us $15.00 an hour good money now,Great money in 1974.We never saw a cent!You could be right because i sure have been proven wrong before on CT.

I can’t believe they ever played “EARTHQUAKE” at a twin theatre,but have read several places they did with sensurrond.Must have ruined the other movie.

I worked at Renton Village Cinema I & II 1972-1975. The sunken screen effect was due to a structure called a “shadow box”, which was white and had to be continully repainted because kids loved to climb on it. Because it eliminated black masking, there were no sharp edges on a picture, which looked bad. It also reflected white light back to the screen which tended to wash out deep black in a scene. It also eliminated curtains and motors, making it another General Cinema Corporation cheap innovation. During intermissions, the screen and shadow box were bright blue from sixty 150 watt lamps with blue filters mounted above the first row – I know because I changed them out on a borrowed scaffold – and calculates out to a ridiculous waste of power. I always heard their theaters in Boston were much nicer.

The original Renton Village Cinemas I & II
was divided into a 3 screen house while I was
working there in 1977 – 1978. It was under
the management of General Cinema Corp which I
believe was headquartered in Boston. Sometime in the
80’s the original building was demolished and
a new one constructed at the same location that
is now in use with 8 screens under AMC management.