University City Cinema
480 Ackerman Road,
Columbus,
OH
43202
480 Ackerman Road,
Columbus,
OH
43202
1 person
favorited this theater
Additional Info
Previously operated by: General Cinema Corp.
Nearby Theaters
News About This Theater
- Jun 18, 2010 — "Jaws"... Happy 35th!
- May 14, 2010 — Please Post Today, May 14 --- "Jaws," Happy 35th
Built as a single-screen by GCC, the University City Cinema was opened on November 16, 1966 with Dean Martin in Texas Across the River". It was located near the OSU campus. General Cinema Theatres also opened the Great Western Cinema on the same day and the same movie. The University City Cinema was twinned on October 7, 1977 and was closed in 1991.
Contributed by
dave-bronx
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Recent comments (view all 12 comments)
The address was 480 Ackerman Road.
Here is a January 1969 ad from the Columbus Dispatch:
http://tinyurl.com/yttv34
It had to have been still open in 1991, as I saw Terminator 2 there. The theater still had a very 1960s lobby decor (big white ball lights, chrome and walnut veneer concession stand?) and the seats were upholstered in red, white and blue vinyl. As with many twinned theaters, projection was from an original porthole near a rear corner of the split auditorium, making for a suboptimal presentation.
Columbus Dispatch archives show this theatre closing in late 1991.
I saw Madonna: Truth or Dare there. That would mean the theater was still open in May 1991.
Theater interior and exterior were functional and unremarkable, as previous commenters have observed.
The Applebee’s that currently occupies the site has a framed snapshot of the old theater hanging on the wall just inside the entrance.
As someone who’s lived in Columbus for a long time, I keep noticing that “Chuck” has a habit of listing closing years for theaters that are early by a year or two, yet he says it with such concise authority, like he’s certain of it. I also, like a poster above, saw Terminator 2 here, so it was still open at least into 1991.
My fondest memory of the theater is taking a break from the film project I was editing at OSU late one evening, walking down the hill to Ackerman Road, and catching “Return of the Living Dead”, which I didn’t really expect to be any good. Turned out I loved it, and was humming the closing song to myself while walking back past the gigantic cemetery which is on the north side of Dodridge. Appropriate.
Sorry, Chuck, didn’t mean that to come out as hostile as I now realize it sounded. I just thought it was kind of strange that every theater I was landing on had you giving a date, then someone else saying “it was open longer than that”. No problems. We’re all just trying to share what we know; sorry for sounding snotty.
Wow. I lived in University Village for several years and would have loved to have had easy access to a theater. I would eat at Applebees at least weekly. I had no idea that a theater was there and I lived there around 1999.
The Great Western and University City Cinema both opened on November 16th, 1966. shared grand opening ad posted.
Two screens on October 7th, 1977