The fading charms of Britain’s historic cinemas
And the unequal struggle against TV, covid and the multiplex
For clevedon, North Somerset, the sinking of the Titanic in 1912 is intertwined with an altogether happier event. Five days after the passenger liner went down in the north Atlantic, one of the world’s first “picture houses” opened in the seaside town with a matinée to raise cash for survivors. Aside from several months’ closure during the pandemic the Curzon, as it is now known, has been showing films ever since. Of the more than 1,500 cinemas that were built in Britain during the first four decades of the 20th century, it is one of only a handful still running.
This article appeared in the Britain section of the print edition under the headline “No intermission”
Britain June 10th 2023
- The difficulties facing Britain’s covid-19 inquiry
- Why does London have so much sexually transmitted disease?
- Children’s centres in Britain are crammed again
- How grassroots schemes are helping England’s non-white cricketers
- The fading charms of Britain’s historic cinemas
- Britons still do like to be beside the seaside
- British politics is littered with fake taboos
From the June 10th 2023 edition
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