Coventry review
REVIEWS
Coventry Picture Palaces Gil Robottom
Coventry : the City where Cupid rubs shoulders with Godiva
As a country boy (by persuasion, anyway), I am always staggered by the number of cinemas that were busy in cities during the heyday of film-going. In the case of Coventry, the tally is over 30, some of which had several names, as the managements changed. Of course, where you have such a number of cinemas, you have a rich variety of independents and the names of Bill Edkins, Charlie Orr, Gus Pell and H T L Philpot, to name a few, feature throughout the pages of this very comprehensive book.
The accessibility of the detailed information is exemplary. There is an elaborate index where Architects, Builders, Circuits, Companies, Decorators, Organs, Projectors and Sound Systems all merit sub-headings. The Organs themselves rate a chapter in the book and it was good to see that the Mustel instrument at the Grand is defined as a reed organ, as opposed to the serried ranks of pipe organs that otherwise kept Coventry harmonised. In fact the Mustel was probably that superior sub-species of reed organ known as an Art Harmonium. The Forum’s 1934 Conacher 3(coupler) / 8 rank organ is illustrated - looking uncannily like the Compton-made Drury Lane 1950 Strand Electric 216-circuit Light Console.
The history of first openings and last shows is dealt with first, not forgetting the emergence and disintegration of various local chains of cinemas and the personalities that forged them. Then the cinemas themselves and their landmark years are listed chronologically. The longest entry refers to the 1939 to 1945 war years, when four cinemas and a theatre were lost to enemy action. After a page that lists the buildings remaining in November 2008, we have a page giving every cinema (with all its names), its years in use and the page of its main entry in the book.
The detail in the text from here on is prodigious. We have first-hand information from ex-cinema workers and from letters and financial records of the managements. A picture is built up of how complex the entertainment scene was in Coventry and how the launch of a new cinema led to some older houses closing. The only possible omission and one that would be so difficult to execute, due to the war damage and the subsequent re-build of the city, is a map showing where the cinemas were in the conurbation.
Gil Robottom uses the research documentation to get beyond the factual to a point where you can sense what seeing a film in each cinema was like and how you, the audience, would be treated. He is at his best when he uses his vast knowledge to interpret the merits of the various houses, as in his evaluation of the super-cinemas and the merits of the later tripling or rebuild.
This book is generously illustrated, with some early floor plans as well as the more usual 1930s opening souvenir book sketches and elevations. There are contrasting advert blocks from 1938 and 1952, as well as a lively set of colour promotion items on the back face. I particularly liked the exterior photos of the Redesdale and the Regal, both taken at night, after rain.
The Coventry cinema scene has been brought up to date by Ian Meyrick, who takes the story into the multiplex era. No amount of darkness, rain, and soft-focus, could make these latter-day sheds look alluring but it is good to read that there are still 24 screens, albeit in just three venues.
Sadly, Gil Robottom died in October 2007. This very readable account of Coventry’s cinemas will be a great way to remember him. He leaves a cornucopia of cinematic delights for you to dip in to. If, like me, you don’t know the City, by reading Coventry Picture Palaces you will find yourself in the two-and-nines and that lovely colour-flooded festooning is just about to lift for the main feature…
James Laws
Mercia Cinema Society, 2009, £12.50 members. Demy, section-sewn, laminated card colour covers. ISBN-13: 978-0-946406-64-7. Mercia Sales: Martin Hall, 23 Thrice Fold, Cote Farm, Thackley, Bradford BD10 8WW 01274 583251 sales@merciacinema.org