Former Picture Palace Cinema, Prescot, Prescot, Knowsley

Summary

Former cinema and variety theatre, 1912, remodelled from two C19 townhouses. Edwardian Neo-Baroque style.

Description

Former cinema and variety theatre, 1912, remodelled from two C19 townhouses. Edwardian Neo-Baroque style.

MATERIALS: stucco plaster and render, red brick masonry, steel and concrete frame, slate roof.

PLAN: the building comprises three elements: a cinema with a front range that includes the public foyer and offices and a broadly rectangular auditorium projection to the rear; and two-room deep and single-room deep front ranges attached to the east.

EXTERIOR: the building is positioned on the south side of Kemble Street, east of the junction between Market Place and Sewell Street. The main (north) elevation has six bays of three and two storeys, plus a partial basement, of rendered brick masonry with pitched roofs. The eastern three-bays, of three-storeys, forms the front of the original cinema and comprises a blind balustraded parapet with a central segmental shaped moulded panel, decorated with a scrolled and garlanded cartouche, set above a moulded roof cornice and entablature. The parapet conceals a pitched roof with two rendered edge brick stacks to the east and another below the roof ridge west of centre. Rising from the first floor, above a moulded string course, are rusticated stucco quoins and three slim and moulded stucco pilasters, each pilaster terminated with a shield applique with acanthus leaf drops. Each upper floor has three windows all with ornamented moulded reveals, and most with replacement modern wooden windows. The second floor has two moulded square windows set either side of a circular keystoned window which is ornamented with a double swagged garland surround. The tall first floor windows are each surmounted by a pulvinated entablature, the outer windows with a frieze ornamented with plaster double swagged garlands, which connect to the windows above, and the central window terminated by a bracketed semi-circular pediment with acanthus scroll appliques to jambs. The ground floor has ashlar inscribed render with a modern central flat lintelled doorway and two arched windows either side. To the west an early-C20 blocked flat lintel doorway (the former projectionist’s entrance stair) has a rusticated stucco quoined right pilaster jamb (a remnant of the original ground floor pilaster main entrance jambs). The east return is rendered with a range of blocked windows across floors, all with projecting sills, and a blocked doorway. There is one off-set window, with projecting sill, at first floor level and a small square upper window off-set in the gable end. Number 10, to the east, is a two-bay three-storey C19 building and has a moulded roof cornice with two windows to each floor (the ground floor windows are late-C20 insertions), all with projecting stone sills. An early-C20 moulded and decorated stucco pilaster rises from the first floor in the eastern bay to match the cinema frontage. Number 8 is an early-C20 single-bay, two-storey shop with an Edwardian shop front to both ground and first floor, both with cornices resting on moulded shop-front brackets. The ground floor has a stall riser and external east door. The east return is blind.

Extending from the rear of the cinema is a two-storey seven-bay auditorium constructed of brick with six brick piers concealing reinforced concrete or steel columns. Flat sandstone lintel windows, with projecting sills and curved lintel soffits, puncture the upper walls of its east and west elevations. The auditorium’s east elevation has four upper windows and a blocked ground floor row-lock arched window and arched emergency door at the north end. Attached to its south end is a 1970s flat roof single-storey extension. The west elevation is supported by five brick piers and the southern six-bays project outwards to form a wider auditorium. There are two upper windows in the second and fourth bay northwards. The ground floor has a blocked rowlock arched doorway but is mostly obscured by a 1970s extensions attached to the auditorium. The south return is plain brick with a stone skew-coped gable end and a 1990s first-floor two-leaf patio door with metal balcony.

INTERIOR:

CINEMA ENTRANCE FOYER: the original rectangular foyer, accessed through a late-C20 entrance porch, retains early-C20 (1912) acanthus leaf ceiling roses and egg and dart plasterwork coving. The south wall has three original two-panel doors with decorative projecting moulded mid-rail motifs and glazed top panels; two two-leaf doors with moulded architrave access the rear of the auditorium and the other, opens to the balcony staircase. An inserted toilet sits behind the late-C20 east foyer window.

CINEMA AUDITORIUM: the double-height barrel-vaulted rectangular auditorium, decorated in Edwardian Baroque style, extends south from the foyer, and its plaster decoration is unchanged. It has a segmental barrel-vaulted ceiling with six rib bands decorated with interlocking plait plasterwork and edged by egg and dart mouldings. Between each rib are three moulded plaster panels: the central panels ornamented with six stucco acanthus wreaths, with inset decorative ventilation roundels set every alternate wreath, and the outer panels with ceiling rose light fittings every alternate bay. The auditorium side walls are divided into bays by six pilasters, with a projecting entablature (with egg and dart moulding) and string course. The latter and plaster framed panels form keystoned lintels to the upper auditorium windows, and the bays without windows are ornamented with double swag of fruit and foliage garlands with a central scrolled cartouche (one partially concealed beside the balcony’s first floor emergency exit). The floor is raked with 120 early-C20 tip-up cinema seats re-set and re-upholstered, some with wavy Art Deco motifs to the steel end panels. The structural frame of an original balcony remains, with stairs, at the rear of the auditorium; late-C20 temporary partition walls are attached at ground and first floor. Four original cast-iron balcony columns remain to the ground-floor (boxed in) with supporting beams above. The balcony has a flat floor, apart from a section of original raked flooring which leads to an early-C20 first-floor fire escape door. Late-C20 wall partitions have been inserted within the space to form temporary rooms, one of which re-uses a ground floor balcony column for structural support. The 1940s stage lighting and other electric switchboards are retained against the rear west wall of the auditorium. At the south end of the auditorium, the suspended flat lintel proscenium arch survives in situ. The string course forms the lintel of the arch, with keystoned mouldings set either side of the opening. It has scrolled brackets resting on ionic capitals, with rectangular moulded panels to the soffit, marking the width of the screen. Set above is a scrolled cartouche, ornamented with a cherub’s head and roundel with the painted inscription: ‘God is Love 1 John. CH.4. VS8.’ An inserted late-C20 L-shaped staircase at the east side of the late-C20 stage gives access to an inserted upper room behind the arch. Late-C20 doors in the southern bays of the auditorium access the east and west extensions.

CINEMA FIRST AND SECOND FLOORS: the first floor is accessed from the auditorium balcony which opens into a corridor to a bathroom and two rooms; all with moulded C19 door architraves, dado rails, skirting boards and C20 doors. The second floor (now accessed by the late-C19 staircase in number 10) leads to a corridor giving access to a bathroom and three small rooms. South of the corridor the floors and walls are built of heavy solid filler-joist concrete, with cast-iron supports, and house the early-C20 projection room. The second floor projection room is off-set higher than the auditorium vault and retains an early-C20 side room for film reeling or storage, with original opposing doors, one four panel wooden door and a steel-door.

OTHER SPACES: (partial inspection) the interiors of number 8-10, now sub-divided, are accessed through openings in the cinema auditorium walls. The north room of number 10 has a cupboard door opening into the former ground floor projectionist's stairwell (now void, with one quarter winder in situ) and the south rooms retain a re-modelled early-C19 timber door with C20 etched glass panes. There are further subdivided rooms to the first floor of numbers 8-10, with early-C19 reeded cornicing and a late-C19 first-floor open string staircase, with decorative brackets.

History

Prescot Picture Palace was established around 1912. In 1911 The Prescot Picture Palace Company Ltd purchased number 12 to 14 Kemble Street (a pair of amalgamated C19 town houses) and plans were approved by the Urban District Council for their conversion into a cine-variety theatre in September of that year. As constructed the cinema was accessed by two main keystone arched entrance doors set either side of a leaded and five-light stained-glass window, with a projecting entablature which arched around the entrance doors. The ground floor was adapted to a foyer, with a box office positioned behind the central stained-glass window, and the auditorium built into the rear of the building. To the west of the main foyer entrances, a doorway gave the projectionist access, via a staircase, to the first and second floor of the building. In the auditorium the proscenium wall had a narrow stage for Variety Theatre beneath a suspended and curtained proscenium arch. An east stage stair provided access between the basement (not inspected, perhaps housing changing rooms) and the auditorium. A spacious concrete-built projector room was positioned on the second floor (raised above the auditorium), with projection openings in the north end of the auditorium’s barrel vaulting. Messrs S & A Taylor of Prescot were contracted to undertake the works, Messrs Fred Wilkins and Bro Ltd (manufacturing specialists in theatre and cinema equipment) undertook fibrous plaster and decorative work both internally and externally and Messrs George Scott and Sons of St Helens installed heating and ventilation in the auditorium.

At its opening it was described as presenting a palatial appearance and ‘quite luxurious’ with the theatre seating 630 customers, which increased with the addition of a balcony around 1913. The U-shaped balcony, carried on ten pairs of columns, was accessed by a central L-shaped staircase off the foyer. The Picture Palace served as a picture-drome, music-hall and Variety Theatre. It was operated as part of the J F Emery Circuit by 1923, renamed ‘Palace Cinema’ in 1927, and equipped with a British Thomson-Houston (BTH) sound system by 1929. In 1957 the cinema closed and the building became a carpet and furniture warehouse. The plan form remained unchanged until the mid-1970s, although the 1920s cinema seating was removed from the auditorium and stored in the upper floors. Around 1975 former shops (8-10 Kemble St) were purchased by Tudor Bingo and incorporated into the cinema building. Number 8 was a purpose-built early-C20 shop, with an Edwardian shop-front to the ground and first floor, and Number 10 a former C19 house converted to a shop. Both shop frontages were boarded up and modifications included the creation of internal access between the newly purchased buildings and the former cinema, and the removal of the cinema entrance entablature for a fascia sign. A flat roof extension was added to the rear of numbers 8-10 and another at the south end of the auditorium’s east elevation. Internally the east arm of the balcony was extended to the south end of the auditorium, over the stage and beneath the proscenium arch. Around 1976 a further flat-roof toilet extension was added at the south end of the auditorium’s west elevation. Coral Bingo took over the bingo club in the late 1980s and established a social club, with the loss of the shop front to number 10 for the insertion of two ground floor windows. In the 1990s the proscenium arch was modified, with the upper square headed arch retained but the lower stage replaced. The east arm of the balcony was then extended up to the south auditorium wall with a bridge connected between the arms giving access to a new stair inserted at the east side of the stage and a new first-floor fire-escape door with an external metal staircase. In 1995 the buildings were purchased by Prescot Community Church (an Elim Pentecostal Congregation), who remained in residence until 2021. By 1996 the ground floor cinema entrance doors were in-filled and the central window removed for a central entrance with arched windows either side. The auditorium balcony had its side arms removed, and the rear balcony modified with the addition of partition walls at ground floor and balcony level. A temporary partition was also inserted behind the proscenium arch to create a back-stage room.

Reasons for Listing

This former Picture Palace, converted in 1912 from C19 town houses, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:
* as one of the earliest surviving cine-variety houses in England;

* as a flamboyant and ornate Neo-Baroque style cine-variety theatre and cinema which reflect its status as a palace of pleasure and escapism;

* for the high-quality craftsmanship of the matching decorative scheme between facade and interior;

* for an intact and clearly readable plan form, despite the addition of some later-C20 temporary partitions;

* for the retention of its original spatial arrangement with fixtures and fittings, including early-C20 cinema seating, cinema doors, raked floors and purpose-built fire resistant projection room.

Historic interest:
* as a building type which represents a watershed moment in the rapid transition from music hall to cinema.

Group value:
* the former cinema benefits from a spatial group value with the listed St Mary's Church, No 9 Market Place and Prescot War Memorial.

External Links

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