On these twin topic of movie and cinema I have 2 different sentiments The first one I want hijack the the introduction part of this page to talk about myself.

Part 1 - Singing about myself

 I was once  associated with the filming industry. I was an actor and now allow me to show a couple of my glorious moments. The first pictures shows that I was doing autograph when one of the movies I acted in "End Credit" was submitted for premiership at the Taoyuan Film Fest.

Next, was the picture of us lined up on stage on the Gala Night during the premier of another movie "The Journey" This movie still maintain the record as the second highest box office rating. Both movies are made in Malaysia

Cinemas

Now on the topic of cinemas. We must understand the making of movie and eventually showing it to the public is an art form. In the early days where communicative channels were so restrictive, getting involved with some form of art - which ever form that it may be, was a social status. It is an avenue of expression for the people. So among the many art forms, playhouses and theatre was the most popular.

That art form of theatre evolved and got upgraded. Movie became a trend, it evolved and bring forth a new dimension which we now called  - Entertainment. In the old days when we say "Let's go to see a play"  We were then almost half involved with art as a spectator. Then trend changed - we got ourselves entertained

Play evolved. First change the Talkies came!  Then more changes from Talkies to movie The evolution to movies made our outing to cinemas as 80% entertainment and 20% a social event. That is why in the early days, our old cinema Halls had decors and program to bring forth an ambience of art. Remember the heavy curtains and decorated stage. Oh! Different classes of seating etc. More so - some cinema like the Sun and Majestic retained that mixture of showing movies and at times offering live stage shows.

I couldn't help but kept on comparing the idea of seeing a live show with that current trend of watching a movie.  The "Before & After" effects of stage shows. Live shows is still popular now but handled as a very much exclusive event

For example think of the days when you only need to pay a couple of Ringgit seated in an enclosed air con hall and within touching distance - watched singers or Rose Chan performing on stage. Today for those same act, you pay a few thousand Ringgit, seated with 20K other people, some 200 meters away from stage to see Andy Lau doing a live show. Perception and values had varied so much. Was there any added value between the two?

This topic of movie cinemas I find is a topic very close to most people heart Everyone has some sort of memories with each particular cinema that they had good times with. I have read on the internet, recollections of many cinema goers who related their young days experiences.

 This page is a compilation and collection of old pictures for cinemas in Penang. Pictures of a time when I was still very young. Not coming from an affluent family, at that time seeing a cinema was confined to walking around its ticketing lobby.. A couple of cinemas in Great World and Wembley that I have not been to Then there is the Globe cinema where we could join to see movie from the outside the fence and that I visited often. My collection would be almost complete - but I have not found a picture of that Globe cinema

Part 2 - The Cinemas

Along Penang Road

Pix #3 The Old Windsor Theatre

A very good picture to keep - take a look at the Windsor and this picture had a car inside to give a clue as to its time of the picture was taken. I guess must be a period just after the World War II. The proprietor of Windsor Mr Khoo Heng Pan a prominent businessman died at the age of 43 years old on March,14th 1934. Just days after this theatre was opened

Pix #4 And now - The Capitol Cinema

 Capitol Cinema - this picture was made when the building was very new, Remember the days of earliest film on show -  "The Conqueror". Just look at the pictures, it was still the days when riding bicycles was the trend

Pix #5 The Capitol Cinema

Now you see the samebuilding again! Picture from a later year, Capitol Cinema seen with colors. The place was bereft of crowd, Very empty?

Pix # 6 Memories from Capitol Cinema

 There were epic movies like this one, Ben Hur and the Ten Commandments etc

Pix # 7 M-G-M

This was the logo which is etched into our memory. The roaring Lion

Pix # 8 The Empire Cinema

Watch that 1914 signage!  Boldly displayed too the "Empire" signage.  Good to see real evidence of the words EMPIRE. This picture was taken well before my time.

Also note in this picture, the signage of "Choong Lye Hock" 莊來 福 not seen on this building yet. He is son of Choong Cheng Kean - a rag to riches tycoon. Lye Hock himself kept a low profile. Not much was written about him other than having own this Cathay Building an another mansion in Macalister Road

Pix # 9 This next picture, the year's sign is 1927

Another very good collection - this time Choong Lye Hock sign was up - name of cinema is QUEEN

Pix # 10 The Queen Cinema

On this next picture, the facade changed slightly and the building's owner name again not visible.

 I have more photographs of the Cathay Cinema on another page featuring the cinemas of Penang. For this picture, the name is still "Queen" but the Choong Hock Lye name taken off

Pix # 11 The Cathay Cinema - at last

Now this is the Cathay Cinema. I cannot confirm when the switched was made,

More importantly, picture shows the cafe next door on the left. Much enquiries made  on the internet seeking the name of the Coffee shop . I found it at last. It was called "Khor Lok Cafe". In Hokkien with the same sound and pronunciation - it's "The Cola Cafe|

Pix # 12  The Cathay Cinema ^ Pennag Road

  I was constantly reminded that Penang Road was known for its crowd presence ? This picture shows rather thin crowd. There was one group of people though - on the left edge, all gathered in front of "Murah". Notable point - the old electric bus with the two poles upright was in use then

Pix # 13 The Cathay Cinema

Found another picture with better signs of life along Penang Road.  In another era with lots of bicycles and cars. Guess must be in the early 1960's

Pix #14 The Cathay Cinema

 I have deliberately chosen a picture with big crowd at the Cathay. Quite a change in mood. Good showing the craze then was over a Jerry Lewis movie.  "The Defective Detective" was on screening then which would placed this picture as 1974

Pix # 15 Movies that I am most impressed with!

Rogers & Hammerstein "South Pacific" - In Super Toa AO and color by De Lux etc, Unforgettable was the changing hue scenes during the musical segments that swept everyone away

Pix #16 Next - The Odeon Cinema

A bit of background about this name "Odeon". A very popular name for Cinemas in UK, Read that origin had been based on the ancient Greek word 'Odeion'. They were huge open air theatre at the foot of the Acropolis in Athens. Also were more popular amphitheatres of ancient Greece which had adopted this name too

 In England, Odeon was used as a name for cinemas after Oscar Deutsch, founder of the Odeon Theatres circuit, The English fell in love with the sounding of this name.

. There was a claim that our Odean Cinema in Penang  could be been open as early as 1921. At that time this cinema came under the name "Lyric". With time passing it was later changed over to be called "King". The  exact dates of all these changes is unclear. For me, at last I solved one mystery and that is - there were a trio of cinemas name "King, Queen and Majestic" While Majestic was straight forward, in my search I now found the "King" and "Queen"

Pix # 17 The Old Odeon Cinema

In between showing pictures from the west, occasionally a local movies would be offered as and when they were available

Pix # 18 The 1970 Odeon Cinema

 I salso read record that even up to the 1970s, Odeon  was still screening western films.

Pix # 18 The 1970 Odeon Cinema

Then the cinemas switched over to showing Movies from Hong Kong as their  main line. I am not sure whether it was with this change that another name was needed - this picture shows PG Odeon had to be adopted

Pix # 20 The Old Odeon Cinema

 Over time, it was tough showing movies from Hong Kong. There was a switch of popularity among the cinema goers from watching Movies in the cinema to chasing TV series at home. At the same time, illegal VCR with the latest movies were offered at night market.  Was a big impact to running a cinema hall

 Business was so bad that Odeon in Penang was closed on April 30, 2001

Pix # 21 The Old Odeon Cinema

Good news for Penang folks  the cinema was once again reopened on 31st July 2014 To keep the patronage, the cinema focus on screening Hindi movies in its ending years. That time our cinema was known as Iswaria Veenai Cinema.

Pix # 22 Majestic theatre

The first real cinema in Penang was knoown as the Majestic Theatre, which opened in 1926. It was also named by its owner, the late Khoo Sian Ewe, who was the doyen of the Chinese business community.

Also the first cinema in Penang to screen sound movies, as they were called Talkies in the 1930's. According to reports,  the locals called this place by another name - the Shanghai Sound Movie Theatre.

Pix # 23 Majestic theatre

It was not actually a full fledge cinema but more of a theatre offering live performances and shows. The Majestic Cinema in color . Through the passage of time, with less live shows, Majestic became one of the more popular cinema.

Pix # 24 Rex Cinema

It was an outstanding cinemas as well as a very accepted place of entetainment. One of the early captures of this building - The Rex Cinema

Pix # 25 Rex Cinema

Sorry all the pictures I collected seem to show the building in a drab state. Can't help, as the pictures available on line. I accumulate my stock of pictures of Rex cInema, most of them taken after the place was left to a long  period of neglect

Pix # 26 The Rex cinema

This is a cleaner picture of Rex Cinema

Pix # 27 The Rex Cinema

 One of the more notable pictures of the time. "Around the World in Eighty Days" This was a1956 movie

Pix # 28 Federal theatre

As far as I can remember, Federal Cinema under the Shaw Brothers umbrella was the latest as well as the newest cinema to open in Dato Kramat Road. For a change, instead of looking at antique pictures of cinemas, these few photographs show the hype brought about by this new addition The size of crowd, that were gathering for each showing

Pix # 29 Federal theatre

Another frame showing the crowd inside the lobby

Pix # 30 Federal theatre

Then looking down from the Level 2 of the cinema's Hall

Pix # 31 Royal Cinema

The Royal cinema at Prangin Road. it was a cinema for Indian Movie goers. Having said that, I could see the poster of English movies in this picture. Surprised me  that Royal had handled Western Movies at one time. Must be in its very early days.

Pix # 32 Hindi Movie Haathi Mere Saathi

Hindi movie had its trend, imagine a cinema screening the same shows 4 times daily continuously for a period of 6 months. That's a feat that no one can compete with

Pix # 33 Bee Toh Cinema

Metro Cinema in Jelutong, a place we hardly step foot on

Pix # 34  Cinemas showing Indian Movies

The Paramount Cinema together with the Eastern Cinema were lost - demolished at that time to make way for the Komtar construction work

Pix # 35 Star Cinema

Very good picture taken in the late Forties after the war or very early 1950's.  This picture do not have the big Star signage yet.

Pix # 36 Star Cinemas

Star Cinema - A pathetic looking faded colored picture of the Star Cinema. The buses that I was on, passed this place on my trip in and out of town

Pix # 37 The Sun Cinemas

After school I took a bus down from Dato Kramat Road to Prangin Road and then walked to the shop to render assistance in the shop selling watches. As the shop was just next door to the Sun Cinema, their car park our backyar.d Play time, we would sneak into the Sun Cinema halls to enjoy the cool air con and to collect discarded cigarette boxes after the show was over. Big time hobby then was keeping a collection of used cigarette boxes.

Sometimes when the show started, we would make our way past the curtains at the entrance for some free shows. At that time still in the primary school years I was too young to know what movies or the live stage show were all about. There were occasions when Sun Cinema was having live shows, though it was brught we got ourselves inside too. As I grew older and looking back I learnt that we could at one time had seen saw Rose Chan performing on stage. Believe me those days nothing was mentioned about sex and I had not reach puberty to make any sense out of it.

This Sun Cinema had its interior renovated and converted into a place to be used as a fitness centre

Pix # 38 Tears jerker movie

From the most loved actress of that time Lin Dai. Till these days we are still singing Karaoke with songs featured in the movie

Pix # 38 The more decent looks of Sun Cinema

Still remembers the days when there was bustling activities in this lane

Shaw Brothers

Bringing back good memories. This is the screen logo that we all are very familiar with

After the Great Depression of 1930s Shaw brothers started their amusement business in Hong Kong. Rapidly spreading their presence to all over to South East Asia. The Second World War came and all these countries were under Japanese occupation. Shaw Brother closed their business but was asked by the Japanese to keep them going but to be supervised by the conqueror.

. By 1939, the Shaws Brothers operated a chain of 139 cinemas across Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and Indo-China. Some buildings were bought, others constructed by the Shaws and quite a number leased or operated in partnership with the buildings' owners. All these cinemas were managed under "Malayan Theatres Limited", a subsidiary of Shaw Brothers Limited.

In Penang, the cinemas were the Rex, Sun (previously known as 'Drury Lane Theatre'), Liberty, Royal, Majestic, Windsor (later Capitol), Metropole, Globe and Palarnippa Theatre.

Pix # 40 Office of Shaw Brothers, Penang

They started their business as early as the 1930's. Here is a picture of their office in Penang. I could not find the address

  same

New World Amusement Park 大世界

There were two amusement parks set up by the Shaw brothers organization

The Great World Amusement Park was located at Prangin Road was in the heart of town while the New World Amusement park was in the suburbs

The Great World Amusement Park set up with tinge of family based fun seeking crowd had  Ferris Wheels and complimented with two cinemas. Even though there play places for children I feel that this Park was cater more for the adults.

It had good Cabaret Dance Halls which were drawing in the crowds

 There is a same picture further down but enhanced with color show the entrance to the Great World Park

Pix # 41 Great World Amusement Park

As seen from Prangin Road

Pix # 42  Great World park

Looks like this picture was taken at the main entrance to the Great World Amusement Park, though the Gate itself is not seen in this picture

Pix # 43 Night Life @ Great World Amusement Park

What is the significance of this picture and who were these ladies?

Amusement Park as they called it is very important and popular as night entertainment scene from the 1920s to the 1960s. These ladies went by names such as ‘Cabaret girls’ and "taxi dancers" Here in the Great World was their cabaret. These The Dance Hall opened around 7 pm, closing on midnight during the week and 1 am on Saturdays. In the 1930s, admission fee was between 50 cents and one dollar.

On weekends, there were tea dances that cost a dollar for three dances. Cabaret ballroom dancing was dominated by the waltz, fox-trot, quickstep, tango and rhumba. Big bands entertained crowds in the 1930s with the latest Western tunes.

One of the main draws was the nightly floor shows with performance by Shanghainese beauties. These floor shows were patronized by all segments of society but mostly towkays and young Chinese men dressed in western style clothes and black leather shoes. Many were regulars and came almost every night. Besides floor shows, customers to the cabaret were entertained by cabaret girls who, at any one time, numbered over 150.

 The cabaret girls were known as taxi-girls because they could be hired for dancing by anyone with a coupon. These coupons were purchased by single men at the door. Three dances cost one dollar. Out of this, Cabaret girls were generally paid a commission of about 8 cents a dance and each dance is registered on a card. Popular girls, whose dance cards were always filled, would be promoted by management and allowed to keep all their coupon takings. Others were paid a fixed salary of $25 monthly but only 40% of coupon takings. The girls could even be booked at a rate of $13 an hour, of which they kept a fraction as commission. Often, 'booking' meant that the man could date the hostess after the cabaret closed. But at such a high booking fee which only rich towkays could afford, most men could only engage dance hostesses for a few dances.

Pix # 43 Beautiful and skillful dance hostesses

Pix # 44 Ferris Wheel @ Great World park

Good picture. This must be another entrance going into the Park. The interesting point to me in this picture is seeing the Ferris Wheel. I have never being inside the park and so I could not offer more details other than what I could see from the outside

Pix # 45 Great World Amusement Park

 Eastern Cinema! Oh those forgotten memories of this cinema that I never set foot in. Passed by it daily when coming down from the Lim Seng Seng bus i.e. the last bus stop which was in front of the Park's Entrance.

New World Park

Pix # 46 New World park! 新世界

The New World Amusement Park is what we modern people called "One stop center"

 Besides known places for amusement like cinemas, they had dances halls, western and locals, Hall for the  Cantonese opera. More facilities for the children like Merry-Go-Round and bumper cars rings

This facilities could be set-up to accommodate Trade Fairs and commercial promotion programme. Among the regular features, there were boxing and wrestling shows in the rings

Then again when celebrities from overseas needed to appear on stage during their visit to Penang this would be the venue for them to perform and meeting the fans. So many different types of function had taken place just to mention a few. Oh! not forgetting that there were a few Beauty Contest held too.

I could remember that there were 2 entrances or ticketing offices. One in front of Lido Theatre and another one in front of Globe Cinema. Again I cnnot rmember seeing this frontage, could be the earliest version or looks long before I was born

Pix # 47 New World Park

Good picture - down memory lane This was how the place was like when it was still in business

Pix #48 New World park

This is the looks of the Lido Cinema from outside the Park that I could associate with. Picture taken at the time when the whole park was in its hibernation stage

Pix # 49 The Lido Cinema

The picture says "Lido" - so? Lido Cinema! Honestly the looks of the Cinemas is familiar to my impression but I still could ascertained that this is the same cinema that I knew which was inside the New World Amesment Park . One point! - mainly because the presence of the crowd and the Zebra Crossing. Both didn't fit my picture  

Pix # 49 Got an old picture of Lido Cinema

This is how Lido looked like

Pix # 49 At last a picture of Globe too

Must be the very early days. The sign "Talkie" was still used

Wembley Amusement Park  春满园

Pix # 50 Wembley Amusement Park :

 Wembley Cinema! This must be an early picture from the days gone by. I have no Impression at all of the place. From my search, this place both Wembley Cinema and Amusement Park were popular in the 1950's and 60's mostly on weekends.

For attraction the Wembley Amusement Park offered :- Spiffy swing dance Halls, movies screening, live Bangsawan performance, Ronggeng parties, Pin ball arcade, Billiard parlors and Bumper cars.

Pix # 51 Wembley Amusement Park

 The Wemley Cinema sharing the same name as the Park. Wow! That must be a long time ago when the cinema was there. We hardly ventured down to the Magazine Road area as it was so far away from Campbell Street where I had spent time

In Air Itam Village

Pix # 52 The so-called "Kong Beng" Cinema

Glory Cinema or locally called "Kong Beng", The cinema having the exact same Chinese sounding name as my primary school which was right across the road. Of course the Chinese writing for both were entirely different. Happy to have this valuable picture in my collecton

Pix # 53 The so-called "Kok Pin"

 Which in fact was named as the Ambassador Cinema. Didn't spend time in this cinema at all - I had already left Air Itam for further studies during its era

Pix # 54 Not so well known Choong Nam Cinema

 It was hard to get this picture

This is the best I could get in assembly the pictures of old cinemas. Regrettably, I could not find any picture from the Globe Cinema in New World Park and also good direct picture of Lido Cinema. Happy that I finally got those from the Great World Park. Anyway these pictures are only a fraction of the stories linked to Cinema.

There are more stories about First Run Pictures. the secknd and Third run. Without internet we depended solely on monopolistic Magazine "Movie News"

Then comes the hard to get ticket for premier on Saturday night "Midnight Shows" and a swing to the low end - cheap matinees! Cinemas and Movies were graded to First Run, Second run, and Third Run. Remember those ticket trouts selling black market tickets at triple the official prices. Of course, there the seasons when cinemas offer running 2 shows for the price of one ticket.

Good recollection eh? Hang on, when I find time I will keep writing