Cinemas In Croydon

A Memory of Croydon.

I lived in Croydon until 1969 (the year I got married and moved away). My Dad - Len Marsh - was a Cinema Manager with the ABC chain, and we lived very near the Rex Cinema, Norbury, closed in 1962. Dad was based there for a time, but acted as Relief Manager all over the South London area : cinemas he managed at various times included the Regal, Purley, Mayfair, Tooting, Ritz, Balham, Majestic, Mitcham and the Regal, Streatham. Also others whose names escape me at Forest Hill, Brixton, Elephant and Castle and Camberwell. His last job before leaving cinema management was at the ABC (formerly the Savoy) at Broad Green, West Croydon. Most of the cinemas he worked at are long gone, I suspect, but if anyone has memories of cinema - going in Croydon during the 1950's/60's, I would be delighted to hear from you. Anyone remember the small cinemas in Croydon High Street, the Odeon and the Eros ? There was also the Davis Theatre, at the top of Scarbrook Road, closed and pulled down in c. 1959. At Thornton Heath there was the Granada: if you were a devotee of "Saturday Morning Pictures" as we called them, you were an "ABC Minor" if you went to the ABC shows, a "Granadier" if you went to the Granada.
There was also the Classic, South Croydon - considered rather racey, as at one stage it specialised in continental films, and our trick was to bluff our way in to see "A" or "X" rated films that we were not meant to be able to get in to. My Dad died in 1997, but among his possessions I found the badge he used to wear when on "minors duty" - Uncle Len he was called !
One advantage of my Dad's job was that I never had to pay to go to the cinema - I could either use Dad's staff pass or his contacts - because the various cinema managers knew each other, he could even arrange to get me into the "opposition" cinemas : this impressed my girlfriends no end ! I also think that there was a small cinema in Thornton Heath High Street called the Pullman, but by the time I was a pupil at nearby Selhurst Grammar School, it had been turned into a D.I.Y. store ( it was almost next door to the Thornton Heath Swimming Baths, as I recall).
I am engaged on an MA in Public History at Ruskin College, Oxford, and am considering doing my dissertation on some aspect of the historical significance of cinema. Anyone who has memories of Croydon cinemas in the period 1946 - 1962 (my Dad's time) please, please contact me. Dad left very little memorabilia from his days as a Cinema Manager, and I am trying to put together as much material from that time as I can. Someone out there may remember Dad, may have worked with him, been chucked out of a cinema (!) by him for misbehaviour !
I have not been back to Croydon - except briefly - since I married, and for the last 35 years have lived in Leicester. Would like to come back, if only to ride on the trams (yes, I am an anorak as well!) and remember watching the trains from the footbridge just north of Norbury Station.
By one of those odd quirks, when the Rex Cinema, Norbury, was demolished in the early 1960's, an office block was built on the site, and when my mother returned to work after having us kids, she got a job in that same office block, on the site where Dad had worked. Many years later, after my parents were both dead, my wife got a job with Age Concern and had to go to occasional meetings at their Head Office which was - guess! - in the same office block in which Mum had worked. Wonder what the chances of that kind of coincidence happening are?
Anyone remember the night when P.J.Proby, doing a live show on the stage of the ABC, Croydon, split his trousers, and the story made the national press (wouldn't raise a murmur today, would it?). My Dad was on duty that night, and had to make the decision to bring the curtain down and stop the show ! Since I have mentioned Selhurst Grammar School, also be good to hear from anyone who was there with me - from 1959 to 1966.
COLIN MARSH ( 07979 718765 )