Rebranding And Closure 1980s
THE CAMPAIGN TO SAVE THE ELECTRIC CINEMA
When threatened with closure, big names fought to save the cinema
As Mainline’s unsuccessful attempt to turn the Electric into an arthouse cinema came to an end in 1987, and closure loomed, local residents and staff began a campaign to save their beloved cinema. The intention was to buy the cinema from Mainline using a trust fund and the pressure of local MPs.
A petition was mounted, garnering 10,000 signatures, including some of the most famous names in British film: Audrey Hepurn, Tom Conti, Frank and Margy Clark, Anthony Hopkins, Alan Bates, and Julie Christie. With directors Stephen Fears and Nicolas Roeg going as far as publicly expressing their concern at the potential closure. Rumour had it, to become an antiques market.
In the short term, their efforts came to nothing and the cinema was closed, but the Campaign had placed the Electric back onto a public stage and arguably ensured the inevitable return of the cinema. Despite various closures and attempts to use the listed building for shopping, its destiny remained to prevail as one of London’s most beloved cinemas.
JoJo Smith
Writer, comedienne and TV presenter
Electric Screen, cashier and Save The Electric campaign, 1984 - 1987
"I was part of that campaign! I worked as a cashier when it was owned by the Screen group and we got local councillors involved - Labour and Tory (I even managed to get a housing trust flat out of it!).
I left the Electric and went on to be a journalist at The Evening Standard, before becoming a stand-up comedienne, actress and TV presenter. I still get a buzz when I come to
watch a movie there.
www.jojosmith.com
Romaine Hart
Mainline Cinemas
Electric Screen, owner/programmer 1983 - 1987
The view from the Electric roof, early 80s
With a preservation order obtained in 1972, the future of the Electric seemed assured, but the 80s would bring a period of turmoil. Firstly, inspirational manager Peter Howden decided it was time to lend his skills to a new cinema and moved onto the Everyman in 1981. Without its great figurehead, an offer was accepted from Mainline Pictures to buy the cinema, beating out a last ditch offer from a co-operative of staff hoping to keep the spirit of the Electric Cinema Club alive.
“Londoners have lost the best privately-managed repertory theatre in the business.”
Derek Malcolm, The Guardian, Thursday 27 October 1983
In March 1984, Romaine Hart of Mainline took charge and set about renovating the building, intent on returning the auditorium to its former glory, and adding such modern comforts as air-conditioning, as well as a new screen and Dolby stereo sound. At first, audiences were impressed at such newfound luxury. The spruced-up cinema was rebranded as the Electric Screen.
But as smart as the cinema facilities were, the change from repertory to single-run programming proved too austere for the regulars. The Electric Screen had lost its personality as a second-run and rep house, trying to compete with the first-run arthouse cinemas of the West End. By 1987, with box office revenue faltering, it was clear Mainline wanted to sell. Worse still, in the words of the managers, the potential new owners “have no intention of keeping the building as a cinema”.
Thus began, the Campaign To Save The Electric, mounted by staff, local residents and more than a few celebrities. Alas, in the meantime, Central Properties took ownership of the building, and despite assurances the cinema would be kept open, the Electric closed on May 6, 1987, with an appropriately edgy double-bill of Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom and Nicolas Roeg’s Performance.
Campaign to Save the Electric
Karen Smith
Long-term local resident, ex-Co-Chair of the Campaign to Save the Electric and currently Associate Academic Leader, School of Media and Music Technology,
Sir John Cass Faculty of Art, Media and Design, and researching with King’s College, London. Married to Thom Heslop, ex-Electric staff and ex-Chair of the Campaign to Save
the Electric, now an information architect and film lecturer.
"I have far too many memories of the Electric Cinema to recount here, so here a few highlights and lowlights...
My first memories of the Electric Cinema was watching Welles’s lost ‘The Magnificent Ambersons’ during the heyday of classic Electric repertory, in the early 1980s. Studying film at university and working in a rival repertory cinema, it seemed a reasonable way to spend my spare time watching Orson Welles, Powell and Pressburger, film noir and psychedelia. The market, its tastes and smells, the tattoo parlour, Woolworths, the whole food and record shops and the people smoking fragrant cigarettes, the amazing frontage, Disney kiosk and intricately moulded auditorium ceiling all contributed to the unique experience of the Electric.
On moving to a flat overlooking the Westway, I regularly went to see films in the glorious venue on Portobello Road after a shift elsewhere. Walking back home after a screening made it my local. Thom’s sister and brother worked at the Electric so it was inevitable that we would end up working there too. Front of house became a Heslop family affair. After cashing up the kiosk and box office at the Electric we decided to marry. The wedding was in Pottery Lane W11 on a Saturday in July 1987, our reception around the corner from the Electric with all the staff, and back to work (in rather fragile states) on Sunday. This year is our 25th wedding anniversary.
There were packed screenings and great late nights: ‘Stop Making Sense’, ‘This is Spinal Tap’ and ‘Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown’ among many others; music from new comers such as Mick Hucknall and Courtney Pine and a healthy interest from patrons in the local pubs.
Later in 1987 we were told that the cinema was closing and to keep quiet, as it was being turned into an antiques market. This was an insane idea and a threat to our beloved Electric, so we told everyone about the threatened closure – within minutes the message went out across the shops, market, pubs and clubs of Portobello and we were being asked to start a campaign. With the help of local councillors, film and television directors, record producers, shop owners and journalists – mostly local residents, we got the word out and outraged supporters joined us from around the corner in Blenheim Crescent and across the world. The Campaign to Save the Electric Cinema was born – Thom Helsop was Chair and I was Secretary. We received letters of support from Michael J. Weldon, editor of the ‘Psychotronic Encyclopedia of Film’ in New York and Julie Christie in W2. We collected signatures in the cold and rain of an English summer outside the cinema and presented a petition to the Council of over 10,000 – mostly local - signatures to preserve the cinema in 1988.
Supporters gave us moral and practical support, held petitions in their shops and attended public meetings. Wonderful journalists such as Cynthia Rose, Geoff Andrew and ‘The Hill’, ex-Electric Cinema staff, staff at other cinemas and specialist organisations such as the British Film Institute and Cinema Theatres Association gave the Campaign coverage, time and help. Signatures on the petitions represented all areas of the Royal Borough.
We were terribly excited on receipt of signatures from the Old Vic Company, including Jonathan Miller, Francis De La Tour and Gemma Jones, but our core support was from the market and locals including Keith Allen and Mick Jones.
We held events such as heated and packed public meetings, the Electric Action Day supported by ‘Time Out’, ‘The Hill’ and ‘The Roughler’, gigs and photo opportunities. Members of the Campaign were photographed with Don Letts, Stephen Frears and Alan Yentob in support of the Electric and its existence as a cinema.
‘The Electric is tremendously important. We’ve got to keep an eye on it – on both owners and the Council. We’ve got to hold them to
their pledge.’
Stephen Frears
‘I’m very pleased to campaign to save the Electric. It’s too important to Britain’s heritage to lose – both as architecture
and for film.’
Alan Yentob
‘Personally I would have to deplore any departure from the Electric’s real role… as a cinema’
Barry Norman
‘Let’s keep this cinema as a cinema. Save it.’
PP Arnold
‘Developing the Electric as anything but a cinema would not be in the spirit of the Gate. Besides, the British film industry is on the up and up – but
we don’t have anywhere to show the films! The Electric was the first place I fell in love, too: I was in the back row and she was on the screen. I love the place and I’m
committed to saving it.’
Don Letts
I remember confrontations with a series of arrogant and clueless owners, promises of funds to buy the cinema for local residents, gazumping from new buyers and at each stage the price of the cinema rose astronomically. I remember endless unglamorous research at Companies House, the Council Planning Office and endless scrutiny of increasingly bizarre proposals for the building – with the refrain that the ‘Electric was not viable as a cinema’. We knew this was wrong as so many locals were so passionate about the cinema. Triumphs included getting a photograph of the Electric into the Museum of the Moving Image on the Southbank labelled as the oldest purpose-built cinema in Britain. We collected a second petition and again received massive support and energy from everyone who loved the cinema. A heart-breaking low point was watching ‘Notting Hill’ at the Coronet, seeing the graffiti and poster-strewn Electric, shutters opened just for the shooting of that film.
But we prevented some of the more bizarre plans and the cinema has been restored to its former glory. It is no longer a much-loved but grotty flea pit – it is the vibrant heart of Portobello, showing films just as it should – on its lovely screen under its Grade II* listed barrel-vaulted ceiling. This is a memory I also treasure."