Monday, October 6, 2025

Garvie's Rooms - Kenya's first Cinema

 I came across the following descriptions about Garive's Rooms, the first cinema to operate in Nairobi!!

Kenya's first Cinema
Donald Sutherland Garvie (3 June 1873 – 22 October 1912) was a pioneer European settler in Kenya. In 1909, he opened Garvie's Bioscope in Nairobi, the first movie theatre in Kenya
source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Garvie

Donald Garvie, a Scotsman, began new ventures. He opened a a picture house or Bioscope, known as ‘Garvie’s Rooms,’ opposite Madame Rowe et Cie in Government Road, Nairobi. This was sometime after 1907. It showed entertainment every evening at 9 pm. The program was changed twice a week, and on Wednesdays there was a matinee for children; the cost was 3 rupees a chair, and half price for children. Donald’s youngest brother George often played the pianola during performances and his daughters Dolly and Louise were fine singers who took part in Nairobi concerts. If the quality at the Bioscope was poor, there were jeers from the audience and bottles would rain down on the tin roof of the Travellers’ Club next door. Garvie also edited the Nairobi newspaper The Advertiser
At Garvey's Rooms in Government Road, on hard wooden seats, Europeans could enjoy shadow play and music-hall acts, smoking concerts and amateur theatricals.

source:https://oldafricamagazine.com/donald-garvie-and-the-first-cinema-in-kenya


 "Although amateur theatricals were the mainstay of pre-war entertainment, celluloid had made its debut thanks to J.Garvie (sic). If films were  little more than flickering shadows thrown across a screen, many paid to  sit on wooden forms at Garvie's Rooms to watch them. When the quality was  very bad, the performance was interspersed by jeers as disapproving  members of the Travellers' Club nearby threw empty bottles and more  vulgar things on to the tin roof of the little theatre." - Errol Trzebinski, The Kenya Pioneers.

source: https://www.europeansineastafrica.co.uk/_site/custom/database/default.asp?a=viewIndividual&pid=2&person=873

Wednesday, October 1, 2025

Majestic Cinema, Zanzibar

 



Built on the site of the Royal Cinema Theatre/Majestic Cinema Theatre which was destroyed by fire in 1953 . Located in the Stone Town district of Zanzibar City. The Cine Majestic was designed in an Art Deco style and opened in 1955. It was closed in the 1980’s and fell into a state of disrepair. Eventually the roof fell in. However not to be daunted, the cinema is open in 2019, with a small number attending what is now an ‘open-air’ cinema. It is hoped that repairs will be carried out and if so it will have 200 seats. There could also be plans to demolish and build an office block on the site

Garvie's Rooms - Kenya's first Cinema

 I came across the following descriptions about Garive's Rooms, the first cinema to operate in Nairobi!! Kenya's first Cinema Donald...