Elgon Cinema, Mbale, Uganda

Elgon Cinema in Mbale seating ranged from 500-900. It was built in 1956. The photo below shows the poster Zamana. Zamana was released in 1985

Elgon Cinema auditorium was being used as a church in 2019:

Century Cinemax Cinemas in East Africa

 

Century Cinemax is the leading cinema chain in East Africa. With a history born out of Tanzania, the chain now boasts more than 65% market share, with:

3 sites In Tanzania,

3 in Uganda,

and 4 in Kenya.

Century Cinemax is now the exclusive licensee of the patented IMAX screening format, having the only IMAX screen in the whole of East Africa.

Century Cinemax branches in Kenya can be found only at the following locations:

Century Cinemax, Junction Mall, Ngong Road
Century IMAX, Garden City Mall.
Century Cinemax, Sarit.
Century Cinemax, Two Rivers (see photo below). (You can see a technician at work in the projection booth!!)

Nairobi Indian Cinemas 1970s tickets!!

Embassy and Liberty Cinemas:

See a sample of an Embassy Cinema ticket - customer's portion below.    

        

In Nairobi upstairs was called 'Circle' while in Mombasa we referred it to the 'Balcony'!!. Embassy Cinema was owned by the Samji Kala family, the same family that owned wonderful Kenya Cinema in Mombasa.

This ticket was probably issued in the early 1970s. The date is in Gujerati! Can someone translate!

On the top left of the Embassy ticket you can see a portion of the the circular entertainment tax stamp. Each such ticket had to be stamped by a cinema staff member at the tax office. The ticket books (usually 100 tickets to a book) could only be released from the tax office after paying the entertainment tax in advance!! You can read more about Kenya's entertainment tax system in the 1960s-1980s here https://historiccinemaseastafrica.blogspot.com/search...

The photo at the bottom provides a Liberty Cinema ticket-customer's portion. 

I liked sitting at the back in the stalls as you could look directly ahead on a screen that was far enough, while in the balcony you had to look slightly down!! The new cinemas have no stalls!! If you find a seat so that you can look directly ahead the screen is usually too big

Globe Cinema, Nairobi ticket

 

Globe Cinema Nairobi ticket

The date is written in Gujarati...12.6.1974

It's for a Saturday Night 8pm show of an Indian film. Looks like its for seat # CC18. Remember the days when an usher showed you your seat even if you knew where your seat was!! Note the ticket #11331.

Occasionally a government entertainment tax auditor would buy a ticket such as this and show up the next day to see the books so as to check if this ticket was recorded as a sale!!

After printing, ticket books were stored at the government Tax office. The cinema had to pay entertainment tax in advance before ticket books were released!! It's a pity they did not extend this system for Video stores!!

Majestic Cinema, Mombasa Ticket!!

This ticket probably dates back to the early 1960s! 

Later on tickets had to have a serial number when the entertainment tax was introduced. And there was a door keeper's portion on the left that was separated by a perforation. This made it easier for the door keeper to tear when the film patron entered the auditorium!

At the Regal the door keeper would count the number of door-keeper's ticket portion, write the count on the top and drop these at the book-keeper's office. These would just end up in the dustbin. I always thought this was a make work task! That is, until I saw a door keeper's portion being sold as legitimate ticket to an unsuspecting film patron!!

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

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

Kenya Film Corporation, 1979

Interesting story here! (see below) It appears that after the fall of Amin, Kenya demanded Uganda pay KFC over 1 million shs. in settlement of its debt.

This must have been for KFC distributing various films including Hollywood films to cinemas in Uganda. It appears KFC also distributed films on behalf of Anglo American Film Distributors, the only other distributor allowed to operate in Kenya. While AAFD had rights to 20th Century Fox, United Artists, and Disney films, KFC had rights to Paramount, Columbia and Universal films.

While at Regal Cinema, Mombasa we never viewed KFC and AAFD as neo colonial firms?! People loved films! This was just business. KFC was a successful government owned entity!

Video Stores incursions into Kenya's Film Exhibition industry 1989!!

 By 1988 a US report titled 'Foreign Protection of Intellectual Rights and the effect on US Industry and Trade' identified Kenya among other countries for losses!!

By 1989 things in Kenya was becoming desperate as by then Indian movies were all watched at home on pirated VHS copies to the detriment of cinemas. It baffles the mind as to why KFC did not demand 50% of the revenues of the Video Stores as it did from the Kenyan Cinemas. In the West, video stores had to pay the distributors almost $100 a copy or share revenue at 50%. Pirated copies were rare!

Possibilities cited for inaction in Kenya include that 'big wigs' were involved in the VHS business, technocrats at KFC had been replaced during the Moi era with staff that had less knowledge of the film distribution & exhibition industry, the pace of VHS incursion was very quick & before solutions could be implemented, and the existence of a local culture of wanting something for free & low price with no regard to creators of intellectual property.

One of actions that KFC undertook was to gazette lists of Indian movies, making it specifically illegal for these films to be distributed to video libraries without obtaining approval from KFC!! (see below)! I guess the distributors ignored this?!

Naaz Cinema lobby, Mombasa!!

 Do you remember the wonderful Naaz cinema lobby where you could view the numerous posters of upcoming releases!! The lobby floor ceramic tiles was always gleaming and spotless. In the photo below you can see the doors to the stalls in the center. On the left was the cashier/book keeper (Suleiman) for the balcony. And on the right was the cashier/book keeper for the stalls - in the early 1970's you would have seen Suresh Chauhan here!

The lobbies at the Regal and Naaz in Mombasa resembled a village square with lots of continuous activity: patrons walking in to book tickets and going in, staff hanging around, by standers walking around to look at the posters & chat with the staff, film patrons leaving the auditorium during the interval to buy concessions, patrons coming in on their way to the bar etc. And of course there were always the bargain hunters who would gain access to the auditorium by slipping the doorman a little cash!! There was never a bored moment!

At the other end the lobby at the Kenya cinema was quiet and uneventful as you first had to buy a ticket to gain access to the lobby!! Almost no one got in to the Kenya cinema without a ticket!!

The Odeon Cinema, Kampala

 Advert in a local publication sometime in the 1950s:

There were 2 cinemas (Regal & Majestic) in Mombasa in 1944

 There were only 2 cinemas in 1944!! note how multi racial and multi faith the community was!

excerpts of a description of Mombasa and the cinemas from http://asmrb.pbworks.com/w/page/23143131/Pulp%20Mombasa

from the Seamen's Guide to Shore Leave, 1944:

Population 42,000

Hotels for Officers. MANOR, Salim Road, Tel. 112, rooms 15/50 up. PALACE, Killindini Road, tel. "Palace", rooms 15/- up. REX, Killindini Road, tel. 319, rooms 15/- up.

Seamen's Homes. SEAMEN'S INSTITUTE (Missions to Seamen, London), temporary quarters Killindini Road, tel. 262. Shower, canteen, reading and writing rooms, library, billiards, table tennis. THE SERVICES CANTEEN, tel. 432. Restaurant, lunch counter, reading and writing rooms, library, table tennis, concerts, dances, cinema, etc.

Seamen's Bank. Consult Port Captain, dock area.

Legal Aid. American Consulate, through the Provincial Commissioner.

Hospitals. European Hospital (whites), tel. 561. Native Hospital (colored), tel. 550.

Venereal Disease Clinics. At the hospitals (8 a.m. to 12 m.).

Physicians. Medical Officer, European Hospital. Dr. W. N. Sargent, Native Hospital. Dr. J. H. Chataway, Native Hospital.

Dentists. C. E. Thomas (dental surgeon), tel. 921.

Laundries. European Laundry, Killindini Road, tel. 209.

Amusements. Moving pictures: Regal; Majestic.

Points of Interest. The town itself. Fort Jesus, 16th century.

Caution: Not a "pay off" port. Seamen who miss their ships are subject to penalties provided by law. Tropical helmets should be worn because of great heat.

American Consulate: At Nairobi, 400 miles.

Most of the policemen are Sikhs; the railway staff, crane operators, and other "technical" people are largely Indians. Small shops are run by Arabs; larger shops and markets are run by Chinese, Goans, Persians, Indians, etc.. There are Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant churches, Hindu temples, mosques, etc

Local languages in Mombasa: English, Swahili. Arabic, Chinese dialects, Portuguese, Hindi, Farsi, etc. are used by immigrants and traders. Out of the 40,000 persons in Mombasa in 1932, "... 900 were Europeans, 6,000 were Arabs, 12,000 Asians, and 20,000 were Africans." Back in 1918, the total population was only 30,000, with only 230 Europeans

The Regal Theatre was constructed in 1931, on Salim Road.