Last week, the CNJ splashed the sad front cover headline that, “following talks with our landlord”, Odeon had announced their cinema on Camden Town’s Parkway is to close in 2026.

The move will mark the end of nearly a century of the flicks on the site, and is also another glaring example of the unstoppable, shifting nature of how people choose to watch films and go out socially these days.

Following our own somewhat audacious campaigning to see if we could activate a community cinema in the space long-earmarked exclusively for such use just up the road in Kentish Town, it was very apparent that - lovely as the dream may be - there just isn’t the interest, finance or (most importantly) guaranteed audience to make such a venture viable today.

I’d been speaking with Nigel Smith about him taking the slot as the latest Camdenist Guest Editor, writing on the topic of the area’s many lost picture houses, for some time before the Odeon news broke.

He co-hosts the long-running Tufnell Park Film Club, with screenings every Tuesday night upstairs at The Star on Chester Road, and also leads Camden Town’s Lost Cinemas walking tour, where he explores the history of this soon-to-be-lost cinema, and five others, locally.

He’s hugely knowledgeable on the topic, making this is a particularly timely piece. Take it away, Nigel…

The Odeon opened in 1937 as the Gaumont Palace Regent’s Park. It had just one screen and more than 2,500 seats - a fact that astounds many people who come on my tour.

Today the largest of its five screens has just over 300 seats, though fragments of the 1930s decor are still visible in the foyers and - unlike so many modern cinemas - Screen 1’s red velvet curtains give it a semblance of old-school glamour. (The Odeon’s manager James has been incredibly supportive, and on the tour we always take a look inside the cinema). 

In the late 1930s and 40s, millions of Brits went to ‘the pictures’ every week and while the heyday of this cinema was certainly its first decade, I’ve met dozens of people who fondly remember it during the 1980s when the cinema thrived as a quirky independent called The Parkway (pictured above). 

The 1980s were the nadir of cinema-going in Britain. From a peak in 1946 when a staggering 1.6 billion cinema tickets were sold, 1984 was the worst-ever year at the UK box office with just 45 million admissions. By then many of the cinemas built in the 1930s and 40s that remained open deserved their literal flea-pit reputation and the booming video rental market allowed audiences to stay home and watch the latest blockbusters (from Blockbuster) on their sofas. The era of out-of-town multiplexes had yet to dawn. 

Into this miserable business environment, enter one Peter Walker who, in 1983, spent more than £50,000 restoring the old Gaumont Plaza with a distinctly retro vibe, a tone that continued with a jazz combo in the lobby, bar staff dressed like Parisian waiters and ushers in military style red uniforms that wouldn’t have looked out of place when the cinema first opened. 

Peter himself was a born showman who often introduced films at The Parkway dressed in black tie. At the end of the evening he’d lead his whole team in wishing patrons a good night as they exited onto the street. He was also a medium who claimed to take programming advice from the "other side"!

Around the corner, another old cinema enjoyed a similar renaissance while much of the industry floundered. Between 1909 and 1994 the building that’s now Urban Outfitters opposite Camden Town tube was a cinema, initially The Electric Theatre, but for most its life known as The Plaza. By the early 1970s it was a dump, showing X-rated schlock like Angels from Hell and The Vampire Lovers (“If you dare... taste the deadly passion of the blood nymphs!”)

The Plaza’s rebirth came in 1977 when Pam and Andi Engel, the founders of Artificial Eye, transformed it into one of London’s best-loved arthouse cinemas, with comfortable seats, plenty of leg room and a programme for Werner Herzog and Bela Tarr fans to salivate over.  The Plaza’s success led to the birth of a mini-chain that included the Lumiere on St Martin’s Lane, The Chelsea Cinema and the much-missed former incarnation of the Curzon Bloomsbury, The Renoir. 

While Pam and Andi didn’t share Peter Walker’s flair for showmanship, they did introduce things that were radical in the 70s (no smoking) and unthinkable to anyone running a cinema today (no food or drink on sale). 

The Plaza closed in 1994 after its landlord tripled the rent. At the Parkway round the corner, Peter Walker always benefited from peppercorn rents in return for short term leases and was continually under threat of closure with the proposal of each new Camden redevelopment scheme. Eventually, in 1993, Odeon decided to return and transform the cinema into the multiplex we know today. 

When Peter Walker’s Parkway shut briefly in 1992 a 7,000 strong petition against its closure included such notable signatories as Michael Palin, Beryl Bainbridge and Melvin Bragg. As the Camden Odeon prepares to close its curtains for the last time, it seems unlikely that a similar response or the recent uproar that met the potential demise of the Prince Charles Cinema in the West End will be repeated today in NW1.

Cinema-going habits have changed. From single-screen auditoriums of almost 3,000 in the 1930s, Camden’s newest cinema, the excellent Curzon under the railway arches at Hawley Wharf, has five screens each with just 30 seats. I’m a regular there and like it a lot.

Come on my Camden’s Lost Cinemas tour and we’ll finish up at the Curzon’s cafe, where The Plaza is remembered with a handful of wonderful vintage posters.

FESTIVALS

👑 Positivity in the capital, from the grassroots to the monarch

It’s been an inspiring few days in London, with the inaugural SXSW London festival a great unknown on Monday, but by last night generally agreed to be a proper big deal for the cultural and creative sectors here.

As well as attracting thousands of delegates (causing a few annoying non-moving queues on occasion), the powers that be clearly see the event has major potential for the capital, from Sadiq Khan’s rabble rousing opening speech including an invitation for disillusioned Americans to make their homes here, through to a surprise walkabout from none other than King Charles yesterday.

Inevitably for an event in 2025 there were some boycotts, with a few musicians none too happy to be ‘on the same bill’ with another surprise guest, Tony Blair. But that earnest position misses quite how big this particular juggernaut is. With hundreds of packed out events, from world premieres of movies to late night gigs from you next favourite hyperpop artist, the whole of Shoreditch into wider East London has felt en fête in a way that transcends any one cause or individual, no matter how much success or infamy they bring in their wake.

From my perspective, SXSW London finally gives us something that combines the best thought leader platforms like the techno-optimist CogX and mind-expanding HowTheLightGetsIn with the impressive city-wide party vibes of Amsterdam Dance Event mashed together with rowdy Notting Hill Carnival after parties.

Seeing so many people from the worlds of music, politics, heath, tech and more converge produced a somewhat rare feeling of modern cultural optimism, from which more green shoots may hopefully continue to emerge and counter our rolling near-decade of Brexit/Covid/Putin/Trump malaise.

Love the night? Have your say.

Another truly optimistic event this week was the roundtable discussion I attended at legendary Farringdon nightclub fabric, convened by the Mayor’s Nightlife Taskforce, bringing together a brilliantly broad range of grassroots club promoters, DJs, artists, cultural campaigners and more.

While it is a given that nightlife, its venues, people and promotions (and indeed daytime raves and park-based festivals, too) remain under existential pressures like never before, the positive dialogue for how we push towards a better situation for the culture in future was joyful to be a part of.

While the situation remains dire - with trigger-happy noise complaints, onerous licensing conditions, spiraling costs, tech-addled inertia, outdated prejudices and stretched police/council resources all in the mix - good people are coming up with great ideas and solutions to ensure our musical and social engines do not fall silent.

If you live, work or play in the night time economy, be sure to have your say in the current research on how we should make London’s nightlife thrive into the future.

More festivals to visit this week

🌍 Following it’s debut last year, not-for-profit sustainability festival, Earthfest, is back at King’s Cross all this weekend, until Sun 7th Jun. Today is the Industry Day for eco-minded professionals to network, with a weekend of eco-friendly activities including live music, street food, wellness sessions, a Fashion Quarter with swap shops, an eco Expo, and key-note speeches from chimpanzee champion Dr Jane Goodall, Springwatch presenter Megan McGubbin and loads more.

🧵 Cockpit Summer Open Studios is the eagerly awaited twice-yearly weekend that allows you to go behind the scenes at the Bloomsbury workshops of over 90 incredible craftspeople, learn the details of their practice and support independent businesses with a few purchases. From jewellery to homewares, ceramics to fashion, you can help keep heritage craft techniques alive - and tickets are also half price for all Camden residents, Fri 6th to Sun 8th Jun.

🟩 It’s the famous annual Fair in the Square up in Highgate Village on Sat 7th Jun as 140 stallholders offer everything from tasty lunches to attractive art and unique designer-maker gifts, alongside two stages filled with performances, a programme of workshops and kids activities and popular dog show.

🏦 Fitzrovia is also very much en fête all this month, as the London Festival of Architecture sees masses of talks, tours, showcases and events, plus two Tuesdays of Food & Drinks Trails where you can quite literally eat and quaff your way around over 50 local restaurants, cafes, bars and pubs. Food events are 10th & 17th Jun.

…and some of your comments

“Needs to be expanded further but it’s such a relief to breathe”

“Who is the stupid person who suggested the idea? They should be struck off Camden Council altogether!”

“It’s inevitable that this section - and the bridge over the canal - should be given over to foot traffic only. Whatever the issues, there’s surely no going back??”

We’re experimenting with a few new ideas on expanding the Music and Stage listings at the moment, but they will return here soon…

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