Majestic Cinema, Kings Lynn

Background

A grade II listed building, this is an example of an almost unaltered 1920s cinema complex. In Jacobean Baroque style, and of brick and reconstituted stone, it forms a curved corner site with a clock tower. Inside, the former ballroom contains architectural fragments rescued from the Empire Theatre in London’s Leicester square, which was being demolished at the same time as the Majestic was being built. The first film to be shown here was the silent movie Ben Hur, and a choir sang hymns in the intervals. In 1991 the auditorium was floored to provide two screens, and at the same time the ballroom was converted to a third cinema screen. The tearoom on the first floor still survives intact.

Challenges

Maeve Contractors was tasked with dividing screen 2 to create an additional auditorium, although being a Grade II listed building, this required us to meet planning conditions in the set out and construction of the dividing walls, so as to preserve the mouldings, and architectural features. Alongside Heritage England, we fulfilled and exceeded these criteria, by additionally salvaging, exposing, and incorporating into the design hidden stained glass windows from the original Theatre, and setting out and constructing our walls in such a way that all features were retained, and preserved.

Results

The Majestic Cinema will be celebrating its newly refurbished ground floor screens after a six-figure revamp when it welcomes customers back after initially being closed for refurbishment, and then being forced to shut due to the global pandemic.

When cinemagoers last entered the historic Tower Street premises back in March, there were three screens – there are now four, and the downstairs screens have been decked out with new seats, screens, lighting and sound systems.

When the Lynn News visited, manager Tom Cundy said he “couldn’t be happier” with the new developments.

“Overall, we are feeling excited to let people back in and get back to a bit of normality for the cinema,” he said.

The new Screen Two has 149 seats – including a front row of loungers, four rows of recliners, four rows of tiered seating and two wheelchair spaces, which has been made possible with the additional installation of the wheelchair lift into the cinema.

Meanwhile Screen Four has 44 seats, which Tom said will also be available for private hire.

“There’s a lot of potential with this little screen – having four screens gives us a lot of flexibility,” he said.

All four screens now have allocated seating, which will help with social distancing, as the system will automatically block off the appropriate seats around you when booking.