The BEE's & the Cinemas of East London

Senior BEE's Facilitator Niamh Linnane tells us a bit about what the BEE's have been up to this term so far

'On Friday the 5th of October the Senior BEE’s Autumn term got off to a wonderful start with a visit to two Tower Hamlets cinemas, the Troxy and Genesis. We were joined by Richard Gray from the Cinema Theatre Association who gave a talk at each building. It was amazing to see the inside of the Troxy and one of the BEEs spoke about how he used to go there on a Saturday as a young boy. The BEEs really enjoyed talking about how going to the cinema used to be an outing. The buildings used to be spectacular, there was live music in the intervals, there were ushers in uniform and sweet stands. It was useful to compare the interiors of the two cinemas. The Troxy still has many original features while Genesis has a modern interior which required us to use our imagination. 

Continuing with the theme of Entertainment, two weeks later we had a tour of buildings in Islington that are or once were cinemas. Artist Sam Nightingale took us round as part of his project 'Islington's Lost Cinemas'. Some buildings were easy to visualise as cinemas and others were more difficult as the cinema has been knocked down and replaced by another building. The BEEs enjoyed hearing about these buildings, as you would never know by looking at them that they were once used as cinemas.  

I really enjoyed hearing the BEEs all speak about their experience of going to the cinema when they were children. They really bought the visits to life with their stories.'

You can find out more about Sam Nightingale's fascinating 'Lost Cinemas' project here:
http://www.islingtonslostcinemas.com/