Mgm Cinema Oxford, England

Text courtesy of Historic England. © Crown Copyright, reprinted under the Open Government License.

SP5106SW OXFORD MAGDALEN STREET

(West side) 612- /8/10034 MGM Cinema GV II Cinema. 1922-24 by Frank Matcham and Company (the successor practice under F G M Chancellor) and J C Leeds. Brick, rendered to front, slate and asphalt roofs only partly seen. Narrow two-bay front with three storeys of former flats over entrance vestibule which extends back to form wider foyer with first floor cafe (disused) over and auditorium with single, shallow balcony. Facade with early twentieth-century fenestration pattern and decorative pilasters but may retain mid-nineteenth century fabric behind. This range internally retains staircase above first-floor level, cornices, cupboards and fireplaces, all of a late nineteenth or early twentieth-century character. Foyer retains panelling and moulded plaster ceilings behind late C20 cladding and false ceiling. Staircase with iron balustrade leads to cafe with moulded plaster decoration. Auditorium a double-height space with barrel vault, moulded prosenium arch and shallow rear balcony. A heavy modillion cornice runs round the hall, which is decorated by round-arched niches either side of balcony and proscenium. Between these the wall is filled with murals of 1924 by G Rushton depicting 'Modern Sport' and 'Early Learning'. All this decoration now concealed behind curtains, for acoustic reasons, though two of four gilded urns - an important surviving part of the original composition - exposed over rusticated dado moulding. Balcony has original front, dadoes, and crush rails to rear and round central panelled vomitory. Included as a rare surviving little-altered cinema of the early 1920s, with the exceptional added interest of surviving original scheme of mural decoration. Sources The Builder, 11 July 1924 Paul J Marriott, Early Oxford Picture Palaces, 1978

Listing NGR: SP5118206476