The Spectacular Cinemas of Wellington

Back in the day, short films of around two to four minutes in length often became part of local theatre shows where they would appear on a programme of entertainment along with live song and dance routines, magicians, jugglers, and trained animal acts. 

Films were also shown in the Wellington Town Hall, as well as various community and church halls, but a new era began in 1910 when the Kings Theatre opened in Dixon Street as New Zealand’s first purpose-built cinema.  

Though movies remained popular during the first World War, the conflict saw a resurgence in more community-focussed entertainment such as rallies, dances and mass-singing events. Restrictions on the supply of building materials during the war saw a halt to most cinema construction (the only significant theatre to open during this time was the Paramount in Courtenay Place in 1917), but the period which followed was to become the ‘Golden Age’ of movie theatres. 

In 1924 the De Luxe Cinema opened in Kent Terrace, later renamed as the Embassy Theatre in 1945. This was soon followed by the Regent on Manners Street in 1926, the Majestic on Willis Street in 1928 (which also included a cabaret) and the State on Courtenay Place in 1933. These grand palace theatres, also known as the Spectaculars, were lavishly furnished with luxurious interiors designed to stun audiences and make every visit feel like a special occasion. 

The capacity of these cinemas was enormous, the largest being the Majestic which had 2221 seats while the Embassy had 1800 seats when it opened as the De Luxe.   

This period also saw the rise of simpler suburban movie theatres such as the Regal in Karori, the Empire in Island Bay and the Ascot in Newtown. New technology saw rapid changes occur, as the orchestras which had provided live music and sound effects for silent films gave way to Wurlitzer organs.  

Though these were a major investment (the De Luxe spent £10,000 installing their organ in 1927, the equivalent of around $1.2 million today) they were substantially cheaper to operate than employing an orchestra of live musicians for each screening. 

Wurlitzers in turn gave way to ‘the talkies’ when, in August 1929, The Jazz Singer hit Wellington’s screens as the first film to feature a synchronised soundtrack. By the following year, almost every cinema that could began the process of installing sound equipment so they could screen these new films.  

Some smaller suburban cinemas which could not afford the expense of converting to sound began to close. The transition to this new era of film was sudden and dramatic, by 1930 the production of silent movies had almost completely ceased. Despite the tightening of household budgets during the Great Depression, going to the cinema remained a popular way for people to briefly forget about their troubles as both the Hollywood and British film studios began pumping out ‘talkies’ on a near weekly basis.  

Attendances during this period reached extraordinary numbers, hitting record heights during World War II when our population of only 1.6 million people attended the movies nearly 39 million times over 12 months! New Zealand had nearly three times more cinemas per head than did the United States. Many Wellingtonians in the 20 to 40 age brackets would see a couple of films per week, and bookings for Saturday night screenings often had to be made the previous Monday to ensure a seat. 

The immediate post-war period saw a gradual decline in movie attendance and no significant new cinemas opened in the city for nearly 40 years, but new formats such as Cinemascope and Vista Vision were introduced to try and win back audiences.  

But a dramatic change for the local cinema industry was about to hit: the introduction of television. 

New Zealand was slow to introduce the new technology, with transmissions beginning in Wellington in July 1961. The expense of purchasing a set, a short daily broadcast of only five hours of a single channel each evening, and the difficulty in transmitting a signal around Wellington’s hills meant the impact of television on cinema audience numbers was initially quite limited.  

However, in February 1967, broadcasts shifted from Mt Victoria to a much more powerful transmitter on the summit of Mt Kaukau / Tarikākā and six repeater stations spread across greater Wellington to fill in signal shadows caused by hills. 

Televisions were expensive with a black and white set easily costing the equivalent of around $7000 today, but they soon became the appliance that every household wanted to own.  

The impact of the opening of the Mt Kaukau TV transmitter on cinema ticket sales was dramatic and most of Wellington’s suburban cinemas were forced into closure by the end of the 1960s as audience numbers plunged. Smaller central city cinemas also began to shut in the 1970s as the process accelerated following the introduction of colour TV transmission in late 1973. The 1980s saw most of the old ‘spectaculars’ close, with owners unwilling to invest in expensive maintenance, refurbishment, or new technology.  

Today the Embassy Theatre is the sole remaining example of a ‘spectacular’ in Wellington, but it has since been joined by many other smaller screens following with the unexpected resurgence of suburban cinemas across the region.  

Read more about the history of cinema in Wellington through the original story on the Wellington City Libraries blog.