Coliseum Cinema At Portmadog On The Brink Of Closure

   The future of one of the last remaining examples of art deco cinemas in North Wales is teetering on the brink of closure, for the second time in recent years. The building shows signs of age, and is in need of significant work to upgrade it, and the Cinema is just not getting enough people through the door to cover running costs. As well as the Cinema's future being under threat, so too are ten part time jobs.
    A 'Save the Coliseum' campaign is now under way, launched by the local people in Portmadog, North Wales.  Aled Jones of the 'Friends of the Coliseum' group has stated that the group is not a profit making company. Its sole aim of saving, renovating, and re-opening the cinema. Also a petition has been launched on Facebook for people to sign. All in all support for the Coliseum cinema at Portmadog is high. But with all the support in the world, and should the cinema be saved, without local people using the cinema, putting bums on seats so to speak, the Cinema will not survive. It has but one screen and seats no more that 400 people at any one time, and the cinema isn't doing that. I can remember going to the Coliseum cinema, and queuing outside to watch a screening of two epsiodes of the Prisoner back in the early late 1980's and into the 1990's. And when the screening of the evening film had ended, only a handful of people left the cinema, and that was at the height of summer.
   
    The Coliseum cinema in Portmadog has a place in the history of the Prisoner, as it was there that the daily film rushes of the filming of scenes at Portmeirion, were screened for the Production crew in both September 1966, and again for a second shoot in March 1967.
   The Coliseum cinema was opened in 1931, and Bob Piercy , picture below, had been the projectionist there since 1939, and it was Bob who was projectionsit for the screening of the Prisoner film rushes each night.

   Bob recalled how the production crew would sit in front and watch all the fliming of the day before. The day before because the film had to be sent to London for processing, and then sent back from London for the film to be screened. There was no sound, just vision only. Each day's filming was usually about five to eight minutes long, but would be screened over and over again, and take between fifteen minutes to two hours. Starting at ten pm and wouldn't finish until around midnight. Patrick McGoohan would sometimes nip out to the pub, and would bring little Angelo Muscat into the Projection Room, leaving him here sitting on a stool looking at the film through a hole in the wall!
   It was Clough Williams-Ellis who organised a screening of Arrival, the very first preview of the episode. Clough sent out invitations to all his friends, High Sheriffs, even the Chief Constable of Caernarvon, and Director/Producer David Tomblin also attended. Clough had sent for a 35mm print of the film, which was the only print in existence at that time, so extreme care had to be taken of it, being the only copy. The preview took place on a Sunday evening, even though the cinema had no license for six days, and they were not allowed to show films on a Sunday. But the event went ahead anyway, and was a great success, and that was the first screening of the Prisoner anywhere, a world premier at Portmadog!
    It was during the late 1980's and early 1990's that Bob Piercey would again act as projectionist for the Prisoner at the Coliseum, when screenings of two epsiodes had been organised as part of Prisoner conventions held at Portmeirion. Bob Piercey died in 1993. Will the Coliseum cinema still surive him? The answer to that lies in the raising of funds, and the number of people who pass through it's doors in the future....if indeed the Coliseum is to have a future.   Be seeing you.