The Haymarket until 1955, when it changed to The Gaumont.

The Haymarket until 1955, when it changed to The Gaumont.

Built in 1911 on the site of a former bank, the Picture House in the Haymarket served as Norwich’s second permanent cinema. Over the course of the following 20 years, it underwent two reconstructions to capitalise on expanding audiences and technological advancements. During its 50-year existence, it became a commanding city centre building that occupied a corner of Haymarket Square and was passively guarded by the menacing statue of Sir Thomas Browne. Although I’ve always continued to use its previous name, it was commonly known as The Haymarket until 1955, when it changed to The Gaumont.

The front entrance of the Haymarket was located on the lower corner where it met Gentleman’s Walk, and it was constructed on a somewhat steep slope.

 I have been told by people who visited the cinema before the war that at one time it had another entrance at the top of the slope that was purely for patrons who wished to sit in the balcony seats. It would be possible to enter a door, go up a flight of stairs and buy a ticket, and then be admitted straight into the balcony. It was undoubtedly not used after the war as far as I can recall, but it would have been a distinctive feature made feasible only by the building’s peculiar layout. Although I do recall that the Theatre De Luxe having pairs of seats at the back, I have also been informed that the movie theatre once had double seats at the back of the stalls, which were frequently used by

courting couples. However, these seats also did not survive until my period. We never had the luxury of a double seat, but when we were old enough to accompany females to the movies, it was a sign of distinction to “sit at the back” with lots of winks and nudges.

It was always a popular place to go and was used almost as much as the two large circuit theatres since it would screen big, first-run movies. We had outgrown The Regal “sixpenny rush” by the time we were older, and the girls we would meet there were just as much of an attraction as the movies. It was also the theatre where I moved to for Saturday morning movies. It was a generally lively experience for a while, until I finally packed away my childish belongings and that portion of my early cinematic experience came to an end. Before the movies began, we also sang along loudly to the bouncing ball.

The performance of Elvis Presley’s “Loving You” was the major event at the Haymarket in that landmark year of 1957. Although we had never had the opportunity to witness Elvis in his prime, we were already completely enamoured with his music. The previous year, “Love Me Tender” had been shown on the Theatre Royal, but that was an unusual Elvis performance in black and white; here was Technicolour, and the picture of the denim-clad, rebellious Elvis that had resonated so strongly with us. We had to enter halfway through the movie when a seat opened up because the lines went all the way down the Haymarket’s slope.

 We had no choice were we sat, and had to pay 3/-, an unheard of extravagance, “but worth it”, as I noted in my diary at the time. The cinema was packed and the excitement was intense, as we sat through the supporting film and waited for the fun to start. The sublime representation of teenage angst in Elvis Presley’s “Loving You” is one of the greatest rock and roll pictures ever made. It resonated deeply with us in a way that only a teenager from the 1950s could really understand. As we separated from a social order that no longer seemed relevant and that we essentially turned our backs on as we entered the sixties, many of us were permanently altered by what we saw, read, and heard during that miraculous period of 1957. Others, like myself, never really regained any sort of equilibrium.

The visceral impact of what we saw that night manifested itself when we left the cinema, and for 20 minutes or so the crowd milled around the front of the Haymarket, with none of us wanting to disperse and go home, and lose the excitement of the moment. It was then that I spotted what seemed to me then, and now, a remarkable sight, and something that has always confirmed to me that society really was changing during that momentous year. Hidden in a doorway, on the edge of the crowd, dressed in an anonymous raincoat with the collar turned up, was one of our masters from school; a man of about 40 who taught current affairs. He was quietly watching this commotion, and taking notes, or more likely names. 

He must have understood that there was a subcurrent of change and rebellion in the school environment, and he was essentially on a field trip to examine this new occurrence. It was clear that he was aware of something new happening and was attempting to make sense of it.

Up until its sudden closure in 1959, the Haymarket remained a popular venue in the final years of the 1950s, showing a mix of major motion pictures and revivals. It was closed and the magnificent old structure was razed to make room for a department store, the new palace of dreams of the consumer age. I kept using it to the end, and it always seemed to be highly attended, but the days of independent dinosaur palaces were done.

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