Playhouse Cinema was founded in the hall of Dutton House as the James clan loved watching films in their homemade cinema. It formed the idea of what if we run a full cinema experience for the town and surrounding areas of Leominster. Mike James who was passionate about Cinema, Film, Photography, Theatre and all art and creativity got a grant for the first cinema screen and equipment and with the rest of the family (also passionate about art!) Playhouse Cinema was formed back in February 2009! We started off with 1 screening a month then built up to 2 screenings a month and from there up to every weekend. We started off with films with a whole variety of genres including period films, sci fi, foreign language, costume dramas, historical, musical, war, comedy and romantic. We then joined the Borderlines Film Festival back in February 2010 and are proudly still part of it today. We introduced Satellite screenings in September 2014 with National Theatre Medea and since then have introduced RSC, Royal Ballet and Opera, Exhibition on Screen and one off special screenings for example Matthew Bourne, Take That and Andre Rieu. We have also introduced Live shows and events starting with the Arts Alive Canadian season in 2015 which we have built up throughout the years with a whole range of artists from the worlds of music, drama, theatre and comedy. All off which we would love to have back again and are still in contact with today from international stars to local talent from the UK and beyond! We have for now put on hold Mikes dream of DCI for a whole variety of reasons however it is something under the new management of Stephen and Christina James (Mikes son and daughter and the rest of team James) we will in the future be working towards.

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WE WANT TO KEEP GOING AS YOUR LOCAL COMMUNITY CINEMA SO PLEASE SUPPORT US HOWEVER YOU CAN! Come and see one of our events, take a chance on something you would never see! Give us suggestions of what you would like to see, help us with publicity runs out to villages and around town, keep spreading the word around town that there IS a cinema here and we are cheaper than the Odeon! Or anything else you can think of we do value all your support and community spirit to keep the cinema going so thank you. 

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We aim this year to continue to build on our audiences and keep expanding on our selection of films, live satellite broadcasts and live shows. An important announcement regarding our cafes. We have taken the decision to stop doing them due to lack of interest and the cost of running them. We thank you all for your support over the last 4 years. The cinema will still continue to run the same way. We look forward to seeing you soon.

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We would like to say a THANK YOU to everyone who has supported us through the years it hasn't been easy and we wouldn't have gotten here without all of the love support and community spirit for the cinema and the James family. We would particularly like to thank Leominster Tourist information centre, the Community Centre, all of our satellite providers, Arts Alive and Flicks In The Sticks, Borderlines Film Festival and most importantly our amazing audiences. Also a big THANK YOU to Alice Oxenham at Leominster News for supporting the Cinema and everything you have done to help us we wish you well. We are now working with Chris and Lucy the new Leominster News editors to continue to promote the cinema and other local events.

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Lets keep the cinema going as this is what Mike was passionate about and the James family would like to keep going in memory of the things he did for Leominster. We are going to be doing every year an 'Open Mike Night' or another event in memory of Mike as the one we started with in 2019 was a success so do come and support us with these!

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Some of you may not know that we are a family run community cinema who work hard all year around including holidays to bring you our audiences films satellite screenings and live shows for your entertainment and enjoyment. We love what we do but it is a lot of hard work and we appreciate all your help, patience, support and understanding. We hope to see you soon!

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We would like to make all our audiences aware whether you have been before or have never been to our venue that we are a Flicks In The Sticks venue and so do have an interval (which is on all our publicity!). We do them so our audiences can discuss the film and have a relaxing drink or ice-cream or both before seeing what happens in the second half of the film. We have also noticed some comments about the prices of our tickets for all our events now we work very hard with all our satellite providers, live performers and Arts Alive and Flicks In The Sticks to keep our prices as low as we can and still give our audiences value for money. We work hard all year round including holidays to bring you films and events locally and to give you all the best cinema and theatre experience we can. We thank you for all your love and support and loyalty to our cinema and we will do our best to keep it going as best as we can despite all the pressures that we have behind the curtain/scenes.

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SEE YOU ALL SOON!

 

The James Family and Playhouse Cinema

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