HE WAS PHOTOGRAPHED OUTSIDE THE SCREEN CINEMA WHICH HAS SINCE LONG GONE
To the best of my knowledge Mr Screen did not accept early retirement and now works at the Savoy on O’Connell Street.
In 2017 Dublin City Council granted permission for the development of a mixed-use office scheme at the site which included College House, Number 2-3 Townsend Street, Number 16-19 Hawkins Street, and the former cinema. The new development will consist of the construction of a ten-storey building. On the ground level there will be space for a café, shops and a restaurant unit. It will also have landscaped roof terraces. A 500-seater venue will be situated in the basement, which will hold a bar, restaurant and box office.
The caricature sculpture of a cinema usher, entitled Mr. Screen, which stood utside the Screen Cinema was created in 1988 by sculptor, Vincent Browne. I like it but many of my friends do not like it and consider it to be ugly.
The cinema operated since 1984, showing world cinema, and independent and Irish films. The Screen Cinema, originally named The New Metropole, opened on 16 March 1972 on the corner of Hawkins Street and Townsend Street on the site of the previous cinema, The Regal, which had been demolished since 1962 to make way for offices. The New Metropole name derived from the more famous Metropole Cinema on O’Connell Street (Penney’s department store now occupies the building), and after the latter closed in 1973, the New Metropole became the Metropole.
Originally a single screen cinema, the auditorium was subdivided in 1982 to create two additional auditoria. The new screens were suspended from the ceiling, meaning the main screen was not reduced.
In 1984, it was renamed the Screen Cinema, which became the sister cinema to the more well known Savoy Cinema on O’Connell Street. After this, the Screen showed more unusual, independent, and foreign language films rather than mainstream Hollywood films, which attracted a cult audience to the cinema.
The Screen received a face-lift between 2004–2005 when the interior was upgraded and the cinema lost its original marquee and neon sign in favour of an electronic board displaying the programme.
November 2015 it was reported that staff had been put on protective notice.
On the 19 February 2016, after 35 years in operation, it was announced in the media that the Screen Cinema would be closing its doors to the public as a result of falling ticket sales. It was hinted that Irish Multiplex Cinemas, parent company of Screen Cinema, were to close and sell the cinema a year earlier due to a drop in audience numbers. Staff working in Screen Cinema were said to be offered redundancy packages but this was later withdrawn by IMC and staff were instead offered to be transferred to the Savoy Cinema on O’Connell Street (another cinema in the IMC Group). It was reported that all staff were transferred to the Savoy Cinema with a redundancy package being available from the 29 February 2016.
